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by knowing oneself, my way of controlling fear and greed will not not be the same as yours. Some use automate system some use semi-automate system for me personally I just reduce my targets to control greed, keep looking for entries to control fear.
Thanks Cory. This was the response I thought I would get from others.
When writing a public journal and being honest with oneself and with the community, one exposes unpleasant truths about oneself. When potentially good advice is presented in the form of honest criticism, the temptation is to in some way respond in a manner that reduces the criticism from others that may or may not be more advanced than oneself and try to apply where they are in their journey to where you are in yours.
This is counter productive I believe in the sense that it can produce feelings of inadequacy and possible self doubt. When this happens, I am always tempted to discontinue the public journal and just simply retreat into my own little world. Or worse, lash out at people. While these two responses may satisfy the need for self preservation or revenge, neither is constructive long term.
So while I appreciate and value opinions and suggestions from others, I also know trading is a very personal journey. Realizations and aha moments come. Sometimes from others and sometimes from within. It is my sincere desire that most of the aha moments come from within.....by looking at the scroll so to speak.
Thanks again.
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
As I progress on this journey, my intuition is beginning to show itself more and more. I have certain pattern trades I really like. At the same time, at certain levels, I feel pretty strongly to take a trade or to pass on a trade with no apparent reason other than a feeling. Today I passed on a couple of trades I felt I should take but were not within my normal pattern trades. These trades worked today. Other times they haven't. Learning to discern when to listen to that little voice and when not to is something to think about.
Over the last few days and weeks, I've been looking at a way to filter my 12 range chart to perhaps finesse some entries better. I've been doing this with a 4 range chart. I've only looked at this on historical charts. But over some time, I've come to think that perhaps I can finesse a 12 range chart pattern by being a bit more selective on the 4R. Today I tried this live. I have marked the trades on the 12R chart where I felt I had better entries than perhaps on the 12R. This was an absolute failure. I am sure its possible but I totally screwed it up. Worse, these trades inspired a level of fear response I've not felt in a while. I was really nervous in these trades. Even worse than this, they were all losers. So I am gonna resort to one of the three "F" responses to dangerous stimuli.....Flight. At least until I figure out how to do it properly, I will not be using the 4 range at all in trading decisions.
I also had some input today from a pretty experienced trader. One that uses much larger stops than I do. This was a very casual input. He thought CL was gonna go to a certain level...which it did by the way, but from a specific price. I entered there on nothing other than his say so. This was instantly stopped out....he was still in the trade due to much larger stops. Eventually the target was hit. I did not follow through with this trade idea once the initial trade stopped out. I realized I had committed a huge trading sin. Trading someone else's trade idea. Since I thought his premise was correct in terms of the target, I tried once or twice to enter using my own patterns and also the previously mentioned 4R method. No luck at all......The only way to take advantage of this was to use the stops he used and hold trades the way he held trades. None of which I am capable of doing at the moment.
In terms of trend following today, I only traded longs this morning. But I still lost money. I did not follow my trade plan at all today in terms of only trading specific patterns on the 12 range. By the time the ultra clean shorts showed up, I was stopped out for the day. Still a net positive week so far but only by a bit.
How do I feel today? I am wrestling with this. On one hand, I feel bad as no one likes to lose money and the really stupid trade I took based on someone else's trade idea. That's a pretty rookie mistake. On the other hand, I thought I had a valid method of getting in my pattern trades early and while they were all losers today, at least I give myself some very small credit for trying to improve the existing method and trying it live. I suppose its a lesson learned. Don't trade something live you've not tested in sim with live data.....or something like that.
Tomorrow, its back to my normal patterns, recognize the fear and greed and work to neutralize them with cognitive rational thought about what the chart is telling me.
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
No doubt, the road to self-discovery inevitably leads to the path to success. By identifying and eliminating your weaknesses, negative habits, and negative emotions, you will then be able to trade with a clear head and clear vision.
Developing a trading methodology, and defining your risk, is the easy part of trading. Developing the mental skills of focus, discipline, objectivity, and self- confidence is much more demanding and for some it can become a continuous struggle.
Almost every trader experiences anxiety, but it's instinctual that they feel good. Our brain's need for dopamine makes sure it will do anything to achieve this goal. It will even allows us to deceive ourselves to accomplish this end (cognitive rationalization).
Obviously, our experiences often fail to live up to our expectations. Sometimes, it's just easier to be like the fox who failed to reach the grapes, and say we didn't really want the grapes, or they wouldn't have tasted good. It's a very natural defense mechanism. There would be a lot of depressed zombies walking around, if each and every one of us, didn't fall victim to this practice, once in a while.
Successful traders are cognizant of this fact, it allows them to be objective and honest with themselves. They admit it when they are wrong and correct the problem immediately before it becomes ingrained - acceptance vs. denial.
Just don't fall into the trap of saying " It's o.k. to make the mistakes I'm making, because everyone else does."
Instead, say, " I am not going to make the same mistakes, that everyone else makes. In fact I am going to learn from their mistakes and avoid them.” It’s all in your attitude!
I learned something yesterday from the book about fear I am reading. In it, the author states that our desire to avoid uncertainty will lead us to choose the known negative outcome over an unknown positive outcome. This struck a cord in me in terms of holding a trade for a much larger or even unknown target. Easier to opt for the small loss or small win that face unknown amounts of time waiting for an uncertain event.....50-100 or more ticks to materialize or even worse, price action to tell me when to exit.
This was and is, an unnerving discovery. That our brains will short circuit our best intentions. All without a single rational thought to the contrary.
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
If my previous post offended you that was not my intentions, let me restate it in a more constructive way. As you probably know that the CL market under normal market sentiments will produce at minimum 30 to 40 tick swings and often will move 1.00 pt or more at least once a day. It is our job to recognize when the correct pattern occurs and get in at the beginning. We are creatures of habit and once we recognize the correct pattern over and over again we will build confidence when we see it happening. For instance with my methodology when I see everything line up exactly as planned its a no brainer I must take that trade. Will it always win of course not, but I know my chances of it being a winning trade are favorable.Why? Because I have practiced it over and over again to the point I was completly confident that when I see that pattern it has a high winning percentage.
Now to take advantage of the entire market move I started with a r/r of a minimum 1.5/1 so if I'm willing to risk 15 ticks my target had to be a minimum of 24 ticks. Once the market has taken you out of the trade hopefully by hitting your target watch closely what the market does, how far it moves. You will get to a point where you will feel confident to the point where you will expand your target to 30 ticks and then 40 + ticks. This market will move 20 ticks in your direction and then move back to your entry and then continue towards your profit target. This is what scares most traders out of the big moves.
In a nutshell, practice creating good habits and not the bad ones. This takes time, but builds strong confidence in your trading. Not sure if this is helpful or I may not have said anything that you haven't already known.