Never move your stop loss (except one way)

Your stop loss is a contract you sign with yourself at entry, when you're calm. Moving it wider mid-trade breaks that contract at the exact moment you're least objective.

Why widening is fatal

When price approaches your stop, hope kicks in: "it'll come back." So you drag the stop further and risk more than you planned. Sometimes it works, which is worse, because it trains the habit. Eventually one runaway loss wipes out weeks of gains.

The only acceptable move

You may move a stop in your favour, to breakeven or to lock in profit as the trade works. Never against you. If the trade needs a wider stop than planned, the setup was wrong; take the loss and move on.

Pre-commit to make it easy

Set your stop before you enter and treat it as untouchable. A journal that records whether you respected your stop turns this into a measurable habit, one of the discipline signals TradeDiscipline tracks.