January 29 FOMO

Not a good day of trading by any means.

In trying to figure out why today was so different.

For one I felt like an obligation kept me from capturing the 1% move in the first 30 minutes. The reality is I could've been wrong and even if I was right I wouldn't hold the whole way.

Then this feeling magnified. Once I got to the office my thinking was that I might as well wait until after 2p because we had a huge move and it will be choppy.

I went to look at the charts and saw that we had a huge .5% pullback to complete the 10m mean reversion. Yet another miss.

Then I finally went to actively trade. Before truly engaging in my process I saw an obvious setup. I didn't take it originally, then as it was playing out I kept hesitating. I wasn't accepting the loss. I 'had' to profit given I had already missed on profit.

So, 2x 'missing' and a third time actually missing created an unnecessary sense of urgency. And, so rather than being as patient as I always should've been, I forced trades, then worse, sized large in hopes of capturing quick profit to negate the 'missed' trades this morning.

Just a really poor mindset today. And, one that was hard to escape from.

How do I keep myself from trading when I feel like I've missed a move? Yes, rationally I know there's no such thing as missing a trade. There's always another one. It just requires real patience. Even on volatile days there's still only 3-5 picture perfect trades on the 10m. Aka 1 every two hours. I have to be patient. And, I can't hesitate either. Sizing small and having a clear and confident setup is the only way to profit with small size. And small size is the only way to avoid big losses.

Clear setup, small size. Period.

10m plan!