Traders, Your Trust Issues Are Showing...

Editor’s Note:

This is Issue #16 of Tradetopia Field Notes. A weekly drop for traders mastering both strategy and self.

Last week, we talked about the identity behind execution.

This week, we dive into what happens when that identity fractures. And how to rebuild trust through action. This is a fun ones because it’s literally from rice fields here in Ubud 😂 On the go, from my phone. Enjoy!

A Subtle Drift

At first, it was clear.

Setup. Rules. Structure. System.

But after a few losses… a trade you missed… a runner you cut too early…

Something starts drifting.

You’re still showing up. Still watching charts. Still calling it “trading.”

But what you’re actually doing is different now.

You’re no longer trading your edge.

You’re just throwing money at the market through your feelings.

You’re “trading” your hesitation. You’re “trading” your doubt. You’re “trading” your guilt from the last mistake.

And that’s what’s dangerous…

Because the market doesn’t punish good trading. It punishes misaligned identity in disguise.

You stopped trading your system. Now you’re trading your nervous system.

The Cost of Internal Mismatch

When your actions don’t match your blueprint, the market starts reflecting back something else:

• Forced trades that don’t belong

• Revenge setups disguised as “second chances”

• Chasing confirmations because your self-trust is low

• Inconsistent sizing because you’re emotionally scattered

• Disregarding confirmation because your desire is high

You become reactive.

Not because you’re undisciplined, but because your internal sense of safety has been fractured.

And every click, every skip, every early exit… Isn’t a technical error.

It’s an emotional one.

You can’t trade your way back to confidence. You have to rebuild trust through aligned action.

Rebuilding Self-Trust

You don’t need more setups.

You need more proof that you can follow through with.

Self-trust isn’t something you affirm. It’s something you earn.

You earn it by making uncomfortable choices aligned with your edge.

Start small. Start today.

These are your reps:

• Pick one setup. Trade nothing else for a month.

• Define size. Use consistent size. No more adjusting based on emotion.

• Write your plan. Before the trade. Not after.

• Take the trade when it triggers. Don’t add filters mid-flight.

• Review it honestly. Not emotionally. What did you do right? What was misaligned?

You don’t build trust through motivation. You build it through micro-moments of follow-through. Every time you stick to process under pressure, even when it hurts. You’re proving to yourself that you can be trusted. That’s how high agency traders are built.

Not from what they know but from what they do consistently, especially when it’s inconvenient.

The Return to Clarity

Eventually, the chaos slows down.

You stop trading your doubt.

You stop trying to “get it back.”

You stop flinching at every shift in the candle.

And you start recognizing something else.

Your edge is still there.

It never left.

You just abandoned it when you stopped trusting yourself.

Clarity doesn’t come from waiting.

It comes from resetting your system.

Here’s how you return to baseline:

• Strip your watchlist to 1 or 2 high probability asset classes. Lean into assets that give you more frequent setups during this phase.

• Recommit to your core setup only

• Journal each trade immediately after

• Review at the end of the day with no hindsight justification

• Track identity slips. Hesitation, forcing, hiding. Log them

You’re not starting over.

You’re returning to the version of you that executes cleanly.

Because you’ve done the work to trust yourself again.

In Closing

When you don’t trust yourself, you trade from emotion.

You chase from lack.

You hesitate from fear.

YOU might still call it trading… but you’re no longer operating.

You’re coping.

And that’s where most traders spiral.

Not because they lack skill… but because they don’t know how to come back to themselves.

So ask yourself:

Are you trading your edge or trading your fear?

Are you following your system or following your wounds?

There is no real edge without self-trust.

And there’s no self-trust without evidence-based repetition under pressure.

Build your freedom, one trade at a time.

From Tradetopia,

Mike Navarrete 🧙🏾‍♂️

PS: Catch me live again this week on Youtube, this last Friday we caught a few hundreds points on Dow together ;)

Filed: April 2025 | Location: Behind the Screens, Bali, Indonesia