HOW YOU REACT TO YOUR UNPROFITABLE TRADE
http://daytrading.about.com/od/tradingpsychology/qt/ReactingUnprofitableTrade.htm
One of the things that all traders (new traders, amateur traders, and professional traders) have in common is that they are going to experience an unprofitable trade from time to time. As one might expect, new traders and amateur traders tend to experience unprofitable trades more often than professional traders do, but that is not the main difference between the different groups of traders.
The main difference between new traders, amateur traders, and professional traders when confronted with an unprofitable trade, is the trader's reaction to the unprofitable trade.
New Traders
When new traders experience an unprofitable trade (e.g. a trade that reaches its stop loss), they usually think that they have done something wrong, and they immediately starting looking for a way that they could have modified their trading system or trading technique to avoid the unprofitable trade (e.g. they should have been using a two minute chart instead of a one minute chart).
Amateur Traders
When amateur traders experience an unprofitable trade, they usually get angry or upset, and start looking for someone to blame for their trade being unprofitable (e.g. a larger trader was looking for their stop loss, etc.).
Professional Traders
Professional traders on the other hand, usually say something like "Hmm, that is very interesting", or "Hmm, I didn't expect that to happen", or perhaps "Hmm, what shall I have for dinner this evening?", while they calmly review their charts to see where their next trade will now occur.
One other difference between the way that new traders, amateur traders, and professional traders react to an unprofitable trade, is that professional traders usually know why the trade was unprofitable (i.e. why the market continued moving in the opposite direction to their trade, and why the market moved to the price that it moved to).
Learn From Your Reaction
Regardless of which group of traders you think that you are in, your reaction to an unprofitable trade will tell you the truth about which group of traders you are in. For example, you might think that you are a professional trader, but if you react to an unprofitable trade with anger, then you are not a professional trader, but are probably an amateur trader who is trading incorrectly (e.g. using one of those well advertised, 100% guaranteed trading systems, that for some reason only makes long trades), but doesn't want to admit it.