I know which market 'states' give me the best opportunity to make money & which ones don't. I just take the setups presented to me, designed to capitalise from those opportunities. But that's still no guarantee, as levels of volatility & price direction can change at any time. My experiences and results have framed my own beliefs on this, and have given me a clear path of either reinforcing what I am doing, or offering up potential refinements. But it has to be said, the refinements in my rules have been few and far between.

I never count on open profits. They can disappear far quicker than when being built up. But the only valid reason to exit a trade is when my trailing stop is hit. Learning to accept this and allow things to play themselves out is a difficult but necessary skill. #trendfollowing The alternative would be to try and be 'smart' and attempt to exit at the extreme of a move. The danger then becomes cutting your winning trades short, and over time its the outlier price moves which power the growth in your equity.