Mastering Your Response to Uncertainty

Mastering Your Response to Uncertainty Hello Trader,                The brain makes a best-guess prediction about what is about to happen and then it primes the system to jump into action. Unfortunately, the brain also comes with a negative bias in its predictions. To the Caveman, this was the ticket to survival. To the trader, this is a ticket to consistent losses or stagnant profits. And the problem is that the predictions seem so real in the heat of the moment that you don’t even know to question it.  There is a gulf between the worlds of your Thinking Brain and your much more primitive Emotional Brain. And under pressure facing Uncertainty, that disconnect between your Thinking Brain’s capacity to reason and your survival instincts, anchored in your Emotional Brain, leads to the continuance of performing poorly when facing the Uncertainty of risking capital (your life) to a future you cannot control. That is exactly what the Emotional Brain was set up to help you avoid. And there you are, as a trader, forcing the issue.  You are taking a brain, bent toward negative prediction, and forcing it to pretend that everything is going to be okay. The Emotional Brain is not so easily fooled. You can keep trying to train the subconscious to bend to your Thinking Brain’s wishes all you want through positive affirmations and visualization – but you are not going to fool it into believing them when you feel the pressure. That pressure activates the survival instincts of the Emotional Brain and the Thinking Brain is blown out of the water. And this is where traders typically get stuck and stay stuck – much to the detriment of their trading accounts (a measure of the viability of their lives from the Emotional Brain’s perspective). They cannot see that they need to train the brain (and their performance psychology) to respond to Uncertainty very differently than how evolution molded us. Your brain has to be trained to perceive long term. That’s a huge U-turn. It goes against over 600 million years of shaping by natural selection and at least 6.5 million years as humans.  Up until the advent of thinking, performance and your very life were deeply intertwined. If you lost (your performance under pressure), you died (became somebody else’s meal). That connection remains present today every time you take a loss and the negative assessment machine called your brain declares you a loser. The connection between performance and value of life is center point when the threat of loss is activated. And then, in an emotional hijacking, you do stupid things for the sake of short-term survival over long-term benefit.  It is the connection between performance and worth that has to be recalculated – intentionally. Until that is done, every loss and failure will trigger the brain into existential meltdown (which, by the way, did not exist during our Caveman days). Disconnecting performance from your value as a human being is the missing link between intellectually knowing how to trade and executing your trading plan well while engaging the Uncertainty of outcome.  Most of us still measure our human worth as a function of our net worth. “If I’m making money, I have value as a human being. If I’m losing money, there is something wrong with me.” That loss, that failure, to your primitive brain means that you are a Failure as a human being – and that’s death. Being able to separate the two: competence in performance and your worth as a human being (inherent worth) is the key in building the successful trading mind. And it is here that we focus this month. Both my [new article]( my [new video]( and my [webinar]( are centered on this powerful need. Read and watch them. So, start finding ways to access your inherent worth. That is what we are here to do.  Be well.  p.s. Hey, we now have Traders State of Mind Facebook and LinkedIn pages. Please click on [Facebook Traders State of Mind]( see that page and [LinkedIn Traders State of Mind]( see our LinkedIn page. We would love for you to Like our Facebook page and Follow Us on LinkedIn. To do so, please click on the icons below...and thanks! Rande [[Facebook] ]( [[LinkedIn] ]( Rande Howell Traders State of Mind www.tradersstateofmind.com Free Rande Howell webinar in November, 2021 Title - Leaving the Garden of Winning and Losing: Mastering the Response to Uncertainty Speaker: Rande Howell, MEd., LPC Date/Time: [Thursday, Nov. 4, 4:30-5:30pm EDT]( Description:   Your current notions about winning and losing are not going to produce the success you are seeking in trading. You are demanding that the mind control something that it cannot control…outcome, winning and not losing, or predicting with certainty. A very different mind has to be constructed that separates winning (and not losing) from your inherent worth as a human being. Until you can do this, you will perceive that every trade that you lose will be proof that you are a failure as a human being, rather than just a judgment of your current skills as a trader. This is where the mind you bring to trading has to be reconstructed. Come learn how you can become a force of positive change in your trading. Register for this free webinar from Rande Howell. Please [click here]( to register for this free webinar. And [click here]( to read my article regarding this month's webinar topic. IMPORTANT! The time shown is in U.S. Eastern Daylight Time. [New free Video - ]( Leaving the Garden of Winning & Losing: Mastering the Response to Uncertainty A mindset focused on winning (and not losing) will get you into trouble with your trading account. You are trying to control what you cannot control – whether you win or lose. The harder you push your conviction to control outcome, the more you push your survival instincts to sweep your mind away under pressure into disaster. What if there was another mindset that you could control that would lead to success? Come watch this video about separating your net worth (winning and not losing) from your perceived inherent worth. This is what has to happen in your mindset in order to open the door to success in trading. (Then [register for our November webinar]( Please [click here]( (and scroll down a bit) to view the video. Developing Traders State of Mind Group Course - Winter, 2022 The emotional brain is built to seek safety in a dangerous world. The world that it was created for has long since disappeared. It developed a hair-trigger to the fight/flight response because that is what was needed for survival. Now, it has been taken out of the jungle (where risk meant danger) and is being asked to act civilized in a world of probability - where risk is not lethal. Without re-training and re-programming the emotional limbic system, this is not going to happen. It is built to react to danger quickly. It was never built to ponder your rules when it is experiencing vulnerability, discomfort, and fear. It was programmed to act from your survival instinct.  Until this is done, your emotional brain will continue to hijack your thinking brain when you feel the discomfort of uncertainty and risk. This is your silent partner. The question is: Are you going to try to continue to pretend it's not part of your trading mind? Or, are you ready to re-program it for the modern world of trading and probability. Fortunately, this can be done. The Developing Traders State of Mind Group Course Teaches You How to Master Reactive Emotions The Group Course has been called a wake-up call by many traders. Most simply have no idea how the brain and mind work to produce performance in the clutch with risk on. You learn here. It's more than a wake-up call - it a door that opens you to a whole new world. You learn how the emotional brain (so focused on survival) needs to be handled to become an effective working partner with the thinking brain. This course is eye-opening. I had no idea how to fix the problems I had with my trading until this course. Learning how to manage emotions is only the start. You learn how to create a mind built to manage uncertainty. Bottom line is that I know longer sabotage myself and have become profitable. I wish I had taken the group course a long time ago. It's a difference maker. SD From the start you learn how to calm survival emotions down before they become big and hijack your trading mind. That's just the first step. The major benefit is that you learn how to create a mind built for trading, rather than survival in the past. This is what has to happen for success in trading. You have been using a brain/mind created for circumstances that no longer exist. What is needed is a brain/mind built for probability management. Where you learn to become comfortable with the discomfort of uncertainty rather than triggering to your survival instinct. This is what every trader, to be successful, has to learn. Time to register! The first review session for the Group Course is January 13. By this date you need to have studied the Class 101 materials in depth. So, give yourself lots of time to study, and get started now! The survival Instinct is not going to just go away. It is your partner. Do you want to learn to work with it so that it helps you to become the trader you can be? [Please Click here to register ]( the Group Course. [Please Click here to view a video about the Group Course or for more information.]( The DTSM Group Course teaches the same basic skills that are taught in my individual course, but is only $1195. This is spread out as five payments of $239/each over a 10-week time period. It's a whole lot of training for a reasonable cost. SPECIAL NOTE REGARDING PAYMENT - PayPal CANNOT be used as a payment method for this Group Course since PayPal does not allow for rebilling. If you have any questions regarding this, please contact Delores at delores@mytradersstateofmind.com Mindful Trading: Mastering Your Emotions and the Inner Game Author: J. Rande Howell, MEd., LPC If you know how to trade when not in the pressure of trading, but you have not been able to trade live from a calm, detached, and disciplined state of mind, this book will open your eyes. Mindful Trading actually shows you HOW to develop a peak performance state of mind specifically for trading. This book gets in the head of a trader. You will meet a number of real life traders who have overcome self doubt, fear, and impulsiveness. You will see how they overcame self-limiting beliefs and began trading from an empowered state of mind. You will discover your core beliefs that actually trade your system and methodology. And without change at this fundamental level, old self-limiting patterns of thought and belief re-assert themselves shortly after your brain pushes off any "tricks and tips" you learned from self-help seminars. It is this change at the organization of meaning and biology that makes this book so different. A number of disciplines are folded into a unified process that really gets at long term change. Those disciplines include neuro-biology, emotional intelligence, ontological reconstruction of the self, attachment theory and the meaning of the self, and Jungian archetypes. In Mindful Trading, imbedded in self-limiting beliefs, you are carried through a change process that transforms traders mired in mediocrity to a re-organization of the mind for peak performance trading. Mindful Trading is available both as an [Audio book]( and a [downloadable e-book](. [Read an excerpt from Mindful Trading]( free and you get to look inside a trader's mind) And consider the companion study tool: the  [Mindful Trading Companion]( [ e-Workbook!]( Explore a Trader's State of Mind Coaching Relationship with Rande Howell This is a personalized course for the trader who is ready to move beyond being stuck in self limiting beliefs. If you have recognized that it is you that stands in the way of your becoming a more successful trader, then this challenge can become an opportunity for re-invention of yourself as a trader, rather than something to avoid. It's like a door opening to an entirely new world. Great athletes recognize that the mental aspect of their game requires a performance coach for them to reach their potential. Trading is the same. Self-limiting beliefs have to be rooted out and changed - and a peak performance mindset has to be developed. It's all part of the training. Having a methodology that gives you an edge is not enough. You have to develop your mind so that it gives you the psychological edge to use your methodology and platform so that the uncertainty found in trading favors you. This is trading beyond fear. It is trading from a disciplined, impartial, patient, and courageous state of mind. Without emotional regulation training, this can take years (if ever) to achieve on your own. Teasing apart uncertainty from fear is simply something that the brain will not do on its own. The psychology to this has to be developed...or you stay stuck in the same old self-fulfilling prophesies of mediocrity. Do you want to move beyond fear and trade from a calm, detached, and disciplined state of mind?  If you are seriously considering registering for the Individual Course, then c[lick here to check out a free, no obligation consult with Rande Howell]( get to see how this powerful technology of the mind can move your trading to the next level. To make this free consult productive for you, I recommend that you first attend one of my free webinars. This will lay down a lot of groundwork so that when you speak with me -- you'll be hitting on all cylinders. Also, reading my book - Mindful Trading - is advised.   [Website]( Book]( & Interviews]( Videos]( rande@mytradersstateofmind.com | [www.tradersstateofmind.com]( [By joining you get to keep connected to this powerful training process for the development of the potential you have as a trader. And if you decide differently, you can always un-subscribe. If you're a student of trading, this newsletter is a powerful tool for your development.]( Empowered Horizons | 1824 Prescott Ct., Iron Station, NC 28080 [Unsubscribe {EMAIL}]( [Update Profile]( | [Constant Contact Data Notice]( Sent by rande@mytradersstateofmind.com powered by [Trusted Email from Constant Contact - Try it FREE today.]( [Try email marketing for free today!](