expand your timeframe. you should think about alternatives to trading that can pay your mounting bills while you develop edge.
Well, I have some passive investments that provides me some cash flow. First week, I lost about $150/day net making 50 round trips. I've "improved" to $-25/day recently. Timeframe... I currently use a 1 minute bar, but am experimenting with using 5 minute bars. I find that I am extremely trigger happy and sometimes invent patterns of my own. I still dont know what volume and change in volume means and how it affects price. Today, I held a stock for two or three hours. That has been my longest hold, ever. FL was trading in a .29-30 range the entire afternoon. i was short at .33. s&p ran up, but FL wasnt budging. Stop was at .33, eventually the seller dropped down offers, and exited at .15. I was proud of that. But looking back, i dont remember why i was short. I think it had run up a lot in the AM and was losing steam. not sure why..
There is no reason to trade with real money until you can make money on a simulator or paper trading. You should be consistently a winner for atleast 2-3 weeks overall until you go to real money. As a wise man told me, there is no such thing as learn while you earn, it's burn will you learn. There is plenty of time to risk your real money. I don't trade stocks I trade futures. Futures offer alot more leverage than stock trading which can be really bad for someone new. If you do trade futures plan on no more than 1 contract per $5k or more in your account until you are consistent. Lastly do you have a sound method ( with a statistically proven edge ), and a written trading plan to guide you through the day? Without all of these things you are doomed to failure. Search ET you can find some good info on all. The hardest part of trading, you are already finding out, is the psychology. Get Mark Douglas Trading in the Zone, it's the best IMO. Good luck, take your time, the market is going nowhere.
If you beleive this thread your a fool! These are personal opinions as far as 90%. A few are true , but the rest is at best an attempt to grab money!
If you really want help then you need to unveil a lot more details about your trading. You could/should post your trades with charts explaining what you thought before you entered the trade and what finally took you to exit it, your targets, your stops,... After that you will get oppinions and suggestions from others. From the views of them you will get many new things to know. Some very usefull, some less. Add it up with your own experience and learn. Papertrading might be good for some people though for the majority it is not. Rather trade smaller position but keep it all real. When you are good in papertrading you will again arrive with the wrong expectancy to trade. The charts are simply there to show you the past and allow you projections. Making money out of it is by making the right decisions when you are in the market. Papertrading doesnt teach you that lesson. It makes sense for experienced traders who are going to trade a for them new market because they will not lie into their own pockets.
find a methodology, that has been making $. Then maybe you can try fellowing it? Edge don't disappear overnight, but keep your eyes on it. So go, don't sit here facing the computer, and bitch about your problems. Profitabilities come after much hard work.