At the top, yes the very peak of this ideal persona you imagine for yourself sits a future you. Bloodied and bruised from heel to crown of head. He/she sits upon this heaping mass of hardship, tears, triumphs, realizations, victories and set backs. And atop it, you peer down at yourself and see that your eyes are craned upward in attempt to conquer this mountain made up of this self inflicted persecution called trading. Such an uphill battle. The struggle in itself feels the worst and yet the reward outweighs the pain. Discipline is gained and yet still, imperfections, those sometimes unavoidable aspects of the faults that lie within us rear its unwanted head as a reminder that perfection is but a dream. Loss will undoubtedly incur... but that fight for a win is what motivates an almost crazed aspiration to come out on top. This push and pull, rise and fall -- good and evil? Maybe... The urge to conquer yourself is addicting, truly. And trading is the worst way and best way to do so. Looking in the mirror of your bad actions, inside the market, would make the earnest hearted man cry. Because truly he defeats himself, the market is just a reflection of him. And whatever victory is gained in his campaign to climb that mountain, is a step closer to conquering himself and achieving his ideals inside the market and out. Such an uphill battle... If you're on this mountain, hats off to you. No one knows your struggle better than you. And uphill is where you can relay your story to aspire others. Never Look Down, And See You At The Top. -Lee
Well yeah, trading a 5K to 50K account and expecting to make 100K+ a year is always going to be an uphill battle. lol But trading a simple approach while being correctly capitalised with a sensible level of risk and realistic expectations doesn't have to be an uphill battle, quite the opposite if you can just 'go with the flow'...
Nice input. That's definitely the ideal mindset. And that's exactly where as a trader anyone should be. Unfortunately, that old adage, 95% of traders fail. And it's because of this uphill battle - however the battle may present itself - can't be conquered. See where I'm coming from? To me, Psychology is 70%of trading, some say more. You can have the other aspects like strategy, edge and risk management down pact, but blow it all up because your mindset is poor. So, sounds like you've reached your mountain top. Do you mind sharing your story? How long did it take you to get there? What were the struggles you faced?
I re-read a thread I started on another trader website a few years ago. I started it with an explanation of a strategy I was confident in and had back-tested a little and was trading with small positions. Some interested and well-meaning members made comments and suggested some refinements and I seem to have taken these seriously and modified the strategy and continued the forward-testing with commentary posted. By the end of the thread I was running a totally different strategy, which was only randomly successful in random weeks. Poor self-discipline I suppose.
Thanks for the input. It’s interesting how others can sway a persons decision making when it comes to trading. Usually as people out in the world we’re not so influenced by the opinion of others. But when it comes to trading, especially with having no solid conviction in oneself as a trader, one can easily fall victim to the opinions of others. I see it all the time. A person would change their bias and analysis on a ticker or trade simply based on a few words and opinions of another trader. Those initial thoughts that you were convinced of are no longer assured by your own conviction - but that of another. In this case with your strategy, right? Yeah I get it. It’s crazy how easily the mind can be swayed when there’s an eagerness to be right in your conviction when trading. The market also does this and it does it perfectly. Fake outs, liquidity grabs, reversals and consolidation. It’s all psychological mind games when you look at it. This is all apart of this mountain I spoke of. Each person has an individual uphill battle to journey before they become the ideal trader they see themselves as.
I would say psychology is 90% unless you go full algo. Problem with full algo is you will be fighting with algos from Goldman, Morgan Stanley and Citigroup. Their algo is AI, yours ain't.
anyone wants to become a mechanic just buys some tools and starts changing his oil, look at me i am a mechanic. a real mechanic works and apprentices at being a mechanic and about 10 years and realizes he didn't know shit changing oil and still has much to learn. but i have a college degree in the arts or some other stupid major, so i can forego any apprentice crap. now that i fail miserably, let me bitch about it to a bunch of strangers on a forum where surely everyone is more stupid than i am? that will likely make me feel better about myself... look you're totally lost go work for someone at the lowest level of your interested subject.
from purely a trading perspective, you need money to make money, no leverage, no margin. it takes time and daily effect, and focus on only few instruments, keeping simple. it is not about the percentage gain but volume.
Most definitely psychology takes the majority percentage of trading. I’ve never even delved into algo trading so I know nothing about it but I can see there’s no competition when you’re up against firms and banks with millions at their disposal for research and programs to put towards algo’s. That’s a big tree to bark up. Lol