A Reminder to Self

 I had a harsh reminder that I'm am not where I want to be today. The market taught me to stick to what I've been doing and all will be fine. Luckily it didn't come at a monetary loss, but it definitely cost me some nerve. So I haven't been taking any premarket trades recently because I can't put in stop losses with my pre-market orders so I would have to pound out manually - which I am not good at. I hope with losses to much. Hence why I started using stop losses to control me to some extent.  Needless to say I traded pre-market this morning and well.... after the trade I just did a lot of hard thinking about what happened and why I need to continue to do the things I've been doing for the past few months. I got in this trade and it went against me hard and I didn't just get in, I got in pretty all in, yes all in. So any move was very bad and since I didn't have a stop loss to get me out immediately and I haven't developed a pound out immediately method I was looking into the red eyes of a large potential loss. Long story short it came back and I got out for a small gain. BUT if I had waited until the bell and stuck to my idea I might have had my best day in the past 6 months. This is what really bothers me. Not being able to get the better trade because of messing with my routine.  So I ask myself why and then when talking to my psychologist, she too asked why I did this. And because I'd been thinking about it, I had an answer. I think I got excited. This was a type of stock that I like to trade and one that I could trade both ways (the two don't align that often - I won't go into details). Anyway I'd been noticing something specific happening in stocks of a similar type and boom, woke up this morning and there it was Opportunity! Here! I! Am! and I got excited. And entered the trade way too early even though I had marked up my levels and trend lines and then just started going to town with my orders. Luckily it never hit my ultimate stop - my there's no way in universe that you can handle this kind of loss area - I actually did put in a stop once the market opened so I can be proud of that action. And it did get pretty close but then it moved to me and I got out and it kept going.  Don't get over zealous! Stick to your edge - for me, in the past little while, patience has really been an edge - letting the setups and trades really show themselves. And now the day is done and I can see everything and I can wonder/speculate that I might have been able to do much more if I had been patient and traded as I have been - without all of the excitement. That is the stock moved in a rather predictable pattern that I have seen many times. Well. Be thankful for reminders. Maybe I should make a book of reminders or something of the sort to go through quickly each morning. I think Tom Hougaard does something of the sort or mentions this in his book. That is all. Cheers!