Winning and Losing

I recently saw a tweet by @FledglingTrader that I thought was very interesting:

“I’ll forget about the Miami Heat loss, just like I forget when my stop-loss is hit.  It’s all part of the game”

The reason I found it so interesting is because it is so difficult (yet so important) to move past our losses in life and in trading so that we can focus on our wins.  It is so common to beat yourself up about a loss, revisiting it and focusing on it.  “How could I not see that I was wrong early on?  Why did I not close the position sooner?”  When we look back at the day, we tend to agonize about our losses rather than celebrate our wins.

Of course, there is something to be learned from our mistakes.  But we would learn so much more if we spent as much time learning from our successes as we do from our mistakes.

If your system is advantaged, you can expect to have some wins and some losses as part of the head and tail equation (slightly skewed). Use both to improve your system

What was your biggest win today?

Written by Jennifer Galperin. Follow me on Twitter and StockTwits.