Good things are happening.
I've taken a break from documenting the technical aspects of my game in this journal to focus on my mind.
I have been reading the "Daily Trading Coach", working on my physical stamina by excercising more and,
the most important, Trading Live Money more than I study market replay.
Getting to live trading as soon as possible is so important. Just keep your risk down like Spot Forex with
Oanda where you can literally deposit $100 bucks and trade nano
lots... I consider this almost a public
service. Or, A good step above that, is toss a couple grand in a futures account ( I think AMP is the best for
beginners) and trade the M6E for mid
range targets (15-30). (Do Not
Scalp either of these products - the
spreads / commissions will eat you alive)
The Euro / USD respects long range targets very
well and makes it very easy to condition yourself to staying in swing moves.
Why move to Live trading the second you discover an Edge?
The moment you learn to read
Price Action and Volume as it relates to
Support and Resistance levels, the
technical side of your trading education is over. You are now half way to being a profitable trader.
The rest of your career, and this is where the 90% failure rate crashes in, you will be stuggling with one thing.
Emotions.
The battle with your mind will define you as a trader.
This is where I am now.
Learning to take a stop without a flinch and knowing that it is a necessary part of the business is key.
You MUST control your risk.
You MUST aim for a Risk / Reward Ratio of at least 1 : 2.... (1 :3) is perfect.
The second the light comes on in your pysche that you can lose one half of your trades and still make money,
an errie calm comes over your job as a Trader.... at 1 : 3, and you can lose 60% of your trades and make even
more money. The power of math is amazing.
There is only one thing that will stop you.
Emotions.
The battles I still encounter are...
Moving a stop to "make more room"
Worse Yet, after breaking that very important rule, I will
scale into a losing position, instead of simply taking
a very small loss, regrouping and studying WHY the trade failed.
All of the above is related to the account killer of "needing to be right" or conversely "Fear of losing" ... all Ego related.
I MUST learn to take the reasonably set, PA based stops with zero concern. I should simply be
scratching my
head. NOT freaking out. NOT getting heated up with anger. I should calmly begin looking for the next entry.
I may have been correct in the trade and just a bit early (my other demon)
If you get shaken you WILL NOT re-enter the market because you are now gun shy and flustered.
And then, when you realize that you were, in fact correct in the market reversal or continuation and price flys
away from you for 100 ticks leaving no opportunity for a now, far too late, entry, you rise to a boil and
loose it completely.
The above has happened to me as it has to all of us. I was so angry, I literally ripped the T-shirt I was wearing
from my body like the incredible hulk. I returned later in the day to lose even more money in
Revenge Trading.
Then depression set in and I had to lay down for an hour or so. lol .... sad, but true....
I haved improved greatly since then.... thank God..
Another big one and my current demon, is
bailing too early on a trade, Sometimes I save my ass and toss the
5 ticks in the coffers but, most of the time, price moves to my target which is always set to the closest SR
area. Price WILL go there eventually or you were simply wrong or too early.
Bailing can be summed up in one emotion - Impatience.
Whether that means getting in before proof of
absorption develops or closing your position the second a candle pauses,
it is all IMPATIENCE
So, what am I battling here?
Myself.
Ego - The need to be right
OK, that's enough of all the negative waves.
There IS a bright side.
I am no langer losing money.
However, I am not making any money.
This is a fantastic development because I KNOW it is correctable.
The problem is simply me . I am not letting the math work in my favour by working the RR ratio of love.
So, I now consider myself a PROFESSIONAL trader. In the purest definition, I am playing the sport for money.
I'm just not making any right now. But, there is zero doubt in my mind I will succeed.
Hearing the latest cat to make it through the TST combine speak, made me absolutly elated.
He is trading the exact way I am.
Pure PA as it relates to areas of SR.
That's it people.
That's all there is. This is no mystery of a magical sequence of 5 different indys all aligning to show you
where to pick up your weekly check. Price travels to levels it has gone before. It either reverses and
goes down a level or continues to the next.... or skips one. but it will always land at an old level.
Price never stops in "outer space"
If you can turn off your mind
If you can cut your losers short and let you winners run to at least the first, most conservative SR level,
you are unbeatable and will make a good living.
I have also rearranged the office and added a new monitor to keep track of the charting a bit easier.
I now sort of LOOK like a pro and better yet, FEEL like a pro.
I am on the path. I am pouring on the coal to move full steam ahead.
I am studying great people like Will Smith and Bruce Lee. Their minds are / were like steel. They take
lifes obsticles to a spiritual level. Their work ethic is / was obsessive and kinetic.
Never doubt. Never give up. Channel all the postive energies of this incredible universe to work for you.
I know this is a long winded entry in my journal, but I wanted to document all the places my mind
has been traveling lately. So, just because I haven't been posting in my journal, it doesn't mean
I have been inactive. In fact, I have never traded / studied more.
I am very excited.
The TST combine will be coming to NT soon and I will keep trying out until I succeed.
Until that happens, I will trade the TF on my futures account and the Spot Forex on my cash account.
I will be posting entries and being more accountable to myself soon.
It is too easy to overtrade, chase and
bail if you aren't accountable to a public journal.
It, amazingly, does help keep the trade count down and make's you study each entry more if
you have to explain them to yourself later.
I am taking losing much better, yet still wrestling with all the emotional aspects listed above
that are familiar to so many.
There is lot's of road ahead of me, but now, when I look in the rearwiew, I see lot's of road
behing me, also.....
This is a very exciting time in my life and I couldn't have come this far without the help from the cats at nexusfi.com (formerly
BMT)
Thanks for all the assistance and insight from my best buddies... you know who you are
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