CPI, FOMC, NFP and an election, all inside a few days. Some weeks are a minefield, and I built this exercise as a reference point for them. You write down where you're most likely to fail while it's quiet, then turn each failure into a rule you can follow when it isn't.
About ten minutes. Free, no sign up, and it works on screen or on paper.
Five short steps: name the week, picture the failure, write it up, turn it into rules, then review on Friday.
Four ideas from behavioural research. Each one does a different job inside the exercise.
Gary Klein's pre-mortem asks a team to assume the project has failed, then explain why. In the research behind it, people who imagined an outcome as already fact came up with around 30% more reasons for it than people asked what might happen. More reasons on paper means fewer surprises on the day.
Loewenstein's work on hot-cold empathy gaps shows that people in a calm state consistently underestimate how differently they will behave once they're emotional. A candle ripping against you is a hot state. A quiet Sunday is a cold one. Decide in the cold, then hand the decision to the hot.
A meta-analysis of 94 studies found that "if X happens, I will do Y" plans had a medium-to-large effect on goal achievement compared with simply intending to do the thing (d = 0.65). The trigger is decided in advance, so in the moment you're executing, not debating.
Elite goalkeepers facing penalties almost always dived to one side, even though staying in the centre stopped more kicks. When something big is happening, doing nothing feels like failing. Writing "flat is a position" into your rules takes that pressure away before it arrives.
Work top to bottom. Your answers stay on this device and are never sent to us.
What week is it, and what's in it? Tap everything that applies.
It's Friday evening and the week went badly. Not unlucky, your own doing. Tap the ways it happened. Be honest, this is only for you.
Write it as if it has already happened. What did you do, in what order, and what did you tell yourself at each point? Three or four lines is enough.
Every failure in your entry becomes an if-then rule. The "if" is the trigger you'll notice in the moment. The "then" is the action you've already decided on.
Tap one to add it, then change it to fit your own plan. These are examples of the format, not recommendations.
Print it or leave this page open beside your charts. When the week is done, come back and answer these two questions honestly.
Want a heads-up before the next one? Get the Event-Week Calendar.
Get the calendarEvery high-impact week to year end in one place: the dates, the UK times, and the weeks that run thin. I'll send a short heads-up before the big ones with this page's link, so you do the exercise before the week, not during it.
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Inside, we work through event weeks together: the market context, the process work, and exercises like this one that keep you following your own rules when it counts. If you'd rather not do it alone, come and have a look.
Learn how to think, not just what to think.
