The "matrix" is a clincher that changes everything in the world about making money. Just as in psychiatry people use a Progoff journalling approach (making an initial table of contents based on chronological decision points through life history). The "contents", then is the foundation of problem solving by linearly going back to the source of the problem by journalling "essays" into the contents. Overlaying rows and columns on the "system" yields a set of cells. Discovering clearly and strongly that the market "moves" is a major conceptual precept. It has major consequences. The most significant is that many many alternative analysis techniques are shot in the ass and/or destroyed as being viable. Macro is one of these. As Harry trader points out in about 8 of his themes centering on "the general" compared to the "the local", you can talk about the macro but the micro is where making money takes place. Doing averages to find out something is not where it's at. When you look at how "red flags" come up on ET, you are seeing the knashing of viewpoints where the incompatibility usually is based on generalization versus localization. There is also the "sophistication issue." In zero sum games, most people are losers to the few who accumulate capital continually. Some accumulate it at "ridiculous" paces. The difference between "moving" and "jumping around" from place to place, definitely and carefully and finally focuses us on local concerns only. Thus migration on a large array, at any given time, only deals with the tic tac toe configuration of the centered operating point and the 8 adjacent cells totally. As the operating point moves, so does the compliment of the 8 surrounding cells. It turns out the focus on the 8 cells surrounding the operating point, it primarily an issue of what is not going to happen. As all the alternatives close down, the viable alternative emerges. driving a car is a good analogy. The goal is 600 bucks a day for a beginner who has reached a novice level of operating. The goal is the mall. To get there you begin to drive with many ways to get there, gradually alternatives are eliminated as you focus on being effective with what is in you immediate field of vision. You arrive and do "mall" instead of doing "home". If you recognize the "zones" of alexander's method (least connected sub systems) and you see the local array (t t t ) moving from one zone to another zone and, thus, gradually seeing the "emphasis" change, then, you adapt to this in your trading. In ET, at least 20% of the threads originate as this migration gets to the point where a zone change has occurred. Surpriseville. Look at the vocabulary used by these participants. The chider group on ET (see high #'s of posts that cover subsets of chides) plugs right in with a set of responses to "surprised" thread starters. A brain fart symposium of the regulars. ET is a sounding board of the difficulties when the financial industry which often uses inappropriate techniques. This all is as a consequence of not understanding that you cannot apply big deal techniques that fail to address the fundamental and localized way the market operates. If you plot the trail of the market operation point for 40 or so years on the Matrix, you conclude that it is a repititious process and the advent of improvements in the industry only relate to how people are supported in their efforts. The repetitive paths that emerge allow you to iteratively refine your operating methods. Refinement makes more money. The advent of support systems to enable the field to go macro was extremely unsuccessful. But it did provide an advantage to those focussed on the local scene. How to stage up to excellence is uncomplicated. A person learns, creates memory and reasons using his memory. In ET, the primary focus is on continuing failure. I cite a sufi book on "knowing how to know". I mention the AIDS equivalent for trading, PNI. I mention the requirement for a belief system (step 3 of 4 steps) that is perfected through "process". Occassionally, I handle the BS detractors farting around with: "can the process" and just write it down on a sheet of paper (like the sheet(s)paper they got at work to be a robot where they still have to work). Most of all, I support learning. It is my principal interest when I lecture in the field of psychiatry. I do not feel formal traditional teaching is effective nor efficient. I conducted an alternative for ten years and used a 100% sample to statisticulate about it. 1.23 aptitude sigma shift on a +/-3 sigma gausian curve. This is a statement about memory accumulation and reasoning shift as a consequence of "learning". Process education is how to learn to make money. This thread is about 6K a month. 1 or 2 ES contracts make 600 to 800 bucks a day. There are 22 days in a month. Pick one of a hundred approaches. Learn about it by stages of comprehension, preferably with a learning support called a mentor. Build a belief system for the chosen apporach. Enable yourself by creating a memory. Begin to reason (gather data, do analysis, decide using beliefs, and take timely actions) using this memory resource connected to your electronic support system. One paragraph. Repeated failure, on the other hand engenders "trader AIDS" for which the cure is a hundred times more difficult than the above paragraph.
My heart goes out to you, brother. Trading is my passion too so I know kind of where youre are right now. We have some things in common so I hope you don't mind if I lay some advice on you from a complete stranger. First and foremost, I'm going to go with some others on this thread and suggest getting a job so that you can feed that beautiful wife and daughter. Yes, I know you have your savings but I think you should designate that as your trading stake only. Once you do this, a tremendous weight will have been lifted from your shoulders. Even if it cuts into your trading time, you should still do it. Your learning curve will be extended but your chances of success will increase greatly. You can always scale out of the day job later once you get consistent with your trading. This is my personal example: Before I came down with the trading bug, I had a great job. Luckily, I'm self-employed so I have the flexibility that some others don't have. It's taken me a lot longer to learn to trade, but after three years I haven't blown my account (knock on wood). This is due to a strict adherence to money management and patience. I work on the markets on my off time (after family time of course) and I sometimes take a week off to concentrate on trading if I get on a roll (learning, not trading). Things are progressing slowly but surely because I have a written business plan complete with short and long term goals. My ultimate goal is to quit the nine to five and trade exclusively so that I will have the flexiblilty to be involved in my childs life as much as possible. Although I am far from "rich," I am not stressed about money at all. I know that I can always go to the nine to five to pay the bills or generate trading capital. Incidentally, money is the number one cause of marital strife and divorce so you might want to make sure you have that one nailed down if you want to stay relatively happily married. My job is so cool that sometimes I can fire up the laptop there and make a couple of trades if my setups happen to present themselves. In fact, last week I nailed 5&1/2 ES points just by logging on an hour before the NY close. That's another advantage I have- I live in the Pacific time zone so I'm able to trade the first hour or so before I have to show up for work. I sometimes plan my lunch hour so that I can catch the last hour. Maybe you should consider moving out to the left coast . This is very long-winded but the gist of it is that I think you should get a regular job at least temporarily. A lot of posters are harshing you about needing 6G's a month to maintain your lifestyle but I have to disagree with them. I like spending money too and my wife does also. I like to eat well, live in a nice area, send my kid to a good school, and feed my gadget addiction. I'm an unabashed, admitted materialist. Whatever makes you happy! The ultimate coup for you would be to find a way to maintain your ways while building a solid foundation for your future trading career. You have an extremely long and bumpy road ahead of you. Enjoy it! You only live once so make the best of it. Don't spend it being stressed out about the stupid money. Your family deserves the best of YOU so give it to them, however you can. All good things take time. A lot of extremely successful entrepreneurs spent many years living on a shoestring before they finally "made it." Sorry for the wordy post, I hope I've helped in some small way. Uni P.S. You might find some nuggets in Mark Douglas' "Trading in the Zone..."; I sure did. Oh, and read what Dbphoenix writes carefully. You don't have to agree with him 100% all of the time but he's a pretty generous and knowledgeable guy (unfortunately a rarity around here). Take care of yourself and your family.
go to www.Woodiescciclub.com to the lectures section, there is a lady trader there who does regular lectures on the psychology of trading.... Listen to her and learn. Also goo to join the CCI club on hotmom. Its free (but for the hotcom fee). Its a bit noisy but very friendly and there are a lot of soulmates having the same problem.... Good luck!!!
Misery loves company. A more important issue may be whether any of them are making money or not. Fear is not the problem; it's only a symptom.
Criticize any guru and their followers will rush to his/her defense. It's to be expected since it's a ramification of being incapable of assuming responsibility for one's own situation.
my fear right now is cutting back on my biz vs. never giving FT trading a chance. the commercial real estate appraisal biz is really strong and there is plenty of work. i traded and worked FT about 2-4 years ago and got totally burnt out - i mean crispy. i was channel/range trading on swing basis, basic support resistance with good risk/reward set-ups. nothing fancy, enter position, set-stop, monitor trade, sell some to lock in profit, move up stop to BE or better and sell the remaining portion at resitance (reverse for shorts). nothing fancy. i was real precise (maybe too precise aftreall im a friggin appraiser) about going really small on the risk side with tight stops. i wasnt mechanically scanning, i was sitting up going through charts at night... i had files on like 40 stocks and i would wait for set-ups, or scan and hit a decent set-up. i was up $50,000 in first two months - solid - im pretty well off and have almost no bills, incoem property paid-off and home F&C. then one day i was waiting to go long myriad genome and it came to resistance a couple of times and i thought screw this, ill short it, cover and then still go long! so, shorted 2,000 shares at like 52.14. was up $2,000 on the short and it was quiet during lunch, so i ran into take a shower (no stop) - like 3 minutes and im out. broke through resisatnce and now im eff'd; im short a stock that i wanted to go long and its going against me worse by the minute. the pro play was cover ona retrace and get long if the r/r wasnt too bad. well, it sucked, i did everything wrong. i held over night, it was all i could think about. eventuallty, i sold 1/2 at 57 and the other 1/2 at near 60, right before it reversed. i may not have the math exact, but it was a $20,000 shower. and it just messed with my head, i stayed up later and later trying to find good set-ups and it jsut burnt me out - it was not the $20,000; it was the stupidity and self-criticism; also i had a trading partner in another state, which made the embarrassment worse, becuase he is totally disciplined. i started to violate stops and i had some wierd days when i was in the field and the market stopped me out and then reversed in my direction. when it goes bad, it just goes bad. anyway, as you vets already know, the $50,000 vaporized over time. worse, i was just one crispy critter, so i stopped trading and just ran the biz. also at the same time, my buddy and i developed an intraday system for trading the QQQs. he retired early and is solidly profitable week in and week out with the system - he swings the QQQs a bit, but trades nothing else. im almost 49 yo and as time passes its gonna get harder to let go of the rope and jump into the void to grab the trapezze... kinda a mid-life thingy, but also a self-actualization kinda thing too, 'cause im pretty well off and could work PT (or maybe even stop) and make more than enough to live off of... the idea is transition, but im fearful if i dont do it now or fairly soon, i may never - but if i fall on my mug, id had to scale the biz back and then have to re-enter and crank it up, perhaps a bad real estate market. - no dun there. a presssing issue is that the biz lack fulfillment at this point, in fact it feels pointless. each years as i dump old files into the paper recycler, i feel like im dumping anothr year of my life into teh garbage. anyway, im snivelling, but im am wrestling with trying to do the RIGHT thing, while FEARFUL OF not trading and FEARFUL of quitting the biz too early.