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Kirk and Jed,
I wish not to make this eloquent or excessive in verbiage. With this being said, let me continue.
This week was a difficult week. Trading was down as were my emotions and confidence. In times past, I would not let any given loss disrupt that which I was trying to obtain. However, a very good friend of mine asked me if I would manage about $18,000 for him on the foreign exchange. Reluctantly, I agreed to so do. (He had been trading a bit on his own, had used Launch Pad, the Norwood Stop, et cetera, but wasn't accomplishing a lot in his own trading.) He let emotion get in the way. He had suffered a few severe losses while trying to get even with the market.
I began trading his $18,000 first thing Monday morning with excitement, anxiety, expectations, and goals. Monday's trading went well, and we were able to grow the account to $21,500. Tuesday, likewise. However, on Wednesday I took shorted GBP at exactly the wrong place and it turned to go against me. Because of my desire to make sure this individual's account remain positive and "impressive," I let it go against me about 70 pips. Not a huge loss, but not terribly small either.
It happened again. And a third time. I was worried about that which he would think and feel regarding my abilities to manage his funds and/or trade my own funds. He has seen my trading reports and knows that I have had great success in trading the forex. However, because of perfectionism, I wanted his account to remain perfect. So, I went against my rules of trading and placed another trade following three consecutive losses in hopes of "making up" that which I lost. Unfortunately (and fortunately) it happened again. Being frustrated, I entered a fifth trade which ... again ... went against me.
By this point in time, my own confidence was drained, my emotions were utterly wrecked, and I hadn't the faintest idea what to do. Now, the account was still positive from the beginning capital of $18,000; however, I had grown it to $25,600 in 2.5 days. (The five consecutive drawdowns brought it to $22,600.) So, what did I do?....