Your are probably suffering from malnutrition. Your sitting at a monitor from day to day for hours on end and probably not eating balanced meals at regular intervals. I have found that calcium citrate is the best supplement to be found. When the body lacks calcium, you get this tired feeling and your sleep at night lacks quality. I too would have this tired-like feeling until I started taking the calcium citrate pills. Calcium citrate pills can be found at any pharmacy and its best that you drink a few cups of orange juice with them. The purpose behind the orange juice is for kidney stone prevention. You should take 1000 mg a day of calcium spread out over the day. The stomach can only digest about 500 mg of calcium at any given time so its best to spread it out throughout the day. If your uncomfortable with taking pills, then try out the calciumated orange juice that can be found at the store. Drink one 8 oz cup of calciumated OJ every few hours or so. The next variable is the social factor. There is no substitute for human company. However, its difficult cultivating new friendships when your out of college. Try www.meetup.com and find some social groups to attend.
I traded eurostoxx in the beginning but live in the US. I began trading from 2am to 1pm and realized it just was not worth it. I adjusted my schedule where I would trade from 2am til 4am or maybe earlier where I would have a good couple trades and already be at my daily goal. Take my pillow and sleep under my desk until about 6am, go get breakfast with other traders for about 45min to an hour. Come back read my rules to get in the right frame of mind before the 7:30 US economic data. Usually trade just into the US open and then sit on my hands until about 10:30. (this is all central time). Work the book for the last 2 hours but mostly non-participant. While it sounds boring, it was probably the best learning experience I could ever of had. There really is no reason to be in the markets all the time because there is no way to conserve your capital. Wait until you find the time for "you" to trade. Like Livermore said, "Sometimes my best trading was when I was not trading at all." Also a very good trader once told me that he never tried to get more out of the markets instead he just kept doing what he was doing but increased his size. He refered to it as giving himself a raise.
Thanks for the replies everybody. A bit of everything you suggested might be adding up and i need to sit down and analyze and come up with a solution. Basically, I started trading out of the necessity to escape the daily prison called work (i started working at 18). I also wanted to gain a new social status and not have to worry about money (came from a teacher mom/unemployed dad family). I was basically running from something and not TOWARDS something. That is why i have repetitive short term goals rather than coherent long term goals... For me, a long term goal might be that of maintaining my short term goals which is absurd.... Anyways, thanks again. PS: No bad post on ET can bring me down.... At least not anymore.
My health was taking a turn for the worse. I was more worried about my trading. Long story short, I only swingtrade stocks anymore. I work a lot less, see my friends/ family more, and feel a lot better. Take care of yourself... get happy.
Goals are important but you must not be so distracted by them that you miss out on what is happening NOW. The same applies to memories of the past. You need some nourishment. Read Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now or listen to the audio book (which better conveys the subtleties, IMO and is on the torrent servers - buy the book too though!). I'm not at all into the New Age stuff, but there is ancient wisdom contained in his work.
I can suggest some serotonin and/or catecholamine precursors for a N-T deficiency, but it's likely you're simply burned-out by your 11 hour day. I can relate to the intraday fx grind. I began trading interbank spot/options and forwards in 1991 while in grad-school. I had trans-lux boards installed throughout my house, including one in the master-bath. I carried a Metriplex FX/Alert pager and palmtop for portable quotes. There were some weeks that I received no more than 20 hours sleep, so I would sleep 30 or more hours on the weekend. I would suggest a swing-trading method or adapting your system to an index market like the FDAX. The ability to "turn-off" is critical to maintaining emotional health.
What about evaluating what parts of the day contain most of the highly liquid moves and only trading then. I trade HSI which means a 2 3/4 hour session, a 2 hour lunch break, and a 1 3/4 hour session that I normally cut short by 15 minutes. Add 30 minutes at the beginning to prepare for the day and that's enough.
Well, i am trading the european/london/london-newyork overlap sessions. I can't say that there is a period of the day when moves are setting up more frequently, as some have occured at different hours in the morning as a continuation of the asian moves, and some occur fresh during the day when certain trends turn and i am there to follow up on that. If i step further and go for a 4hour trend / 1hour execution then i have to watch setups that occur 24 hours a day, and that is really bad.... If i go even further to daily trend / 4h execution, then things will move so slow... In any of these cases i have to rethink all my short term goals and adapt them..
Or you may consider the possibility of automating your strategy, if it has been proved to be robust and worthy of this. I think forex is a market ideal for automated trading, and can only be traded by automation , else there can be too much of stress even you make money due to long session
I cannot automate my strategy. You see, during the years i have learned to recognize the subtleties of my setups, which are very simple. It's how the setup(given it's valid) "feels" that tells me how much i put into it... OK... Thanks for the replies again. I will take a break, clear my head and get back at it fiercer than ever Thanks