There are a few trading rules that have stood the test of time and enable traders to trade profitably, yet a lot of people fail to follow them. The rules are no secret to anyone as you will find them in many trading books and other materials. The rules like 'cut your losses' and 'follow the trend' have worked for hundreds of years yet most people ignore them!

Money is something that affects people's emotions and your natural instincts with money will often encourage you to break some of the time tested risk management rules, for example 'cutting your losses' and 'keeping your trades small'. Most traders focus on making money and realising a loss goes against the aim of making money. Similarly, when you have a position that is performing strongly, a small part of you wants to sell that position to realise the profit. This is perfectly natural. Letting your profits run and not selling too early is also an important time tested rule, however because of the focus on money, some people can be very quick to sell shares when in a profitable situation.

If you find it difficult to accept an initial small percentage loss in a trade, what makes you think it is going to be easier later on to sell the shares when the position has lost 30% or more? Yet, when you consider the influence of trends in the market and how important it is that you manage risk, the best time to sell the shares is when you are faced with only a small loss.

The road to trade success is very long and colourful. There are many things to consider when trading and for many starting out, there is too much to remember. The best way to ensure that you follow your trading plan and do not cut corners is to develop a routine, preferably written down. If needed, you could write down your routine in the form of a list in a logical sequence, and tick off every item as you complete it. This way you can be guaranteed of completing everything that you should.

You have little hope of developing a routine if you have not developed your trading plan. Your routine will be a logical progression from your written trading plan, and it will facilitate the adherence to your trading plan. You should aim to develop a routine that will guide you through all of the necessary steps and which will stop you getting distracted by other matters.

Decision making heavily influences your trading success. Anything that can help you focus on the important decisions that need to be made should be considered. This is where your written routine or checklist can greatly assist.

In his book, ‘Trade Your Way to Financial Freedom’, the renowned American psychologist Dr Van Tharp discusses in several parts how important your psychology or mindset is to your trading success. He graphically depicts the significance of your psychology using a pie chart and explaining that it is the most essential ingredient to trading.

To many who have traded for an extended period of time, they would agree with the fact that traders can experience a wide range of emotions and often one straight after another. Traders can experience the exultation of a winning trade that went very well to the despair of the string of losses where ‘giving up trading’ is a prominent thought in one’s mind.

Books like ‘Market Wizards’ by Jack Schwager and other similar texts illustrate how successful traders have found a trading methodology that they are very comfortable with. None of them have found any magic solution to trading but they all clearly possess an inner confidence in their own ability to follow rules and their own trading plan.