It's important to be fairly emotionless and not have a "woe is me" mentality when it comes to trading. I've known this for years, but being less in sync with the market lately has really reinforced the value it brings to me as a trader.

Last week I went through a lot of charts and developed multiple plans. For $BTC, I planned to short after sweeping liquidity into 96K. We didn't get the sweep, price went to target. For $XAG / $SI, I planned on longing any LTF candle close above 91.5 targeting 93.7, it occurred 9 hours ago right as I was going to sleep. Price went to target. For $ES, I planned to short any break below 6950, it also occurred 9 hours ago right I was going to sleep. I would be up 25 handles and counting.

There's many more examples of this of course, but here's just three recent ones. There's also the mornings where you sit and wait for price to interact with your level for hours and the second you go to the bathroom, it rips through, gives a retest on the 1 minute, and price is completely gone by the time you get back to the desk.

If you enter a state of frustration and woe is me, you will inevitably take a lesser trade to compensate for your missed opportunity. Because you missing that trade "wasn't fair". You planned it and you were ready to execute and you got screwed, either by the market, or because you needed to let the dog out, or make some food real quick, the list goes on and on.

The fix is simple. When this happens, you need to remember that you are a professional, and strive to be a professional if you are not one yet. A professional will fully accept the unfortunate circumstance, dwell on it for a few seconds at most, and then move forward. Moving forward does not mean taking the next shit trade you see, it means recalibrating, re-reading the chart, and developing your next high confidence plan.

When you approach the chart without deeper thought/planning (ex. "oh look a bearish FVG, let me short"), there's very little edge to this. When you have a strong understanding or "read" on the chart and you can couple that with an entry strategy that typically works for you, that's where you find your high confidence trades.

At the end of the day, you are going to miss trades due to no fault of your own. This is something that happens to all professionals and cannot be avoided. The difference between the profitable professional and the aspiring professional is how they move forward. The true professional shrugs it off, doesn't let it affect their mental, and doesn't feel bad for themselves. They just simply say, "it happens, it's all good" and they wait PATIENTLY for the next quality opportunity.

Be a professional.