So I am a new trader and I just read this great article about how to control your emotions while trading because if not you lose a lot of money.
And I would like to know if others here have had these same problems.
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Hello!
I found myself that the biggest problem I faced when starting out was quickly becoming over-confident!
I would write out my trading plan, stick strictly to it and make a little profit. That gave me the feeling of “I’ve got this now”, started risking more and then got my well deserved humbling by the markets!
I don’t know if you follow signals or not, but another problem I use to have is that I assumed the signals providers were “experts”. In my head, this meant that their trades were obviously much more likely to succeed and therefore I should risk more money on their trades and less on my own.
Since finding a profitable strategy and running a Telegram channel of my own (not a signals channel), I’ve learnt that there is no such thing as a right or wrong answer and every trade should be treated the same - regardless of whose idea it was.
I hope you’ve found this response useful and good luck with your trading! 
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The best market sentiment strategy is keeping away from it. If you don’t use the most popular technical analysis tools and don’t trade reversals, you can avoid the riskiest moves.
Don’t chase the sentiment.Doing so you could develop a sustainable trading strategy with the right mixture of technical and fundamental analysis.
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Hi,
I am also new on forex trading. But i research little more about forex trading. I think most of the traders face many problem on their first trading. Some problem is:
Many traders don’t know how they will start on forex trading.
Some traders may be invest in forex but most of them lost their investment in forex.
They don’t know how they will recover their investment.
Some traders don’t have enough experience and knowledge, for this they afraid invest on forex.
Some traders don’t know where they will get time to time forex trading update.
So, there are also many problem face new traders. I think so.
Thank you…
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The biggest challenge for me was also controlling my emotions. 
I’m a very emotional person and I used to make a lot of decisions based on what I feel. 
But, getting to know traders here and knowing how they manage their emotions when trading made me realize that it’s something I really need to overcome if I want to continue trading. Having a strategy to follow helps a lot in preventing knee-jerk reaction trades and separating your emotions from your trade-making decisions. 
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Hello !
When I stepped into forex trading I came across multiple questions as learning forex market is not a cakewalk.
First of all I figured out what has to be traded here and how is it done? So, for that I got to know about various currency pairs and trading platform.
Thereafter, very thing that struck me was to figure out the various factors that affect the movement of currency pair. My curiosity pushed me to the pool of fundamental and technical analysis. For every pair there are different factors that affect the movement. Just suppose for CAD pairs, it is very important to understand the movement of crude oil. The fundamental analysis is a very vast topic that requires you to understand everything happening across the globe. You certainly need to be aware of the economic indicators, political developments and other geographic factors which influence the market movement.Moving onto technical analysis required me to understand the ongoing trend and historical movements. Gazing at the charts is not enough. It is very important to analyse the past movements to predict about the future price action. Therefore, I read about various candlesticks, chart patterns and indicators.
Finally, it’s time to place trade. Now, this requires you to know the basic terminology of forex market and obviously a reliable forex broker at your disposal. Here, I had to be aware of pip movement, commission, P/l Calculation, trading platform and everything that keeps me going in this journey.
In the early days cutting losses short and letting profits run is the hard thing
At some point you get used to doing it or you blow up your account
For me a much bigger issue was overtrading. However this tends to be more an issue with slightly more experienced traders who think because they’ve mastered a few techniques so they think they understand the markets.
Then there is overconfidence - the feeling of having even two wins on the run makes you feel like a master of the universe and leads to trading new markets or styles you would never have done before the win
Then you have intra day trading and the fallacy that the more trades you make the more money you make
Then we have searching for the holy grail which is rooted in a fear of losses you haven’t yet come to terms with. You think your being productive finding new methods but your really just painting over your weaknesses
Then there is simply not learning from your mistakes quick enough.
Then you run out of money to trade and wish you had been less in a rush to make money.
And then you actually learn how to trade - this is what happened to me anyway.
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What impressed me most in your history @Johnscott31 was not your early mistakes but your incredible determination to overcome them and succeed.
Especially finding the strength and perseverance after, was it eight years of frustration, to revert to demo trading for a whole year during which you changed practically every aspect of your entire trading approach! That was really gutsy! 
Not many people could do that and it is a fine example to everyone struggling to “get there”.
Thanks for the kind words - but I suspect if demo trading hadn’t been forced on me I’d be a net loser still
Yes I’m quite a determind individual it makes up for many of my the other weaknesses.
But in my story remember i burned my bridges, sold my assets in the UK for a whole new beginning.
I remember reading that some times you have to do that to succeed
Anyway less of me - what I will say to any beginner currently struggling is that eventually trading becomes second nature.
I always compare trading to learning to drive - most of us can do it on automatic. But driving is inherently dangerous - unless we start learning in the right way.
If we just get in a car and hope for the best the first time we drive it’s not going to be pretty.
Yet this is exactly how we approach trading - I don’t think trading is hard per se - but it’s the only occupation we think we can just pick up without the correct training.
This is the beginners biggest enemy - it was mine for sure and it’s this lack of a true plan that keeps most of us in limbo.
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You are not an exception as many traders have taken emotional decisions now and then, but what’s important is to earn how to deal with it with the time.
My greediness was a major roadblock in trading initially.
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Hi @Aaron_trader! That is an important issue!
But I wonder if you are being a little hard on yourself here? I know we all talk about greediness but maybe it is more about a misconception of how much of a move we should be trying to win!
It is quite natural to aim to get the most out of every move but moves come in all sorts and sizes. One genuinely successful trader here ( @lang15) often says he does things in “three’s” and by that rule even just the middle third of a move should be satisfactory.
I think that aiming for sensible, moderate gains should be sufficient, and count as “success”, rather than considering it a failure for not having got more out of the move - and that might overcome what we tend to call our “Greed” when we try to squeeze that last pip - and then see the profit evaporate away instead!
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In my experience us traders are never happy if we win we could have made more - if we lose we could have got out sooner.
Which is why I never use a profit target - I get out when the market tells me to not from some figure plucked out thin air.
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Just shows how traders come in all shapes and sizes (physically and mentally).
I am always happy, whether it is a win or a loss - provided the trade and its levels were according to my method and plan (which they are 99.9% of the time).
I honestly NEVER look at what “could have/should have” been. Every time the trade ends, I evaluate it…and move on to the next.
To me, the market is just a moving vehicle that offers opportunities to jump on and jump off. It is I that decide where and when I do that, not the market. To be honest it is my position size that gears my satisfaction with my results not how many more points I might have got. I really don’t care at all what the market does in between my exits and my next entries. My results are consistent and at a level that suits - why ask for more! 
That is a grossly unfair comment! @Johnscott31
There is every reason to assess the level that a market might reach based on solid logical chart analysis - it is not just “plucked out of thin air” just because some of us prefer a measured trade rather than just a “wait and see what happens”
I think you have the psychology down pat with regards to profits taken - I have the profits side for the most part but certain losses - 1R losses still grate.
As for the unfair comment - maybe - some decide they are going to take 3:1 profits, others 2:1 etc is this actually based on anything solid other than a warm fuzzy feeling? I’m not so sure
I know some like to take at SR levels but often SR levels are over run and you miss out on what could have been a lot more.
If you trail a stop you mostly get out around the SR level anyway if that’s what the price action is - but with the added bonus of a home run - which never happens with the profit target approach
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OK, yes, In this type of target setting, I fully agree with you that it is indeed based purely on maths and nothing to do with the market itself at all. It is kind of trying to make the market fit the trade rather than the trade fit the market. And I think we would all agree that nothing tells the market what to do, except the market itself!
I think I wrote earlier on another thread that R:R is only one aspect of the overall quality assessment of a trade. I think both stops and targets should be based on market factors and only then check whether the resultant R:R is sensible (I think this aspect becomes somewhat automatic with experience. I never actually work out what is my precise R:R, it just stands out by itself when I look at the levels.)
But I also think this issue of what profit to look for is closely related to what time dimension one is trading. You and @tommor both look at the longer term and it is here that longer trends and higher R:R are possible. But if a trader (like maybe most Newbies) trades short term charts like 1h=>5mins then even a long trend is going to be broken up into sections with whatever method they apply to their TF. So in these cases even fixed pip targets are sensible because the typical move on these type charts is relatively short anyway - especially if based on indicators like MAs, RSI, stochastics, etc.
So, again, I think this is a “horses for courses” issue where each trader should identify what is best for their own trading environment. Maybe?
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We all do. It’s all part of the process to becoming a pro. I remember when i started a couple of years ago. I would panic when i started losing out.I didnt use stop loss then.
I don’t use TP also. I think I don’t want to fall into the practice of thinking I am always right. No one is right except the market. What I do is look for reversal patterns or break of trendline to tell me price wants to go against me. I have made some good trades this way which I would not have if I had used a TP. Price breaks support and resistance often; so why reduce profits.
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You said it perfectly - profit targets don’t make sense at all.
Why reduce profit potential - also anchoring a certain profit in your mind can lead to refusing to take less - as I have found out from experience.
With that said if I get 8:1 I do usually close a trade because the odds favour a reversal and I start fearing giving back profits.
But 8:1s are rare maybe only 3 times a year events for me