You need to figure out what kind of trader you want to be before you figure out what trading strategy you want to learn. At what speed do you move fast (day trader), medium (swing trader) or slow (long term investor)? Knowing this saves you time and stress because there are just are millions of possible trading strategies so you need to figure out which one do you want to learn and just focus on that one especially in the beginning. Everything a trader does must be planned.

So are you a day trader?

You are the sprinter of the forex market, you trade the market every single day in quick sprints. If so, you are going to need to know your one minute, five minute, 30 minute, one hour and four hour charts. You will mostly focus on the shorter term charts but the longer term charts will help you find the general trend. Choose whichever techniques you want but you are going to have to watch and trade the market a minimum of one hour per day, although I recommend more.

Intraday trading is the most stressful because you're always wondering about that one trade that he missed or should have done this should have done that or if you should take profit. Because there is very little time for analysis it is easy to make the wrong decision, you must exit these trades quickly. In fact you should never leave your computer in the middle of a trade and you should be ready to take profit if you notice the trend turning against you. You must also learn to forget about past trades. This is part of the trader mentality you will learn.

The big question for day traders is how much do you want to make. How many pips will satisfy you today? Are you fine with 10, you may be fine with 20, but always stick to your goal. Change the goal for tomorrow, but not for today. $50,000 a year equals out to about $200 per trading day. If you want to be a full-time Forex trader, you need to make at least $200 a day. And that's $200 profit, you can't be holding on to something and say oh look I'm up $200. You have to be able to cash that money out of your account at the end of the day. After all, You'll need to cash out that $4000 per month to pay bills on time.

Perhaps you are a swing trader.

You want those 300 pip gains every few days. Swing trading is by far the most lucrative with the least amount of risk of the three trading styles. 90% of all forex trades are opened and closed in 48 hours. And although swing trading can be done from a purely technical level you really should know the state of the global economy.

The best traders are swing traders, they patiently wait for their charts to aline, and then in one fell swoop they take in a month's earnings. Swing traders also do better than day traders because the spread becomes negligible for them. Where on a 10 pip trade, a day trader has to make 3 pips just to break even, and then make 10 more pips after that. A swing trader looks for strong support and resistance levels sets up precisely calculated stops and profit targets and then executes the plan. Swing trading takes much more homework and study than actual trading, but each trade is like a work of art, planned flawlessly and executed in the same manner.

Or are you the rarest of breed, the long term trader in the forex market.

Since most trades are completed within 48 hours, it is rare to find long-term investors in the Forex market. Most these investors do something called carry trading, where they plan a long-term trade based on the difference in interest levels for each country. They use much less leverage, and they choose countries that they think will continue to grow for several months, and they make a good amount of money from both the daily interest payments as well as the appreciation of their target currency.

Homework:

Develop a trading journal, where you document each trade. Over time, a clear and concise trading plan will present itself.