The power of auto suggestion in trading; “every day, in every way, my trading is getting better and better”
Yesterday in our article titled; “Managing our emotions when trading; why you ignore this issue at your peril and why dreaming ‘works'”, we discussed how positive imagery can help reinforce positive expectations in our trading. We discussed how setting ourselves ‘imaginary’ but realistic targets can help ward off the many negative thoughts and emotions which impact on our trading performance. Greed, fear, impatience and even anger can be extremely destructive forces in our trading if left unchallenged. Whilst we can, through practice and experience, combat these negative forces, they’re still there lurking in the background ready to impact on our trading performance. Visualizing achievable targets and perhaps interpreting those targets into material gains (in the form of possessions) can help us focus on our bigger aims when we suffer a poor series of trades.
In part two of this article we want to bring up the subject of auto suggestion in relation to maintaining a positive mental attitude to our trading. We’ll deliver a brief introduction, discuss its relevance to trading and then suggest some practical uses of the technique to directly affect our trading performance.
It’s important to stress that we’re not entering into a world of chakra, healing crystals or new edge science here, we’re offering up an extremely practical methods for traders struggling with certain aspects of their trading to regain control. It’s often a lonely space our trading world. Beyond discussing trading subjects on forums, perhaps talking with your broker and reading and commenting on blogs, we’re on our own in retail trading. We learn ‘on the job’ and with that in mind any simple skills and techniques we can put to use to aid our performance is worth considering.
What is auto-suggestion?
Autosuggestion is a psychological technique that was developed by the chemist Émile Coué at the beginning of the 20th century. Coué graduated with a degree in pharmacology in 1876. He quickly discovered what later came to be known as the “placebo effect”. He became known for reassuring his clients by praising each remedy’s efficiency and leaving a small positive notice with each given medication. Coué noticed that in specific cases he could improve the effectiveness of a medicine by praising its effectiveness to the patient. He realized that those patients to whom he praised the medicine had a noticeable improvement when compared to patients to whom he said nothing. This began Coué’s exploration of the use of hypnosis and the power of the imagination.
Coué discovered that subjects could not be hypnotized against their will and that the effects of hypnosis waned when the subjects regained consciousness. He eventually developed the Coué method and released his first book, “Self-Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion”. He described the Coué method as;
An instrument that we possess at birth, and with which we play unconsciously all our life, as a baby plays with its rattle. It is however a dangerous instrument; it can wound or even kill you if you handle it imprudently and unconsciously. It can on the contrary save your life when you know how to employ it consciously.
Coué still believed in the effects of medication, but he also believed that our mental state was able to affect and even amplify the action of these medications. He observed that his patients who used his mantra-like conscious suggestion, “Every day, in every way, I’m getting better and better”, replacing their “thought of illness” with a new “thought of cure,” could augment their medication plan. According to Coué, repeating words or images enough times causes the “subconscious” to absorb them.
The Coué method centres on a routine repetition of this particular expression according to a specified ritual, in a given physical state, and in the absence of any sort of allied mental imagery, at the beginning and at the end of each day. Unlike a commonly held belief that a strong conscious constitutes the best path to success, Coué maintained that curing some of our troubles requires a change in our subconscious/unconscious thought, which can only be achieved by using our imagination. Although stressing that he was not primarily a healer, but one who taught others to heal themselves, Coué claimed to have effected organic changes through autosuggestion.
Auto suggestion and its potential effects on trading
Now Coué didn’t limit his autosuggestion technique to this one legendary phrase attributed to him, neither is autosuggestion exclusively used to heal ailments – physical or mental. Moreover the science behind auto-suggestion has moved on considerably since 1876. Autosuggestion is quite simply the art of manifesting things in your life by putting focus on them and repeating mentally, or verbally what you wish to manifest. It can also be used for making good habits such as exercising regularly or, in our instance, trading proficiently and (hopefully) profitably.
As we stated in our previous article we need to keep our aims achievable and realistic, in doing so our positive reaffirmation has a greater chance of success. For example, simply creating your own autosuggestion stating; “I want to be a billionaire so bad that it hurts” is ridiculous in the extreme. The chances of that outcome becoming a reality are close to zero. There is no mechanism involved to turn this outrageous claim into reality bar our trading and we’d be reciting a suggestion that we have very little belief in; in short it’s a waste of time.
So with our technique in mind what type of autosuggestions could we use in our trading in order to improve our mental approach? For those amongst us familiar with the trading ‘psychologist’ Mark Douglas there may be some ideas and verbal’s that we can adapt from his narrative in order to find suggestions that may work and more importantly work for us as an individual.
Suggestions of autosuggestions
Mark Douglas quotation;
The less I cared about whether or not I was wrong, the clearer things became, making it much easier to move in and out of positions, cutting my losses short to make myself mentally available to take the next opportunity.
Autosuggestion;
I will be unmoved by losses, I will move effortlessly in and out of positions, I will cut my losses and be ready for the next opportunity.
Mark Douglas quotation;
You need to ‘change your thinking’. The goal is to reach a ‘care-free state of mind’. When a pattern presents itself, don’t think. There’s nothing to think about. Take the trade because you have an edge. Then odds, probability and your risk control mechanisms will take care of everything. In the end, the key is to learn more about yourself. The most important lesson though is the importance of viewing every single trade as being part of a series of trades.
Autosuggestion;
I have an edge, I am relaxed, I won’t think, I’ll just do, I’ll take my trades as each opportunity presents itself without fear of the outcome.
Mark Douglas’ 5 fundamental truths:
- Anything can happen
- You can make money without knowing what is going to happen next
- There is a random distribution of wins and losses that define an edge
- An edge is just the greater probability of one thing happening over another
- Every moment in the market is unique
Autosuggestion;
I embrace change, I’m certain of my edge, I will work my probabilities, I will adapt and succeed.
Conclusion
Now these are our simple examples of potential autosuggestions, as readers can deduce there’s an infinite variety. The key issue is to focus on what we’re hoping to achieve and ‘meditate’ on it through the suggestions. We’ve been creative in using a renowned trading psychologist in our examples, but traders needn’t limit themselves to our examples. It’s important that readers personalise their autosuggestions.
We’re not suggesting this is a ‘cure all’ to some of the mental blocks traders will experience, however, as an experiment its worth investigating further. And by all means be our guest with the autosuggestions we’ve provided and please provide any feedback through our comments section.
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