Corralling The Unnecessary
"It is said that if you would have peace of mind, busy yourself with little. But wouldn't a better saying be do what you must and as required of a rational being created for public life? For this brings not only the peace of mind of doing few things, but the greater peace of doing them well. Since the vast majority of our words and actions are unnecessary, corralling them will create an abundance of leisure and tranquility. As a result, we shouldn't forget at each moment to ask, is this one of the unnecessary things? But we must corral not only unnecessary actions but unnecessary thoughts, too, so needless acts don't tag along after them."
— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
When we look at today's meditation and use it in a trading sense, we are actually corralling the necessary as well as the unnecessary!
By corralling the necessary, we are grouping together all the things that make up a strategy; basically all the rules/criteria that must be fully met, before we consider entering a trade. This is how we make our informed choices from the historical stats/data that we have available to us.
We must cut out everything else when we are trading. No trades on impulse. No trades that other people are making noise about; unless we have done our research and they actually fully meet the rules/criteria for our strategies too of course. No revenge trading after a loss. No trading in desperation, because nothing has been meeting our criteria, or out of boredom etc. etc.
These are all examples of a lack of patience and ill discipline and this is where we are "corralling the unnecessary" and ruthlessly cutting them from our trading patterns.
It is imperative that we fully stick to the rules/criteria that we have put in place for our strategies. If we don't do this, we become random traders which will generate random results. We want consistency when we trade, which generates consistent results; which in turn, will give us long term profitability.
So cut out the things that you know you must not do and don't be tempted to stray from your plan. Your trading rules are there for a reason!
If you can stick to the plan 100% of the time, you've got this; but it won't happen overnight. It takes time, discipline and bags and bags of patience and it's a long and arduous road. You will however, be rewarded in the long run.