Because most of us are intimately involved with the trading process and because mind and body interact, it is essential for us as traders to acknowledge the emotions we experience and to shift them in ways that will enable us to still accurately perceive the information the market is giving us.  We need to act in a timely fashion, based on the conjunction of outside information and our trading plan or strategy.  A consistently winning strategy cannot be based on emotion because our perceptions and our behaviors will be skewed.  Hope causes us to give extra meaning to each little up or down tick.  Fear causes us not to see the trend or general movement of the market.

Pure positive emotions could cause us to overtrade or to fail to apply risk precautions.  Pure negative emotion could cause us to hesitate or even freeze.

If emotions are human and inevitable, how do we deal with them?  First, we acknowledge the emotion for what it is. We recognize that we're feeling something and we pay attention to just what it is we're feeling.  Each emotion, positive or negative, is giving us a message.  The message contains important information.

In this article I'll be focusing on the emotion we call anxiety.  Anxiety is a future oriented emotion. Think about it. We don't get anxious about events that have already occurred.  Suppose we had been anxious about an event but now it's over.  We no longer feel anxiety.  We might feel relief, remorse, disappointment, sorrow, or some other past oriented emotion.  Anxiety is focused on the future.

Anxiety is telegraphing a message that there's something in our future for which we need to prepare.  This is a vital message.  If you're anxious about anything, ask yourself, "What can I do to prepare for this event?"  If you're anxious about your trading, ask yourself, "Is there anything else I need to do before I can trust my trading?"  This might involve research, verification, or personal growth.  Get yourself ready.

If, after you've prepared, you're still anxious, you can use this sure-fire anxiety squelching exercise.  It's very, very simple. Just go out in your imagination to a few minutes after the anxiety causing event is completed. Look back on the successful conclusion of the event.  The anxiety dissipates, like magic.