Good wisdom as usual from FT71. I have a similar setup. I simply mark the day during the times I make most money. Once I reach 11:00 AM I check how much I've made. If I give back 10% of that, I leave the room for an hour. If if I give back another 10% of that original figure, I stop until 3 PM. If I lose that last 10% I turn off the computer. It's necessary at this stage for me to just hammer those rules in, forcing myself to leave the room no matter what. I miss moves in the afternoon sometimes this way, but on balance if I continue to give back more than 20% after 11 AM, I've found I trade myself down much further. The difficulty is when I am down net before 11 AM and then make it out of the hole by 11:30. Have to make some rules for that situation.
I have encountered quite a few traders over the years, who say things like: "I'm up a decent amount of money today, therefore I'll quit while I'm ahead and go home now." <b>Not a single one of those guys ever got rich. Most have since completely failed at the business of trading, while the very best of them never got better than five-figure grinder status. </b>
If there is a psychological problem it is that of an underfed cat who will eat very quickly anything it is offered. You have to take the whole day as one big cake. Eat it slice by slice or eat big slices from it. Among many matters you have not yet learned to address, your problem is in this equation: trading another bit of the day should not lead to a loss any more than trading an earlier part of the day. BTW what are the criteria for your entries?
======================== Jax Russell; And until you get to the point where you ''trade to take advantage of the opportunities given you by the market''; may find it helpful to check your brokerage statement or notebook for winning trade entry/exit time. Have had a profit target , especially downtrends,get hit in a few minutes ; usually takes longer,profits for me usually takes longer, so seldom enter a ES emini position in last half hour. Might not matter to a scalper. Actually dont have a rule forbidding it. Even though FuturesTrader71 has a smaller time frame than me; like the fact he has ran several businesses, including derivatives. And if most of my gains were in mourning , losses later; would fix that also. My losses are mostly caused by me not recognizing a weekly trend change, including but not limited to a sideways trend; which affects my intraday trend trading.
cud be a good sign...had da same prob for a long time in intervals...that's u instincts to preserve u capital...mind u all of da sudden i begun tradin' smaller'n'slowly increasin'; me tradin' took off in no time and had successes like never before. hang on
One strategy to overcome the psychological issue which you are experiencing is to lower the per trade expectancy whilst increasing the hit rate... Yes, you may well make less per trade (but maybe not overall, if the opportunity factor increases as a result of quicker trade duration), but at least you will get to book money more frequently, so at least you will get to feel good about yourself... For example, if you employed the above thinking your $700 day (which ended up being a $0 day) could have been, say, a $200 day... the downside is that a future $1400 day may only end up being a $1000 day etc... but the main thing is that you would be taking home profits most days...
Still hanging, I posted this before I read Trading in the Zone by Mark Douglas. I really think it helped me a lot more than and a lot faster than I could have done by trying on my own. Still working on it though.
dump books, never read 1 in my entire career, and glad did so...just trade very small, show uself consistency and things will take care of themseves, there are millions of ways to exploit da mkt and every personality can find somethin' that suits her needs; it's just up to ya to find u way and u will. have a good 1
I trade ES and use the following simple plan to protect my capital: For every ES point I book, I allow myself to give back roughly 1/3 of it before I call it a day. This plan is only applicable AFTER I've booked a profit and am TOTALLY out of a position. It does not apply to positions that I'm currently managing. If I've booked 6 points of profit, I allow myself to lose roughly 2 of it the rest of the trading day before I call it quits. In this manner, I'm able to ensure that I come back the next day with more "bullets in my ammo bag." My goal is to grow my account everyday. While I do recoginze that I miss out on many trading opportunities by embracing this mentality, I have found that it suits my psychological makeup best.
I don't understand the point of stopping for the day and going home... If each trade is an independent event, then who is to say the next 5 trades won't be winners?