Free Rande Howell webinar: Winning by Developing the Essential Skill of Losing

Winning by Developing the  Essential Skill of Losing   Hello Trader,                  “I hate losing! I can’t stand to lose!”. These are the most common first words coming out of a trader’s mouth that I hear when they are explaining what they want to change in their trading performance. Then he or she continues, “When a trade goes against me, particularly after a few prior losses, I want to get it back. It’s a mixture of fear (of loss) and anger (revenge). Before you know it, it’s a fight to the finish. And then I lose bigger than if I had just taken the loss. I know this isn’t right, but I do it anyway. If I could stop this fear of losing, I’d be a completely different trader.” This is the mind that all traders bring to trading. What Is so Difficult About Taking Losses?   After all, all you are doing is applying risk management principles to the potential of a trade – just as you were trained to do. It’s easy to act from reason when there is no clear and present danger. It’s a matter of perspective. When you are not trading and, instead, are analyzing your trading, you are accessing your Thinking Brain. That’s where Risk Management makes sense. The problem is that you are not trained to practice Risk Management where there is a real and present danger to your life (this is what the military does in training soldiers for the chaos of war). Why? Because you are taught to practice logical thinking and compartmentalize (push away) any jitters about your lack of control over outcome (winning, and not losing).    This is survival instinct that has served our human ancestors well when we had to fight or flee to survive real threats. Those same biological threats (that necessitated acting immediately and without thought interfering) are still present and are often triggered when a trade goes against you, or you take a couple of losses in a row. Suddenly, and without warning, powerful instinctive survival programs activate and wipe out your capacity to think clearly and these are replaced by a motivation to attack the source of the threat (the trade going against you).     To your primitive emotional brain, it is under attack (trade going against you) and your very biological existence is being threatened. To your primitive emotional brain, you must fight for your life. You experience this as revenge-trading rooted in the fear of loss. What you have is a brain adapted for one thing (survival in the moment) from another time and place and you are asking it to do something that is completely alien (allow loss = forfeit life). That’s the biological drama going on when the trader hates losing and then the trade goes against him. But that’s not all that’s going on in this perfect storm. Your Psychology of Winning (and Losing) Has to be Re-examined   As a culture, in our highly competitive society, all of us are socialized to win. Winning becomes the way we prove our worth as human beings. We seek status as proof of our power. And the one thing we are taught not to do is to lose. You do not want to be a loser. That is the worst. That notion of winning and losing gets embedded in our psychological make-up through the adaptive power of our brains. And we bring that understanding of winning and losing into the mind we use to trade. And that is where the problem starts.   When we act upon a small world (much smaller than the size of the Markets) it can appear that we can force outcome to our will – we can control outcome. And by controlling outcome we win, which reinforces our sense of power over our environment. Our sense of mattering, our sense of worth, our sense of value, and our sense of adequacy previously was tied to whether we won or lost. And if we did lose, this way of being in the world provoked the emotion of shame (not measuring up) – so we fought all the harder to win and not lose. The problem is that this kind of thinking does not work in trading. A New Paradigm Shift   In trading, the trader must come to grips with the fact that he does not control outcome – winning or losing. He does not make things happen based on his personal power. The Markets are filled with the debris of people who believed that they could control outcome. A mind rooted in the need for control simply does not work in trading the markets. This is the great lesson that has to be learned by aspiring traders who seek to be consistently profitable.    In the environment of trading, a new way of working with the markets must be created - one that does not depend on the trader controlling outcome. No matter how successful the alpha mindset was before trading, the Markets present a new understanding of winning and losing. Winning in trading is not about controlling outcome. Rather, winning simply means that you have landed on the right side of probability relative to you. That’s all. You do not have control over the Markets. In the Markets, you cannot MAKE things happen. But you can land on the right side of probability. Winning in trading says nothing about your value, your status, or your power as a human being.    Losing also changes in the light of this new paradigm shift. Losing means only that you landed on the wrong side of probability relative to you. That’s all. Again, losing says nothing about your worth, value, or power as a human being. There is no reason for shame to trigger if you lose. Your value as a human being is not affected by your performance when you happen to land on the wrong side of probability relative to you.  Separating Human Value from Your Performances   This is the doorway to change. When winning and losing are simply outcomes of probability (with no connection to your value as a human being), excellence comes down to your competency to perform. Since you do not control outcome, you come to accept that the one thing you do control in trading is the mind that you bring to the challenges of managing uncertainty.    When there are failures (losses), you ask the question: What can I learn from this failure? If you bring an empowered mind built for the management of uncertainty, you learn to be more competent in your decision making. There is no judgment of your being, only your performances. As you grow from your failures, you make less mistakes, so you grow in competence by learning from your failures (losses).    And at some moment, you develop the psychological edge you need to drive your method edge. Your inherent worth was never in question. And as your fragile ego becomes stabilized in accepting your inherent worth as a human being, failure becomes the opportunity to shape the human being you are into the mind that performs in the clutch. And trading become a powerful self-development path for your continued growth. Remember, failure (taking loss) is your teacher. As long as you avoid the Teacher, you do not learn how to shape the mind for the management of uncertainty.       Learn more. Check out the associated video and webinar. You’ll discover that our courses teach the skills needed to complete the quest of self-mastery and stress proofing your trading mind. [Facebook](  [Linkedin](   Rande Howell Traders State of Mind www.tradersstateofmind.com   Free Rande Howell webinar in December 2023 Title - Winning by Developing the Essential Skill of Losing Speaker: Rande Howell Date/Time: [Thursday, Dec. 14, 4:30-5:30pm EST]( IMPORTANT! The time shown is in U.S. Eastern Standard Time! Description:   We all want to win and hate losing. It is a powerful bias built into the core of the mind you bring to trading. And in other areas of your life, it has served you well. Then came trading. Your beliefs about winning, and not losing, are put to the test. And you discover that they hold you back from becoming the trader you know you can be. Resisting a loss becomes the barrier to becoming a winning trader. By trying not to lose, your loss is even larger. Just look at your trading account. What if there were another way…where strategic losing became part of being a successful trader. This webinar teaches you how to develop this new attitude about taking losses to achieve success. The world of trading demands a different way of understanding both winning and losing to be successful. If you are serious about becoming a winning trader, come to this webinar and learn to lose like a winning trader.  Please [click here]( to register for this free webinar. IMPORTANT! The time shown is in U.S. Eastern Standard Time. This Month's Free Video Winning by Developing the  Essential Skill of Losing If you hate to lose, you’ll keep running into a serious self-imposed roadblock to becoming a consistently profitable trader. Losing as a skill is an essential part of becoming a successful trader. It is your understanding of losing (and what it means) that has to change. For success, you are going to have to become an expert loser. Most people know this but do not know how to change their beliefs about their need to win and not lose. Most stay stuck. How do you change? Start by watching this video. It will start teaching you the process for changing your attitudes about long-term winning and losing. Losing simply becomes part of winning to the successful trader. Please [click here]( (and scroll down a bit) to view the video. Developing Traders State of Mind Group Course - Winter, 2024 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. All those who register now will be enrolled in the Winter 2024 Group Course, which has its 1st Group Meeting in January, 2024. 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 can be 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]( a [paper 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 [click 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!](