A pre-market routine that takes five minutes and actually gets done
The routine you actually run beats the routine you designed. Five minutes, three decisions, written down.
Three decisions, made while you are calm
Everything that goes wrong intraday is a decision made under pressure that could have been made before the open. So make three of them in advance: today's state in one word, today's maximum size per trade, and the condition that ends your session — a loss number, a number of trades, or a clock time. Write all three on paper where you can see them.
The five-minute sequence
One minute: sit still, breathe four in and six out, name your state. One minute: write the three decisions. Two minutes: read your levels and name the one setup you are actually here for. One minute: say out loud what you will do after your first loss. That last line is the one that saves money, because it is the only part of the day you cannot think clearly about later.
Score it, do not judge it
At the close, mark the routine done or not done, and mark whether you respected your session-end condition. Two weeks of those two marks tells you whether your problem is preparation or execution. Most traders discover the routine happened on the good days and got skipped on the days that hurt — which is the whole finding.
Takeaway — Decide your size, your state and your exit condition before the open, because you will not decide them well at 10:30.
Work it through with the Coach
Describe your last bad trade and it names the state, picks the protocol and gives you the exercise to run before your next session. Free to use.