Hi GaryD.
There's a lot happening isn't there...
It comes as a surprise to us sometimes how things got so "busy".
There are few things worse than re-invoking the wrong things.
But how do we know what's right or wrong ?
How often have we gained the wisdom of what is right by having done what was wrong ?
All contradictions seem to be two sides that make the whole,
but we are seldom aware of both sides.
We are more often than not fixated or more focused on something without being aware of what it's
contradiction may reveal.
We need, as was mentioned to be aware of those reflections in order to see them.
So we face that most obvious of contradictions in trading:
"When the focus shifted to money, I did poorly."
and
" How do I step up while not thinking about the money? To pursue the goal of stepping up, what motivation would there be, other than making money?"
You have clearly stated a clear conflict.
A conflict in the sense that the two things, motivation and the purpose of that motivation, are not compatible.
Such that the motivation (to make money) becomes the very thing (via thinking about it) that doesn't allow us to achieve the purpose of that motivation.
So you got to asking those questions the other way around.
Answers are often within the very questions we ask.
You said:
"You came to trading needing to make money
only to become aware that in order to make money
you needed to forget about the money
and focus on the process of learning how to trade."
Seems like a plan stan (I mean GaryD) ?
I mentioned in a previous post:
"But haven't we all watched those sole crossings of an ocean or the climbing of a mountain or some such "doing" by another that we ourselves feel".
You've watched yourself solo cross many oceans or climb many mountains before.
Funny how such endevours actually result in us ending up at the place we left to start those journeys.
(and I've just re-read your first post of this Journal and some replies I gave in post #176 and #178)
That's where we always are.
Here, now, at the beginning of our journey.
Each and every present moment is the beginning of a journey.
Each and every trade is a beginning of a journey.
We are called upon, indeed we become aware that we are calling upon ourself to be present in this moment,
and in doing so we call into being everything we know to realize, to create something out of nothing.
After all "this" moment we are creating has never existed before.
The money isn't what we are creating, but rather we are creating the awareness to realize who we are.
What would be our motivation here then ?
To make money or to be aware ?
And in that awareness to learn to know ourself ?
Yes the "try not Do"quote.
I first read in a book before I saw that film.
As you mentioned, this is not about being reckless.
Indeed its the opposite.
It's about a high enough level of responsibility that enables a level of awareness that takes
us beyond the
resistance we have created.
However, imo, trying, and especailly too hard, can be a sign post for caution !!
Where there is confilct there is resistance.
Where there is a question there is an anwser.
Some things just can't exist without the other,
indeed some things can only exist because of the other..
There is so much to say about such things but in the limitations of these posts,
this is just my perspective GaryD, for however and in whatever way it might help.
Kind regards
PS: I thought you're bike ride was interesting to say the least.
Re-visiting old ground and old memories can remind us of how we have moved on and so can always move on.
As Alan Watts would say "the present changes the past".
And graveyards ? I don't see it as our future, but as a reminder of where we are, here, now, present.
Nothing is more an important a contradiciton to reveal what is most important, perhaps.
.