LOL That sounds hilarious man! Admittedly, while my knowledge on Seinfeld or any soaps is very limited by choice, the approach you talk about has been discussed in many areas of life I think. The irony is that being "opposite" or against the common perception of direction, is a secret dream of more people than like to admit. So many people are "normal", "mainstream", but don't want to be "normal". However, their conformist upbringing, coupled with a fear of change, is much stronger, and usually wins. A shining example I found was a craft item my dad made a few weeks ago. He is an artist (actor, musician and craftsman) and therefore by necessity non-conformist, much like me. Well, he made a gorgeous silver bracelet with a relief of a stream of fish "flowing" across it from one end to the other. But, in the middle, there was a single fish, swimming the other way, against the "stream", with a diamond set in its eye... I loved the item, it was awesome. Not to much surprise, the item sold within like 3 hours of being put on display, for a very high price. It was one of the fastest-selling items ever I think. What does this tell us? We all, deep within, want to be different, but few of us dare, not to mention ever master it and live it. The total irony in the (futures) markets is that it's a constant battle of nonconformism. It underlies a constant shift to the favor of the non-conformist. As soon as a majority goes one way, the direction has to shift by necessity, in order to let the non-conformist minority profit from the mainstream majority. This is why most traders lose. Because most people (traders = people) are by nature conformists. They do not want uncertainty, they want to see someone else to the same thing do verify the validity of their doing. Like they want to follow a trend, and not enter until the trend is "well established"... In my view, trading is the most absolute distillation of the non-conformist idea, further amplified by the principles of greed and fear, rendering it a continuously flowing, yet ever-changing symphony of sentiment that favors those who dare to argue with the spirit of the collective, while the majority within collective only dares to argue with the swords wielded by them, and you cannot withstand or argue with a sword, only lose a limb to it. However, those few brave ones who dare to train hard and find gaps to axe within the spirit itself, will emerge victorious in the ever-frenzious path of volume conquest and price discovery. That day when I had my large losses was a perfect example of this. 90% of my trades are fades (mostly in the direction of the trend, so you could also say retracement entries), and it was a break-out day, all day long. What had happened? Well, that very day, far too many people were trying to do the same thing as I was. They had their volume sitting on the fades, rather than continuation. Logically, rather than the fades working out, the volume on the fade side was far too attractive not to be consumed by the bold ones, so they fired at the fades, taking out their volume, then running right through to trigger all their stops, further reinforcing the run, all the while making large profits. I was watching the depth & tape and knew exactly what was going on here. Yet I still stayed with my system, assuming that the "norm" was soon to return. It didn't for the day. It was a day where people agreed on running stops, and so they did. But I stuck with my system. Which was good, for as long as you have no complete set of rules to govern contrary action, do not attempt contrary action! It was folly and emotionally biased of me to assume that my edge had disappeared forever. On the flipside, the experience animated me to research the total contrarian side of my approach, which is what I did all over the weekend. I now am prepared to adapt a completely 'contrarian' approach if the parameters agree, and well prepared for the next time such a market behaviour pattern arises. As I went deep into this study, I discovered that "contrarian" strategy adaptation is not a matter of doing "the complete opposite" at all. Much rather, it is doing the exact same thing, only, so to speak, on a different frequency and amplitude! If you look at a few charts, you will know exactly what I mean... Take a complete fade entry in one timeframe, and you will most likely have at least one other timeframe where the same trade is a trend entry, and another one where it's a retracement entry. The same that applies for timeframes, also applies for MM rules and directional decisions. iriekity, I would love to hear some further thoughts and explanations of yours as to your knowledge and perception of the Constanza method. Best Regards, Scientist
How or as what do you define "this very special time"? Easy? Difficult? From what perspective? From what location? For example, would you consider this "very special time" to be similarly perceived by people in the USA as it's perceived by people currently living in Romania, Ireland, Cuba, Brazil, USA, China, Switzerland? I well accept your apology, but I think the reason the confusion arose was your lack of specification in the first place. You assumed we all knew and thought the same about what you were talking about. Not all of us did. Why don't you give us a summary about your own perception about the "macro environment of this very special time"? I would be all ears to hear! Best, S