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Thanks, yes
And to believe you can do it
And Believe you are worthy of achieving it
For me i now need to treat this endeavour purely professionally.
Not for fun or social interaction....those things are good but very secondary side effects of the process.
Tried a lot, yes. But it works for me the other way - I just control my mind and don't let it go out of boundaries. And breathing calms down itself)
I have been in quite difficult and sometimes even dangerous situations in my life, and only mind control helped to overcome overwhelming fear.
Don't forget, whatever happens to you - is mostly because of fear. What is your fear? That is the point. Once you are ready to deal with fear - it's gone. Look at your fear, study it thoroughly. Listen to your guts - it's telling only truth.
Breathing techniques help in reducing side effects of fear, but fear isn't going anywhere. It comes back every time.
BTW, that "finish line" figure that for some reason you keep in mind - what does it mean to you, have you ever thought of that?
At first I thought my issue had nothing to do with fear. But when I re-read your comments tonight I suddenly had these thoughts. I think there are many fears. I think it starts with the fear of not being able to reach the goal. This fear is a consequence of the fear of having to wait longer to increase size/getting back to even. This comes from fear of not being able to make big money as soon as possible. The underlying fear is fear of not being able to trade consistently, which basically is the fear of not being able to generate an income from trading, which creates fear of having to stop trading.
That's a lot of fears . The good news is, since I've started this thread, I am working on self-discipline and am not focusing on the goal anymore. Instead I am focusing on the process. If I focus on the goal, I'm never gonna achieve it. Instead I focus on my behavior, because behaviors are in my control. Goals are not, they are controlled by outside factors.
That was the first step, maybe most important. Most people can't do it - facing their real feelings.
For now I suggest you try just to accept it. It's not "bad", "wrong" or "being not a man" to have those feelings, just accept as a fact. No emotions, no blaming yourself etc...
Suggest you now also watch how fears effect your life in general - this way you may see a bigger picture. And you may have lots of changes in your life ahead. And not only in trading.
Cool to see your thought process and how you worked your way backwards through it. Reading through your journal has raised a lot of questions about my own approach.
I have yet to place my first live trade, been in sim up to this point. Been thinking about going live for a while now. This morning I switched off sim and turned on live trading, and the simple act of doing that has made me apprehensive...I'm afraid to pull the trigger.
Is it the money? If I were to place a trade on my instrument and have it go against me, it wouldn't be a big deal. The tick value is absurdly low ($1.25) so even if the trade ran against me 10 ticks, it would be about what I spent on lunch yesterday.
Is it fear of losing? Maybe part of it.. but I'm gonna have to get used to it and even welcome it as a learning experience in this business.
Fear of the unknown? Yeah I think this is a lot of it... I've been self employed for almost twenty years now, and it's comfortable. I'm like a little kid again, learning to ride a bike for the first time, scared but excited. Trading is a whole new world that I've been peeking at through a keyhole in the door. (Answer: sooner or later I'm gonna have to open this door and step through it, see the whole thing for myself.)
Fear of not being able to trade... yes! Trading is something I really want to be good at. I've been the beneficiary of good success in my life. What if I suck? What if I never make it? (Answer: Success and failure are part of life, and how we grow. I'll never know unless I try.)
Thanks @rdaytrader and @roadahead for the poignant conversation. You guys have me looking deeper into myself, and ultimately I believe that is the goal of me becoming a trader. Now to focus on the process...
I suggest at this point it's a fear of "being wrong".
Just mentally accept a certain loss (say 1000 and be really ready for it, like it's already a happened fact!) and start pushing buttons. After some (short) time this fear should be gone.
Then you'll be facing some other fears (probably something similar to what was discussed above). And there will be a way out of it.
This story shall keep repeating (new fears coming out), until all of them connected to your situation will be gone.
You have to survive all this time and not blow up your account.
According to me, if we all started trading with "clean" mind (like in beginning of our lives), it would be exactly you and market process and no distractions. But we are all so "experienced" and "knowledgeable" that we have to fight our own beliefs (fears come from beliefs) first. Somehow we need to reach a state of that clean mind, where it would be only "me" and the market.
Some observations coming from a self employed hard working (manual skilled labour) background myself....
Hard work in the normal sense means nothing in the markets and it can be difficult to equate making large sums of money with sitting there clicking a button when you have done no physical labour to achieve it.
Also knowing how much hard work you have to put in to earn x bucks when it might be gone in the blink of an eye.
Knowing a nurse/fireman/policeman earns x a year when one can make x in a week can induce self worth issues. (They don't get well paid or as well respected our side of the pond)
Also there are the natural nature/nurture issues we all have. A fantastic book that outlines these is the Celestine prophecy by James Redfield
Read with an open mind it's well worth it. Might break out my copy tonight
Thanks for your feedback and sharing your own thoughts. I'm glad this thread is useful not only for me but also to others.
Unfortunately I can't really give you advice about the situation you're in, since I started almost directly with live trading. However, if I were to start over again, I would probably try to sim trade for a long time before going live. But I know/think/feel if you've never traded live before, it's hard to keep trading sim with the same attitude as trading live. I think an analogy could be that it's like having sex. Excuse me if it is inappropriate, but this just came to my mind . If you've never had sex before, you can have 'simulated' sex as long as you can carry on, but doing it for real is just different. Perhaps it's not the best comparison, but I think you get the point.
I've read your story in your journal and I think that having been an entrepreneur is a good starting point to start trading, since you've already enabled certain skills that are useful for trading. The fact that you already have these fears before trading live is one of them I think!
As you yourself say so, you have to experience it, otherwise you'll never know. If you're still afraid to trade, and you can still hold it out, I'd say keep sim trading until you feel comfortable enough to start with small account. Just my 2 cents.