Documentation Index
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Tracking your emotional state and tagging mistakes isn’t about judgment — it’s about building a dataset of your own behavior. Over time, patterns emerge that no P&L statement can reveal.
Why this matters
Two traders can take the exact same setup with opposite results. The difference is usually behavioral — emotional reactivity, impulsive decisions, or rule violations made under pressure.
By tagging emotions and mistakes on every trade, you create a record that surfaces these patterns. You start to see which emotional states lead to your best execution and which ones precede your worst trades.
Emotional states
During journaling, you’ll tag your emotional state before and after the trade. You can select multiple emotions — most trades involve more than one.
Emotions are grouped into three categories based on how they affect your trading, not whether they’re “good” or “bad” feelings. The same categories are used in the Game Plan for consistency.
Composed (green)
These emotions support disciplined execution. Trades taken in a composed state tend to have higher Align Scores.
| Emotion | When to tag |
|---|
| Confident | Clear conviction in the setup based on your rules |
| Focused | Fully engaged, locked into the process |
| Patient | Willing to wait for the right setup, no urgency |
| Calm | Relaxed, no emotional charge — operating from routine |
Reactive (red)
These emotions signal a state where you are likely to break rules. Trades taken under reactive emotions often involve impulsive decisions or rule violations.
| Emotion | When to tag |
|---|
| Anxious | Uncertainty about the trade, second-guessing your plan |
| Frustrated | Irritation from prior losses, missed entries, or market behavior |
| Fearful | Worry about loss, hesitation to pull the trigger or hold the position |
| Impulsive | Acting before thinking, skipping your checklist |
| Angry | Emotional reaction — often precedes revenge trades |
| Revenge-driven | Taking a trade specifically to recover a prior loss, not because the setup is there |
Revenge-driven is the most important emotion to tag honestly. It maps directly to the revenge trading mistake tag. When you flag this feeling, you create a direct signal connecting emotion → mistake → outcome that no other metric captures.
Unsettled (amber)
These emotions could go either way. You might execute well or poorly — the outcome depends on your awareness and discipline.
| Emotion | When to tag |
|---|
| Excited | Elevated energy — can lead to oversizing or chasing trades |
| Bored | Low engagement, prone to forcing setups for stimulation |
| Uncertain | Not sure about the setup but trading anyway |
| Distracted | Attention elsewhere — multitasking, fatigue, or external noise |
| Indifferent | Going through the motions without real commitment |
Be honest, not aspirational. Tag what you actually felt, not what you think you should have felt. The value is in the accuracy of the data over time.
During Step 6 of journaling, you’ll tag any mistakes that occurred during the trade. Select all that apply — or None if the trade was executed cleanly.
Entry mistakes
| Tag | Description |
|---|
| Early Entry | Entered before your setup fully confirmed |
| Late Entry | Waited too long — chased the move after confirmation |
| FOMO Entry | Fear of missing out drove the entry, not your rules |
Position & risk mistakes
| Tag | Description |
|---|
| Oversized Position | Position size exceeded your risk rules |
| Moved Stop Loss | Adjusted stop loss after entry in a way that increased risk |
| No Stop Loss | Entered without a defined stop loss |
Exit mistakes
| Tag | Description |
|---|
| Exited Too Early | Closed the position before your target or exit criteria were met |
| Held Too Long | Stayed in the trade past your exit signal or invalidation point |
Behavioral mistakes
| Tag | Description |
|---|
| Revenge Trading | Took the trade to recover from a prior loss, not because the setup was there |
| Overtrading | Took more trades than your plan allowed for the session |
No mistakes
| Tag | Description |
|---|
| None | The trade was executed according to plan with no rule violations |
How patterns emerge
Individual tags on a single trade don’t tell you much. But across 50 or 100 trades, patterns become clear:
- “I’m 2x more likely to overtrade when I’m frustrated”
- “My FOMO entries have a 30% lower Align Score than my calm entries”
- “Every time I move my stop loss, the trade loses”
These patterns surface through your Analytics dashboard, where you can filter performance by emotional state and mistake type.
