death by a thousand papercuts
Instead of taking one big trade with conviction and accepting the outcome (win or lose) and walking away after that, many traders prefer to die by a thousand paper cuts. They prefer opening one small trade, when they lose they enter again, and again and again and again. In the end their loss becomes bigger than it would have been if they just took one big trade and allowed it to play out. I call this death by a thousand paper cuts because the small losses add up and become a large loss.
Everyone passed through this phase at some point in their trading career. Some are still stuck in this phase. Its actually like a mental case where someone who wants to commit suicide keeps cutting himself little by little till he passes out. Instead of trading once and accepting the outcome, they keep piling up small losses till their account is blown
Sometimes you take a trade and lose $1200 and then you say what's there if I lose another $30, oh yeah what's there if I lose another $15, what's there if I lose another $5? And it goes on and on and those are the small papercuts that will kill you
Sometimes you take a trade and lose $1200 and then you say what's there if I lose another $30, oh yeah what's there if I lose another $15, what's there if I lose another $5? And it goes on and on and those are the small papercuts that will kill you
I can relate to what you're saying, this used to be me some time ago. When I look at my account statement I will see so many trades with small losses but no big wins