Did you know that Bargaining is one of the five stages of loss we all feel? Recognize these four automatic reactions, and you will be closer to overcoming your emotions.

The Four Stages of Loss:

We can all remember traveling through this series of emotion.

1. Denial: "This is just market noise. It will come back and go in my direction..."
2. Anger: "Darn it! Why is it so easy to lose! I hate the e-mini trading! There's no way to tell what's going to happen!"
3. Bargaining: "If it will just come back, I will break even, and I will never make that mistake again! Come on, just come back!"
4. Acceptance: "Alright. If I get out now, I'll only loose this much. It was an expensive lesson. I'll do better next time."

Watch for these emotions. It is amazing how accurate they are, and how everyone experiences all five stages, in the same order.

Reduce Emotions While Trading:

• Over weighting: Do not be in a position where one trade can make or break your account. The less each trade means to your account, the less emotion you will have.
• Ego: People do not like to be wrong. After we take losses, we are angry, and want to get back at the market. We'll enter trades just to get our money back, without forethought or consideration. A trade made irrationally from the beginning is doomed to fail.
• Excitement: Games are meant for excitement. e-mini trading for long-term gains is an investment, and should not be used for excitement. e-mini software trading is a business, and should be treated as such.
• Fear and Greed: Fear and Greed can arise from both winning and loosing trades. In winning trades, greed wants more profit, we don't want to miss a move, and we stay in a winning trade too long. There is also the fear of loosing the profit we already have. In loosing trades, fear makes us resist cutting our losses, in hopes that the trade will move back in our direction.
• Fear of Success: Did you know that most e-mini traders are afraid to win? There are many reasons that people are afraid of success.
• Fear that you will accomplish all that you set out to, but that you still won't be happy, content, or satisfied once you reach your goal.
• Belief that you are undeserving of all the good things and recognition that come your way as a result of your accomplishments and successes.
• Opposite of fear of failure, in that fear of failure is the fear of making mistakes and losing approval. Fear of success is the fear of accomplishment and being recognized and honored.
• Lack of belief in your own ability to sustain your progress, and the accomplishments you have achieved in your life. Fear that your accomplishments can self-destruct at anytime.
• Belief that no matter how much you are able to achieve or accomplish, it will never be enough to sustain success. Belief that there are others out there who are better than you, who will replace or displace you if you do not maintain your performance record.
• Belief that success is an end in itself; yet that end is not enough to sustain your interest and/or commitment.
• Fear that once you have achieved the goals you have worked diligently for, the motivation to continue will fade.
• Fear that you will find no happiness in your accomplishments; that you will be perpetually dissatisfied with life.

Consider the high percentage of novice e-mini software traders who never become successful over the long term. The overwhelming majority of individuals empty their first live account TWICE! Why is it so hard to become successful?

Most people are afraid of success, especially when it means easy money. Most of us have been taught that we must work hard for money. The harder you work, the more reward you will get. If you want easy money, you're a lazy dreamer. We have been taught that wanting money is bad and selfish.

Becoming a successful trader actually invalidates the reason we worked hard all our lives.

As you can see, our emotions control our every action, without us even knowing it. The only way a trader can remove his emotions from trading, is by following a constructed trading plan. All you need to do is follow through.

For more from Giles, please visit the Emini Trading School.