Stock Doc: Facing Fastball Pressure

Regarding his emotional awareness, Roger realized that he felt pangs of anxiety and insecurity when faced with an early roadblock. He noticed that his face flushed and his muscles tensed. His thought log indicated that thinking about those past losses he'd incurred by pulling out prematurely made him feel angry. My solution for him was to focus on his evidenced-based "anchors" to boost his confidence and to stay strong throughout the trade, even when things get ambiguous.

After we met, Roger was able to use his anger as a cue to thinking about his 70% success rate on positions that he wavered on. He stuck to his guns and stayed strong with his convictions. He dug in and stayed for his at bat. As Woody Allen was once said, "80% of success is just showing up."

Confidence At Bat

Now comes the pitch. This guy threw the ball hard, much harder than others I had faced, with speeds that reached about 85 miles per hour. Lenny Dykstra would have eaten this guy up in his prime.

But I'm sure Lenny would agree that no matter how good you are, if your timing is off from a lack of practice, your confidence can be negatively impacted when facing a power-packed fastball. Lenny at least was a professional hitter; I, on the other hand, am a 31-year-old psychologist, a mere mortal.

The first pitch to me was a blazing fastball down the middle and was called for a strike. I took the first pitch to get my timing down and size up my opponent. I was definitely impressed with his velocity, but I changed my thinking about the situation.

Instead of waiting for a pitch and thinking, "I hope that I make contact," I shifted to a more confident mindset and said to myself, "I have taken out pitchers like this in the past five years!" I remembered a few similar David-and-Goliath battles where I rose up at the end. On this day, with a 2-and-2 pitching count, I singled up the middle to keep a rally alive.

Please write to the Stock Doc with your trading, emotional or investing dilemmas. Dr. Cass always welcomes comments and stories, for which he'll try to offer valuable solutions in later columns.

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