Hi vettelsfinger,
Great name, btw!
I think what both you and the OP are really saying is that you're afraid of losing. If you knew that every trade would be a winning one and that the only unknown factor is the amount you won, I suspect the apprehension you experience would quickly evaporate. Now, back to reality. In the real world of course, not only will you have losing trades but, potentially, you could have more losing ones than winning ones - and still turn a profit. So, the issue is how does one embrace losing trades, or at least not care about them? Well, if your methodology has a positive expectancy, then there really is nothing to fear.
My first job after graduating from Bristol Uni in 1982 (actually Bristol Poly back hen) was to pound the streets flogging life insurance door to door. I did that by night and hit the phones during the day, making 1,000s of cold calls. As anyone who has ever done any selling at the sharp end of the industry will confirm, those that do well master a number of skills. Number one on the list is losing their fear of rejection. And I gotta tell you, it doesn't take many doors to be slammed in your face or for people to hang up after telling you to copulate with the natives in some far off exotic land before you get
very dispirited! It's a tough gig. What's this got to do with trading? Well, like traders, all salespeople have their own stats. As an illustration, they know that if they talk to 100 people that, from that, they'll make 10 appointments and, from that, they'll get 2 sales. Let's say that 2 sales equals £1,000 in commission. That, averaged across the 100 initial contacts is £10.00 per door knocked or number dialled. So, as salespeople, we were taught to love rejection, to welcome it even, for two reasons. Firstly, the more no's we got, we knew we would be getting closer to the person who said yes. Secondly, and more importantly, with every 'no'; we knew that nominally we'd earned £10.00.
So, coming back to trading, a losing trade may record a debit to your account of X amount but, when the winning trade(s) come, they'll more than compensate. So, don't worry about the losing trades, worry about trading well and executing your game plan correctly, safe in the knowledge that if you do - the equity curve will rise - slowly but surely. I must stress that all this is entirely dependant upon having a positive expectancy. Anyone who isn't sure what that means can learn about it here:
Essentials Of 'Risk & Money Management' (If you don't want to read the entire Sticky, scroll down to the heading: 'Do You Have a Positive Expectancy?')
Lastly, the other obvious point to make is that all this boils down to good ol' psychology and, if you're head isn't in the right place, chances are you're going to struggle. Sorting out your emotions is paramount. There are lots of excellent contributions in the
Psychology category of the articles section on T2W to help you with that. Go read!
Tim.