How to Meditate: Improve Your Day Trading Mindset

A Trading Mindset Practice For When You’re Away From the Charts (And How to Bring It With You Wherever You Go)

If I told you there was one daily practice that you could do away from a trading session that would have a greater impact on your trading mindset and ability to profit in the market than any other, even if it’s something you think you’re not interested in, would you be willing to give it a shot?

I want you to think about your most recent fumble with the markets. Bring to mind the last time you made a mistake or felt out of control while you were trading. Do you remember what you were thinking and feeling when that was happening? For a lot of traders, myself included, when we’re itching to appease a strong emotion, like hyper-contemplating moving our stop loss for fear of losing money when price plummets toward it, there’s usually a lot of heated thinking happening. Our trading discipline is nowhere to be found.

If you couldn’t feel or think at that moment, would you have been more likely to follow your rules or accept the loss? If you could magically flip a switch off in your brain and stay completely serene, in control of your trading mindset, no matter what’s happening in the market – don’t you think that would make you better at following your trading rules or help you stay confident during a losing streak?

In reality, there’s no switch to turn our emotions on and off. There’s no silver bullet that can make you stop feeling a mix of emotions while you’re trading. But the good news is that we don’t need a switch because you are 100% capable of trading with confidence and clarity despite all the different emotions you feel when you profit or lose in the markets. 

How do we do that?

We develop an observer’s mind. When you’re able to create some pause and space between your feelings, thoughts, and your decisions and actions, you gain more control over your trading behavior and your reactions to the market. One of the best ways to achieve this is through keeping a meditation practice.  

Before teaching you what meditation is anUsing meditation to improve beginner trading performance in forexd how to do it, especially with the main goal of using meditation to help your trading, I’m going to share a little bit about my past with you all.

Long before I ever owned a piece of stock or knew what Forex was, during my college years I was studying psychology in Los Angeles. During my second year of studies, I took a class about different mysticism and meditative traditions that stem from a variety of major religions. We learned about the concept of atman and dharma as illustrated in the Hindu suttrhas. We explored the prayer practices of the Jewish Chasidim of eastern Europe in the 17th century, and we also learned about the tenets of Buddhism that arose from the Buddha’s experiences with meditation.

This was by far one of my most favorite classes I had ever taken. I was so enthralled with the ways in which people found relief from the difficulties of life through contemplation and prayer. And it was also the point in my life that I became incredibly interested in Buddhism. Now, this wasn’t the first time I learned about Buddhism.

When I was 16, I had picked up a little book of the sayings of the Buddha as edited and compiled by Jack Kornfield, a psychologist who during the 1970s became deeply invested in learning about and teaching Buddhist practices as a means to healing trauma. As someone who wrestled with depression for decades, the Buddha’s emphasis on seeing things as they are instead of becoming attached to any thought or emotion offered me some relief and helped me prevent my thoughts from spiraling.

So, when I was taking this mysticism and meditation course during college, it was the springboard I needed to dive deeper into Buddhist philosophy and practice. I found a few meditation groups in the Los Angeles area, including the Northridge Zen Center, where I was able to learn how to sit Zazen, the form of meditation taught through Zen Buddhism, and I attended dharma talks that discussed some of the Buddha’s prominent teachings about becoming an observer instead of staying in a reactionary way of thinking.

This started my love affair with meditation. I’ve been on and off daily meditation streaks for over a decade now and I can’t emphasize enough just how much this one practice has changed my life. Meditation does not need to be a religious practice, it can be a discipline for feeling at peace and aware of what you think.

So what exactly is meditation?

Woman meditating about success, discipline, mindset, psychology

It’s a practice of sitting still for a handful of minutes, usually as little as 5 minutes or as long as 20, 45, or even 60 minutes. Personally, when I keep a daily practice, I find 15 to 20 minutes to be the sweet spot for getting a noticeable benefit from regular meditation. I’ll do this once a day before starting my work.

Next, let’s talk about how you meditate. As you’re sitting still during this slot of time, your focus should stay centered on your breath. The feeling of air moving in and out of your nostrils, or with the rise and fall of your chest and belly. Naturally, your mind will start to move, so to speak, while you are trying to focus on your breath. When that happens, you notice that you are thinking this thought, you let it go, and you return to focusing on the breath.

That is meditation – continuously returning to your breath over and over, as you let your thoughts move by, like clouds floating across the sky.

You are training yourself to not get caught up in everything your thoughts say.

By doing this every day, you learn to let go of the constantly stimulated stream of thoughts and over time you’ll find that it’s easier to quiet your mind when you sit to meditate.

There’s a saying, though, that the real practice of meditation occurs when you’re not on your cushion. See if you can bring this tactic with you to your trades.

How to Bring Meditation to Your Trading

Midway through a trade, maybe you’re starting to sweat as your taAndrew Bloom meditating as a disciplined trader in Forex markets for successke profit target is almost hit but then turned the other direction. Instead of sitting in anxiety, see if you can return to your breath. Then, the next step is to mentally return to your rules. Do you have a rule for this kind of situation? If not or if you’re supposed to hold through, that’s what you tell yourself. “Hold on.” The anxiety is still there, probably, but you’re better equipped to intercept the reaction and allow space for both the anxiety and your decision to follow your rules.

Should you keep a regular meditation practice, you’ll also find that when you don’t let your thoughts spiral or be continuously filled with more steam, they will often calm down and go away. Like a car that runs out of fuel, without the energy and heat of your emotions, self-sabotaging thoughts will die off.

Can you see how this practice can save your tail while you trade? It’s such a powerful tool!

If you’d like to start with a guided meditation specifically crafted for traders, check out another video I made for this purpose.

I recommend checking out other videos about how to keep a daily meditation practice and even see about using an app like Calm to help you stay accountable and go deeper into your practice. Best of strength and luck, and I’ll see you in the markets!