There is an ideal mindset, character, and mental attitude that traders need to acquire. I say 'acquire' because few people have the innate personality that makes this mindset 'natural' With respect to your trading, this involves being free of anxiety, fear, despair or regret. It also involves being able to remain calm, confident, focused and disciplined in the face of adverse trading outcomes.

Trade with a Disciplined Plan

The problem with many traders is that they take shopping more seriously than trading. The average shopper would not spend $500 without serious research and examination of the product he/she is about to purchase, yet the average trader would make a trade that could easily cost him/her $500 based on little more than a feeling or hunch. The plan must include stop and limit levels for the trade, as your analysis should encompass the expected downside as well as the expected upside. Be sure that you have a plan in place before you start to trade.

Good Execution Good Anticipation

Everybody knows that trading is a number game. I mean, our success is not depend on the outcome of the next trade, our success is depend on the overall profitability of many trades. So, while we are trading, whether the last trade we did was profitable or not is definitely not important. There is no point drawing conclusions on the outcome of just one --or even a few-trades. We can only access our anticipation skills when we have made a reasonable number of trades and see the longer-term result of our action. It is so important that when we are trading, our goal should be focus on executing our trades with ruthless efficiency and to judge only that. If you consider the ways that you lose money trading, you will find that it is down to poor execution, rather than poor anticipation.

Cut Your Losses Early and Let Your Profits Run

This simple concept is one of the most difficult to implement and is the cause of most traders demise. Most traders violate their predetermined plan and take their profits before reaching their profit target because they feel uncomfortable sitting on a profitable position. These same people will easily sit on losing positions, allowing the market to move against them for hundreds of points in hopes that the market will come back. In addition, traders who have had their stops hit a few times only to see the market go back in their favor once they are out, are quick to remove stops from their trading on the belief that this will always be the case. Stops are there to be hit, and to stop you from losing more then a predetermined amount. You simply allow your profits on the winners to run and make sure that your losses are minimal. What is it about cutting a loss that is so hard?

Do Not Over Trade

Do not bet on the farm. One of the most common mistakes that traders make is leveraging their account too high by trading much larger sizes than their account should prudently trade. Leverage is a double-edged sword. Just because one lot of currency only requires $1000 as a minimum margin deposit, it does not mean that a trader with $5000 in his account should be able to trade 5 lots. One lot is $100,000 and should be treated as a $100,000 investment and not the $1000 put up as margin. Most traders analyze the charts correctly and place sensible trades, yet they tend to over leverage themselves. As a consequence of this, they are often forced to exit a position at the wrong time. A good rule of thumb is to never use more than 10% of your account at any given time.

Do Not Marry Your Trades

The reason trading with a plan is the #1 tip is because most objective analysis is done before the trade is executed. Once a trader is in a position he/she tends to analyze the market differently in the hopes that the market will move in a favorable direction rather than objectively looking at the changing factors that may have turned against your original analysis. This is especially true of losses. Traders with a losing position tend to marry their position, which causes them to disregard the fact that all signs point towards continued losses.

So should you before you trade. In order to start the trading day in the optimum state of mind you should take 15 to 20 minutes to prepare. Treat each day like an elite athlete prepares for a competition. Here is how to do this:

1. Get yourself in a comfortable sitting position and close your eyes.

2. Breathe in and out slowly, pushing your stomach out each time you breathe in.

3. Consciously relax all your muscles.

4. Focus your entire attention on your breathing.

5. When your mind starts to wander (as it will) re-focus on your breathing so that you eliminate from your consciousness whatever your mind had started to think about --including bodily sensations.

6. Become aware of being exclusively --in the present moment. Exclude memories or thoughts about past events, and worries or anticipation or planning about the future.

7. Do this past the point of boredom, until your restless mind settles down and you enter a peaceful, relaxed state. This usually takes 15 to 20 minutes, but it can be longer for some people.