@tiddlywinks gave an insightful answer to your question @WchPl. However from what you have described of your struggles, you might want to consider sticking to the ES until you've built up some level of confidence. You have not incorporated the basic concepts as it applies to the ES, nor drilled extensively on that instrument. You've not produced one completely annotated chart nor log on the ES yet you continue to hop around to other instruments. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that, but at your level of questioning, you appear to have a habit of making things difficult for yourself by a constant shift in focus. There's not necessarily a "right way" to learn the method however there are recommendations that make forward progress easier to accomplish.
This is a nice question, to which I can't answer better than what follows : currently, and it has always been like this so I'd say : since the beginning, I've always been trying to get 100% of Jack's SCT method, in order to be profitable 100% of the time, on any market. So, I'm doing my best to BE a SCT trader, as I've understood it is the most profitable, the most expert and hardest method. For the now, who am I then ? ...well...I'd say I'm a SCT learner. From what I know about Jack and his SCT, the job is to get 3 levels of fractal, and to trade from ftt. Profits are made when price changes, and the ftt is the signal price is discontinuing to do what it has been doing. I know the differentiation bewteen ftt and FTT : ftt are for Fast fractals, FTT for Trading fractal, right ? I assume if one can trade the ftt's he can also do so on FTT's, as they're the same thing but from a different level. I'm just trying to get everything that is to be know in order to reach the point where there is no reason no to be in the market at every second. Whichever name it has, I do not really care and do not really know. I'm just learning to get to this point. There is no market that does interest me really. The only interest I have for any market, is 100% positively correlated to its degree of extractability (as for its offer) by me performing the SCT. Then I have no reluctance to monitor whichever market. I just don't see any difference between them anyway. All areseries of bars in a row with volume underneath, for my eye. Thank you for thoses examples of markets, I will post soon a last version of my nested fractals on some markets you mentionned to me. I am very glad to see you actively answering and providing some thoughts. Thank you very much Tiddlywinks !
I did not know that drilling on different markets was not a good idea. I thougt a point 1 or an ftt or a ve was the same on any market. I thought knowing to do any drill on one market meant you could do it on any other one. My mistake, it's ok, thank you. Thank you for the warning, I'm gonna try to follow your recommendations. It is not so easy, as sometimes I have posted fully annotated charts (relative to what I know for sure), and you keep on saying I did not. This situation can only mean I am missing something. PS : I post the 5 or 10% of the drills I do. I have done my best to finish the comprehension of the nesting of the fractals. I said I'll move to the Failsafes, BM and VTP if that last attempt was not good. I felt way better at ease while doing this drill one last time, so I decided (being as you said I'm the only one who can answer the question "must I put this item aside or do I continue ?" ) to 100% finish the drilling of nesting fractals. I'm gonna post a serie of fully annotated charts with : - tapes - fast fractal - trading fractal - slow fractal - pre-lats - Lats - BM - guessed failsafes - pts 1, 2, 3 - ftt - fbo - ve - tb - turns - 3 rows of gaussians I'll join a Log for each chart. I will fill what I can, which is the same as what I've been able to do from the beginning, in other words not much. I'm still at the same level, beeing as the nesting of fractals took me much time. Once this will be done, I will start one more time my study on the VTP.
If you do not know already, the ET search function is horrible. Use Google instead. "quote from jack hershey" "drills" -spydertrader site:elitetrader.com You can replace the word in blue with any word you like and search his quotes. The -spydertrader is to disallow any of his posts coming up in spydertrader threads. I hope this helps anyone trying to do research on what he said about certain things.
Beginner and intermediate levels are mentioned and recommended, probably for a reason. Why not start there, rather than expecting to leap straight to the highest attainment level of SCT, from what: nothing? JH mentioned many approaches, not just SCT, where SCT was used to minimize risk, when successful in "staying at the right side of the markets". One of the core concepts of JH is "iterative refinement", which means you need to start where you are, build on some success (validated correct understanding of market structure), and lay stone by stone of improvements, discarding or postponing what does not work for you. Sometimes, that may even mean deconstructing everything you thought you knew as true, in order to lay a more robust foundation. The nature of this process is you never know in advance, until you see the need to change and verify new understanding, so flexibility of mind and self-responsibility is required. When gaps are too wide (chasms), you may even need to invent "training wheels" in order to create temporary bridges in understanding. If you don't see differences between markets, that may mean you don't have enough real trading experience to build on. How can you aquire this experience, preferably without creating failure, as repeat failure can wreck a mind? Often this means trading small for learning purposes. Do you have some interest in this? If not, why would you have enough interest to create trading systems using JH methodologies? Trading results depend on a holistic and practical approach. No methodology can do the job for you making it all work in practice. Real experience may teach you that hindsight perfection is often not present in real-time analysis, so various adjustments and considerations may be needed that you just never see in hindsight.
@WchPl 1) Pay attention to what is being conveyed by @Sprout and @Simples 2) Without VTP, you can not annotate properly or completely. If you can not annotate properly you can not identify points 1,2 and 3. If you can not identify points, you can not construct containers. If you can not construct containers, you can not identify Ftt's. As you explained in your previous post, Ftt's are necessary for your trading goal. There is plenty here to keep you busy, engaged, and progressing. Your work thus far, IMO, has been scattered across many pieces of JHPV, few of which have been fully understood by you. A "Jack" of the pieces, with mastery of none. All in hindsight as well. It is time you focus on what you actually need to trade, not what you THINK you need.
Thank you very much James Roscoe and Simples for your answers. I maybe need to provide a bit of context around my work : I became aware of the existence of JH stuff 5 years ago. It took me 1 year to understand the importance and believe in the SCT. I took 2 years to read all the litterature quoted in the very first message of that thread, and to try to understand everything. I took 2 years more to pair up my understandings with real time charts (the 2 first years I never opened a chart, I was only reading threads). I've been from one year now trying, for example, to go back in time and read some litterature on an problematic area in the morning, then annotate the charts in th afternoon, then a break, then back at my desk to invent "training wheels" to quote you , then re-annotating in the evening, reading a bit in the night. Along the last 2 years, it has been 1 year of this routine 7 days a week, and 1 year 4/5 days a week. This is where I am now. This morning I read again Sprout's message about Inductive/Deductive/Abductive reasonings. I annotated half of the charts I wanna post tonight. I'm making a break now as I'm writing to you This is the kind of routine I have. I've been through this process you mention of construct and deconstruct believed or taken as true things/concepts/ideas/results. I have invented maybe 10 or 15 derivated methods from my understandings of the SCT. All have failed. I started for example from an hypothesis, considerating that it was true in the SCT, so it had to be true in my method. Going from similar to different results on both methods, I was trying to make, build, partly-broke, reconstruct, or crush some believed things, to begin again until creating the system that was so close to what I understood of the SCT, that it could be that I was already understanding the SCT before knowing it. As this result never happened, I decided some months ago to rego in some litterature, this was a wonderful advise from Sprout. I discovered a new world with the way of nesting fractals. And the 3 levels. I knew about many things, but never 100%. Always many areas, concepts, theorems, but always partly understood. Currently, I feel nice confort with - the fundamental concept of Volume : when inc then trend is continuing; when dec, trend is changing - Tapes - fanning drawing and concept - acceleration drawing and concept - Nesting fractals - Turns - Concepts and Locating of Points 1, 2, 3, ftt, fbo, tendance bar (tb), bo on any channel - Locate Laterals - Identifying any price case - Locate Bookmarks - Tapes - the concept of Gaussians I feel a bit less at ease with - Failsafes - drawing Gaussians I feel horrible with - VTP (filling the VTP cells in the Log) - Bands - the context given by a Lateral price case I will fill that list along the time, as I think about one more area, or if one changes of list. I saw recently that I know much more than I said and believed I did. This is really good for me as it brings energy to me, in addition to all the advices I had from generous people, that I incorporate in my routine. I feel very good as I see you all lead me to better results, and do not think I am not ready to deconstruct any idea. Sprout could confirm, as I already wrote him that i'm ready to begin from scratch with any knowledge area of the stuff if it is good for my comprehension. I am not really sure of what you talk. When you say "trade small". Do you mean open orders of few money ? To learn ? If this is what you mean this is a contextually impossible thing. If not, wan you help me with the sens of your question please ? It has already been said to me, and I feel lucky that someone took the time and the patience to reiterate the advice. Thanks a lot, I am on solving that problem. Annotating more in real time. I just have to say a thing. This an explanation, not a justification -> as I said I'm a bit lost with markets to monitor and do MADA on. So I've never managed to get some markets (since I know I need around 2.5k contracts on popular markets in a nutshell) that provide sufficient liquidity. That's why I had no choice to annotate only one market in the best case, in real time. So, most of time I annotate after the fact, it must represents 60% of my work. I am gonna remedy this, thanks to tiddlywinks I do not want to create any system. I wanna understand the SCT system of JH, to be in the right side of the market at each and any time. "No matter" what it takes, I'm just here to do everything that is actually needed to get it. Thanks a lot one more time, I'll do much much more real time annotations.
I have a strong abhorrence to sadism. Nonetheless, I have to say : some months/years ago, what you say here would have been felt by me as the most humiliating sentence about my work. Today, I feel just very happy that you told this to me. I hear it like "you really know many things about really many things of a really big part of the method. But you just don't get the full identity of each of those things, nor the link that keep them together". To me, today, it is a very positive thing, cause if the way I hear what you say is good, if I understand what I actually need to do, and if I do it and finally get the whole, then what I already know about so many things but so scattered, will be very useful Yes, definitely.
"Trade small" means trading using minimum amount of money, to get a feel for how markets work for you, yes, in order to learn the practical nuances of real-time execution. By demo you can get a feel for how broker interface works too, for free. This is crucial experience in order to do/plan any real trading. Forgoing this step, can create alot of pain if trying to trade with normal/large position, and if too big losses ensue can be crippling. So best avoid that and try to solve "trading small" first IMHO. It is possible, but as everything, require responsibility and finding solutions. This is adviced because trading, managing positions on HRE in real-time, is very different from just doing analysis and annotating. It's the difference of being a passive spectator and an active participant. I know it isn't easy, and it's hard to find a firm foothold in markets. But it's crucial that *you* find where *you* have opportunity for growth. Nobody here says such things to hurt anyone, but is meant to kick your ass in the general right direction. What can be experienced through real trading can be much worse if not dealt with swiftly, so some toughening and rude awakening may assist recognizing this faster. JH notes and documents do not prescribe finished systems, but methodologies of understanding, hints and drills. The systems itself left as exercise to the reader. You may find bits and pieces scattered, but no whole system description/explanation, that I'm aware of at least. This explains all the confusion and differences between JH practitioners. There are multiple possible systems mentioned by JH, and it may be easier/faster to start at beginner/intermediate level, or with a system that makes most sense to you to gain some proficiency in. It seems you have chosen SCT, but may not realize how difficult it may be as a starting block (high step), or its limitations (the need for correctness and constant monitoring). Being the last system developed, there may be an easier, more direct path, leading to earlier success to build upon. I consider Consistent Break Even first step in the ladder of success, as demonstrably some success to build on further. If *your* trading system is not yours, to create, maintain and destroy, how can you ever trust or depend on it? You need to understand every nuance of said system yourself, as asking around for advice will be too late in real-time. If there's a finished manual somewhere though, I'd appreciate a working link or post on it!
Hi there. I am lurker at ET since nkhoi invited Jack here. I read nearly all of his posts in real time until 2007, the year I got married. I have come back to ET and joined because I saw that JHM still goes on, even to this very day. I noticed that you did not mention a category in your studies, and that is EE. You have to know what some of the basic end effects are. Most traders know when to get in, but getting out is an issue. For example, c turns kill any trend. "quote from jack hershey" "volume test" -spydertrader site:elitetrader.com See what comes up from that search. "quote from jack hershey" "volume bands" -spydertrader site:elitetrader.com Check this one out also. "quote from jack hershey" "laterals" -spydertrader site:elitetrader.com There is an OOE to building the mind. Jack laid this out. Try to not take short cuts, try to not invent.