If you are at war, who is the enemy? Are you at war with other traders? Are you fighting the market? Is the enemy yourself? Or is it a nameless, faceless enemy? If you are at war with the market, you have an unequal contest. The market is much bigger than you are. The market has more battle intelligence in the sense of information and certainly more forces. No matter how big a trader you are, you're puny compared to the market. Even if you're George Soros! Same thing if the enemy is the other traders. You against all the other traders? I hope not.

Some market gurus urge the trader to take a Samurai approach to trading. I think that's great, but it still presupposes that trading is war. I read one article where the author urged the trader to approach trading as the samurai releasing fears and trading in an egoless state having made peace with a future outcome---so far so good, but he went on to say---because you are willing to die. Willing to die? I thought. Isn't this conceding the possibility of total wipeout? And speaking of total wipeout, how many times have you said to yourself, "I got killed in the market." Or, "If I do that, I'll get killed!"

These things are subtle and even if the conscious mind can make sense of it, please remember that the unconscious mind interprets whatever you say literally. To illustrate this, let me tell you a story. A woman came to see a hypnotist colleague of mine because she continually ran a low grade fever. Medical doctors could find no cause for it, and she was literally burning herself up. In trance they discovered that after surgery, she had been in the recovery room when a nurse said, "Keep her warm or she'll catch her death." Fortunately, together they were able to resolve the problem. He gave the unconscious new instructions.

When you say you'll get killed or you're willing to die, what does your literal unconscious mind think? No wonder so many traders hesitate before entering the market and jump out of trades well before they should.