Sticking To The Routine

I'm very much a person that lives by a set routine. I get up at the same time every day, I do the same things before the market opens, and every trading day looks like the next one no matter what the market is doing. That consistency helps maintain my focus under pressure and allows me to be effective with my time management. Yet, when that routine is broken, all bets are off.

It has been a truly crazy week. While the unexpected website issues are enough to rattle my cage, there are other things going on this week that have been putting the pressure on as well. All of us have weeks like that and the best thing to do is to 1) realize that this too will pass, 2) stay positive, and 3) don't compound the problem by making bad decisions.

In many ways, trading would be better if we all had a manager like in baseball who would be willing to tap us on the shoulder and pull us out of the game if he thought we needed to sit on the bench. Unless you work for someone else, those of us who trade on our own don't have that luxury so we have to remain cognizant of when we are not bringing our best stuff to the table and trade according.