What are your disciplines and how you force yourself disciplined?

I use a 9% stop loss.

I have been able to always honor this rule by having a different stock to rotate in when my stops do get hit. It allows me to look at the stop loss more as rotation into a different stock and a new opportunity. It is a lot of work as you always have a new stock researched and ready to trade, Before I discovered this approach I would often let stocks slide pass their stop loss and take a big confidence hit. Now it does not even phase me.

I am +18.8% ytd.
 
The worst you can do when you want to master a new strategy is punishing yourself when you fail to do it. It is very unpleasant and doesn’t work. In fact you should know how to set a habit, how to purse yourself when you follow your plan, how to motivate, how to measure your results. Without this knowledge you have a little chance to succeed. There are some valuable materials about discipline, for example this book http://www.amazon.com/Power-Habit-What-Life-Business/dp/081298160X/ref=la_B006X0XPLM_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1438193703&sr=1-1 . Unfortunately most of them aren’t adopted to trading. What do I mean? Usually when you learn something new (for example tennis) bigger effort = progress and it motivates to even bigger effort. On the other hand when you trade you can follow your plan and lose in the short run which decreases your motivation. Unfortunately there aren’t many materials which deals with this issue, I know only this free report http://www.decisiveinvesting.com
 
Author of this thread asked „how you force yourself disciplined”. When you were a child your parents forced you to go to school and learn because you only wanted to have fun. But now you are adult and you also want to succeed so stop treating yourself like a child and assume that want to be disciplined.

When you set a new habit you have to go through 4 phases.

1. You define what you want to do and when.
2. You practice your habit.
3. You follow your habit automatically but you don’t perceive it as something normal.
4. Your habit is a natural part of you.

If you have to force yourself then you are probably in phase 2. In this phase it is normal that you sometimes fail to follow your habit because it is something new for you. There is no reason to blame yourself because of that. You should accept your failures.

How to get from phase 2 to next phase? You should reward yourself whenever you follow your habit (for example applaud yourself) and measure your progress (not financial progress but how often you follow your habit).
 
wqking said:
...I would like to know how you force yourself disciplined.

...Any more efficient approaches?
More...

Professional traders do not trade alone because others in their office help instill discipline (e.g. compliant office, bonus, promotions, chance of being fired or transferred to another job duty, psychologist - most firms have them these days, peer group pressure).

In contrast, most of us here at Elitetrader.com are retail traders and if with discipline problems...don't trade alone unless you're located in some remote location.

I started my career as a retail trader with two other retail traders in a rented office. It was the peer pressure of being around others that were disciplined that instilled discipline in my own trading. Later, I went out on my own (trading at home) for a few years and then one year the discipline problems returned...within a few months I found a group of retail traders and traded again in an office environment. The peer group pressure worked again.

Now that I'm trading at home again (its been many years) and much smarter about discipline...any discipline problem that shows up (once in awhile it does)...its minor and has very little impact on my trading results. I've learned that discipline problems for me is caused by something occurring in my personal life and it then gets resolved quickly to prevent sabotaging my trading.

My point is that as retail traders...we need to design an environment more like the environment that professional traders have to resolve discipline problems because more often than not...the self help route does not work no matter how hard we try. Thus, very few retail traders are discipline out of the gate on their own in live trading conditions with real money on the line.

Lastly, if a trader has any kind of mental illness (something not easy to talk about) involving depression, anxiety, severe mood swings, personality disorders, OCD, PTSD or other)...seek professional help because the stress from trading can easily exacerbate the situation. Professional trading firms these days have things in place to help employees cope with this to minimize the impact on their employees (traders).

In contrast, if a retail trader has any type of mental illness that's the cause of the discipline problems...do not hesitate to get professional help from a psychologist or psychiatrist to prevent having a very short trading career.

I have a friend (a very successful trader) that went into depression after a nasty divorce. After his first losing year he had to get help from a psychiatrist and is now back trading successfully...better than he was before. I'm just a strong believer that most discipline problems are related to something occurring in one's personal life. Ignoring such...any self help regime in trading will fail because the real cause has not been resolved while traders in error approach the discipline problem as if its something in their trading that's causing the problem when in reality its something much more personal and outside of trading.

Mental health is an important chapter in a trading plan.

P.S. Financial problems (debt pressure) can also cause discipline problems in trading.
 
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It's an easy thing to say when you're talking about theories, but it's a hard thing when you're about to practice it.

And about punishment, I almost took every of them (losses) as a part of my lesson.

Nice tips...
 
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