Lesson 55 of 69
Keeping a trading journal
8 min read
Chapter checkpoints
0/5- Why journalling actually works
- What to record for every trade
- A template you can copy
- Add a short emotional note
- The weekly review
Optional — tick a chapter as you finish it to keep your place inside this lesson.
A is a written record of every trade you take and why you took it. It is the least glamorous habit in this course and the one that separates traders who improve from traders who simply repeat their first year over and over. Without it you have opinions about your trading; with it you have evidence.
Why journalling actually works
- It separates strategy problems from execution problems. Most losing months come from breaking rules, not from a broken plan — and only a log can prove which it was.
- It makes patterns visible. Twenty entries is usually enough to see that, for example, every trade taken before 09:00 or after two losses is a loser.
- It slows you down. Having to write a reason for entry before clicking buy removes a surprising number of bad trades on its own.
- It makes losses ordinary. A logged, pre-sized loss is a data point. An unlogged one is an emotional event.
- It is the only honest scorecard. — the percentage of trades that followed your plan — matters more than profit in your first year.
The rule of thumb
If a trade is not worth 90 seconds of writing, it is not worth risking money on. The is the entry filter as much as it is the review tool.
What to record for every trade
| Field | What to write | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Date & time | 2026-08-08, 13:20 UTC | Reveals which sessions and hours actually pay you |
| Pair / instrument | EUR/USD | Shows where your edge really is |
| Direction | Long or short | Exposes a bias toward only buying or only selling |
| Entry price | 1.0842 | The basis for every measurement below |
| Exit price | 1.0901 | Together with entry, gives the true result in pips |
| Position size | 0.10 lots | Confirms you sized from the 1% rule, not from feeling |
| Stop loss / take profit | 1.0812 / 1.0902 | Lets you calculate planned risk-reward before the outcome |
| Reason for entry | Daily uptrend, bullish engulfing at tested support | The single most valuable field — it tests the setup, not the trade |
| Result | +59 pips, +1.9R | Record in R multiples, not only in currency |
| Rule adherence | Followed plan / broke rule X | Your real score for the month |
| Lesson learned | Entered before the candle closed — wait for confirmation | One sentence, written while it still stings |
A template you can copy
Recreate the layout below in a notebook, a spreadsheet, or your platform's notes field. Anything works as long as it is the same every time — consistency is what makes the entries comparable later.
| Date | Pair | Dir | Entry | Exit | Size | SL / TP | Reason for entry | Result (R) | Lesson learned |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 08 Aug | EUR/USD | Long | 1.0842 | 1.0901 | 0.10 | 1.0812 / 1.0902 | Daily uptrend, bullish engulfing at support | +1.9R | Plan followed — repeat this setup |
| 09 Aug | XAU/USD | Short | 2412.5 | 2419.0 | 0.02 | 2419.0 / 2396.0 | Rejection at supply zone | −1.0R | Valid loss, no error |
| 09 Aug | GBP/USD | Long | 1.2740 | 1.2718 | 0.10 | none | Felt oversold | −2.2R | No stop, no setup — this is the trade to stop taking |
| 12 Aug | EUR/USD | Long | 1.0866 | 1.0866 | 0.10 | 1.0840 / 1.0920 | Same setup as 08 Aug | 0.0R | Moved to breakeven too early |
Print it or rule it out by hand
Ten columns across a landscape page, one row per trade, one page per week. Add a screenshot of the chart at entry and one at exit — the picture recalls the trade far better than the numbers do.
Add a short emotional note
Alongside the numbers, write one line about how you felt: impatient, confident, bored, desperate to make back the last loss. Within a month you will find that a specific emotional state precedes most of your worst trades, and that is a rule you can write ('no trading when rushing') rather than a vague resolution to be more disciplined.
The weekly review
- 1Set aside 30 minutes at the weekend — not during the trading week, when you are still emotionally involved.
- 2Count rule adherence first: what percentage of trades followed the plan exactly? Aim for 90%+ before worrying about profit.
- 3Group trades by setup and by session. Which combination made money and which quietly bled?
- 4Read the 'lesson learned' column end to end. If the same sentence appears three times, it becomes a written rule in your plan.
- 5Change one thing for the coming week. One. Then measure it against the next 20 entries.
Journal setup checklist
0/6Fifty entries is the target
One trade tells you nothing, ten tells you very little, fifty tells you almost everything about your edge and your . Journal a month to fifty entries before you go live — the habit is far harder to start once real money is involved.
Open a demo account, take your next fifty trades with the template above, and review them at the weekend. That single routine is the fastest improvement available to a beginner.
Practise journalling on an Exness demoRelated lessons & next steps
Key takeaways
- Record setup, entry, stop, target, size, reasoning and outcome for every trade.
- The reasoning matters more than the result.
- Journal losses in detail — they show whether you followed or broke the plan.
- The review, not the writing, is where the improvement happens.
Knowledge check
3 quick questions — your best score is saved to your progress.
1. What should a journal entry record?
2. Why journal losing trades in detail?
3. How is a journal best used?
Progress is saved on this device.
Your next step
30-Day Demo Challenge
Put the whole course into practice over four guided weeks on a free demo account — with progress tracking for every task.