Being trapped—almost every trader will experience this issue. Rather than calling it a problem, it's better described as the market's normal state. No one can avoid black swan events; what truly makes a difference is how you handle such situations when they occur.

Many friends ask me what to do when they are trapped. Instead of panicking at the last minute, it's better to start building your response system now. My approach can be summarized into several dimensions.

**Step 1: Mental Adjustment**
Accept reality—this is very important. Being trapped is not shameful; it’s an opportunity to validate your trading system. Never lose your composure over a single trap; emotional decisions are the real killers. What you need to do is handle the situation objectively and calmly, rather than throwing a tantrum or blaming external factors.

**Step 2: Quick Assessment**
Determine, according to your trading system rules, whether this loss is within your acceptable range. If it is, continue holding; if it exceeds expectations, you must cut losses. There is no gray area—just follow the rules strictly. The benefit of this approach is to eliminate emotional interference and make decisions based on evidence.

**Step 3: Root Cause Analysis**
Before being trapped, you must understand why it happened. Different reasons require different remedies:

- If the market suddenly reversed and you didn’t react in time to stop loss—that indicates you need to add an automatic stop-loss feature, such as setting stop-loss orders in advance to let the system decide for you.

- If overconfidence or subjective judgment led to adding positions against the trend, and you kept buying as prices fell—that’s a mindset issue. You need to work on overcoming greed and overconfidence in the market.

- If you entered at a high point—set rules to constrain yourself, such as limiting entry points for chasing high prices.

**Step 4: Establish Defensive Rules**
Knowing the problem isn’t enough; you must use rules to prevent it from happening again. For example: do not add positions when in profit, and always test new positions with small size. This can at least prevent a single trap from escalating into a heavy position trap.

**Final Reminder**
The most serious situation is repetitive trapping—repeatedly making the same mistakes. If you keep making the same errors, you need to ask yourself whether you are truly suited for trading. Because this is no longer a skill issue but a fundamental one.

The best way to solve the problem is actually very simple: don’t let the problem happen in the first place.