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I just can't figure out this "trading a plan" thing everyone talks about. How do you create a specific plan when everything is so random. Let's say you only want to enter trades after a higher-high, retracement, and then a continuation.

I made a spreadsheet of about 200 of these situations & sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. I tried really hard to determine what led to a target being hit vs stopped & it all just seemed random to me. It worked a little better when the price action was really going up steeply, but still not that great.

I've looked at other patterns also. I can't find one single way to trade strictly according to a plan that is profitable.

If a brain is anything like a computer I have some kind of glitch which is causing me to miss what I need to be seeing. I am completely lost. I think I'm the worst trader wannabee I've seen on this site.

 

No offense intended, but this is really sort of pitiful, and you need to stop. Like yesterday. You appear to have no concept of buyer and seller behavior: what they're thinking, what they want, how they interact with each other. Without that, you could develop something that is entirely indicator-based, but you'd have to be tweaking it on a regular basis. And you'd always be late.

If I had traded this according to my plan, I'd have three longs and three shorts, and that's it. Each trade is taken at the first retracement of either an upmove or a downmove. When the move ends, the trade is exited and I wait for the first retracement during the "counter" move. If there's no retracement, there's no trade. Or if price can't break out of a trading range it happens to fall into, there's no trade there, either.

There's a bit more to it, of course, but that's it in a nutshell. But if you have no concept of demand and supply, it won't make any sense to you.

Imagine working in a grocery store in which all transactions are bartered. Then work there for a year.

 

Well at least I know I can still laugh at it all...............as you observed that it's "really sort of pitiful". It's funny in a way, but not so much since I am really, truly, trying.

It's like I see things that aren't really there. I have a glitch in my brain.

I can turn on the computer at any time & immediately come up with a reason to enter a trade (usually wrong unfortunately).

If I could trade one single setup that was tested & I had confidence in I would gladly trade it like a robot, but I can't find anything like that.

I can sit at a blackjack table & play strictly by the rules for hours & hours if I wanted to. It's not like I have a discipline problem or anything like that.

I scrolled thru charts many times trying to trade by the lines you talk about, but I still get my butt kicked.

It pisses me off because I sit at my horrible job watching people who don't attempt to do anything except sit there day after day, and I try my hardest to break out of that situation, and I'm absolutely horrible at what I have chosen. Ugh !!!!!!!!!!

 

Well, I'll take you at your word that you're really truly trying. You've been at this for six years so clearly it's not just something you're dabbling at. I have no idea why you're trying or what you want but it's really none of my business and it really doesn't matter anyway. But there are at least a couple of problems that are easy to spot.

For one thing, you think WAY too much. You over-analyze. You anticipate. You visualize scenarios in your head and translate them into something that is actually occurring, that is, you think about what you expect to see and then you see it even though it isn't really there.

For another, you are continuously expecting tricks and traps, so you see them even though they aren't really there. And by trying to avoid them, you end up falling into traps of your own devising.

There's more, but that's enough to virtually guarantee failure.

You've been at this long enough that your behaviors, including your fears, must be thoroughly engrained, so starting over is most likely not an option. But you may be able to institute some self-protective tactics that will enable you to at least get through the day without losing too much money, like learning how to scratch. Otherwise you really need to move on. Do good works or something. Not everybody is cut out to be a trader.

If you can't leave it alone, here's one suggestion which may seem awfully esoteric, but there it is. When you open a chart, ask yourself who's in charge, buyers or sellers? Why do you think so? What are they doing that leads you to that thesis? If buyers are truly in charge, then price will rise and you can go long. If sellers are in charge, then price will fall and you can go short. If neither of these actions occur, then you misinterpreted their behavior. What did you miss? What was the story? How did you misread it?

 

This is neither better or worse – just another view


With all the rejection ~ 95.15.., and the big down bar 7:15

I wouldn't be looking long till that whole mess was taken out

(Picture price moving up – then repeatedly getting slammed down – but only to a point)

In the meantime I'd look for a short setup(s)

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There also the last 3 decreasing highs (7:25 / 7:51/ 8:09) (although the last two are pretty much equal) but taken in its entirety - price is being compressed

Either it’ll break through the bottom… or burst out the top

Disclaimer – I don’t trade CL – nor claim to know its characteristics

RN

 

I should have said that I don't either. I studied it long enough to know that it held no interest for me, nor do any other commodities. And Macattack might be happier with something that actually trends. But that's beyond the scope of the discussion, I guess.

Thanks for bringing that up.

 

Why? Why trading? Be specific.

 

Trading PA successfully is solely predicated on trusting price / trusting what you see

If one can’t do that – one is in a constant battle with their self – that he/ she will never win


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And the whole mkt is out to get me thinking is self inflicted bullshit

RN

 

Price action is far from random. dbPhoenix posted a chart indicating "three longs and three shorts" according to his plan. If price is so random why does my plan allow for 5 of those 6 trades?

So you want to enter trades after a higher high, retracement, then get in on the continuation. I'm assuming you want to do this with the 1-min chart, so starting at the pit open today, the first higher high occurred during the 7:09 PST bar when the resistance shelf of 94.16 broke by 2 ticks. I would never construe this as a "higher high" because it's simply a failed break of a range high. Also if you had your upper trend line drawn from pre-market, that 94.18 touch was almost to the tick of that UTL. (That was a juicy short signal for me with a profit target zone at the LTL in the mid-93.80's.)

It's a pure downtrend from then into the pit close, no higher highs that I can see. You could've gone fly fishing to the long side in the chop (around the flat 5-min 20EMA), but price simply failed to make a significant break through that UTL, so any longs would be scratched and then when the LTL of triangle breaks during the 8:16 PST bar, then look to sell retraces for continuation.

So you've studied 200 of these situations.

FWIW, I have over 450 spreadsheets, at least 300 of which have 6 or more trades studied, including description of setup, description of price environment/context, MAE/MFE, results with fixed targets vs. flexible targets, results with break even management, and additional notes.

When you watch a figure skater or a gymnast perform at the Olympics, it looks so effortless you lose sight of the fact that it took not only certain innate abilities, but also 12 hour days, day after day for years, to get to that level.