You’ve heard the maxim: A win is not always a win and a loss is not always a loss. It’s true in many aspects of life and particularly in futures trading. Making a profit does not always indicate a correct trade. Likewise, losing money does not always indicate a wrong trade. What is essential for futures traders to realize is that the inherent rightness or wrongness of your trading method can not be determined by the outcome of any one single trade. Those who incessantly tinker around with their system, trying to fine tune it to perfection after every trade, are doomed. Those who jump from system to system, searching for that elusive perfect system, are doomed.
The perfect system is a myth. Even the most carefully planned and flawlessly executed trade can lose. And there will be times when you actually win with what you know was a faulty approach. While winning and losing are important, they cannot be the driving force behind your trading approach. You cannot base your trading tactics on a single win or loss. Tactics are best based on patterns, say the results of 50 to 100 wins or losses.
Don’t get me wrong. It is important to learn from your trades. That’s why I recommend keeping a detailed trading log and taking a snapshot of each trade for future study and reference. You may need to make some adjustments to your system as you develop it. But traders who second guess every trade don’t have faith in themselves or their system and are doomed. Futures trading is not for the timid and unsure. If you are going to succeed as a futures trader, you must first and foremost have faith in yourself and your system. Professionals know that winning is in the details. If you concentrate on proper execution of the individual components of the trade – timing, entry, money management, exit, etc. – winning will take care of itself.
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