Hey, I wonder if there is any way to put some sense into me, I feel I'm losing the plot. Been trading for 15 months now and never been able to keep consistency in my trading, and whenever I had some decent profit, was just because I was over leveraging. I keep doing the same mistakes over and over again. I depozit any amount, keep a decent risk management at first but just for a short while, and soon I find myself increasing my lot size and over trading. Many times I get influenced by other traders from the group chat, it makes me chance my bias and this gets me to close the trade when I'm in a little draw down, reverse my trade and then end up losing again, and then the trade goes by my initial bias. All the gains that I had, I ended up giving it back to the market, I barely managed to withdraw half of all the money I deposited from the beginning. The most frustrating thing is that I'm aware of all the mistakes I'm doing, I always say to myself that next time I'm not going to repeat them but eventually I still do it. I'm wondering if anyone been through the same feeling as I am.
Random suggestions: A) Create a spreadsheet on GoogleDocs or Excel. Depending on your trade frequency, write down weekly (or monthly, or daily) starting amount and ending amount, plus an automated column for returns. Add some columns to automatically calculate a target and max loss for a given start amount. When you hit target, trade much more defensively (potentially even stopping on first loss). If you hit max loss, stop trading for that period (and potentially longer if you're trading daily). Make a strong point of sticking to this, it will protect you from yourself. B) Ditch the group chat. Why hang out with losers that you admit are influencing you negatively? The majority loses money, don't hang out with the majority. C) Figure out your edge if you have any... you can also add to your spreadsheet above e.g. your preconditions for every single trade if you have the stomach for it, so you can systematically go back and deduce whether signals had any correlation with returns. I don't do this personally but I saw an experienced guy here suggest it and I can see why it would help. If you don't have an edge, you will be on a gentle downward slope using the above rules that gives you plenty of time to react.
Hey Geo, Couple of things. 1) There are many styles of trading. Choose one that works for you. It is like eye glasses, just because they work fantastic for me, does not mean they work for you. 2) The cycle you describe is typical and all new traders go through it. Less learn to get beyond it. 2.1) Think of it as driving. You can drive 2 hours no problem non stop. 14 hours non stop? Very hard. So if you can make 3 trades good. Stop, take a break. "get back in the car" after a rest period (maybe 25% of the time it took to make those trades), and make another 3. STOP. That may help break the cycle. 3) Go to Paper. Get consistent for 100 trades. After that evaluate all the trades and optimize. Do the work of understanding how you P/L evolves, which trades are consistent, which are outliers etc. 4) accept that you are not a trading savant. It take years. REALLY, years. Some of us have decades of work into this. Ignore the newbie chatter, hubris, and excitement. Trading should be kind of boring day to day. Best of luck
You posted it in the correct forum. Our subconscious mind has already been set. We can't erase it and reprogram it so that our minds are centred all the time. You have to face and address the root cause ( the mind aspect), Not avoiding the root cause. In fact, there are lots of trading books teaching us how to avoid addressing the root cause. the problem will surface again and again and again unless you do something to the mind. are you doing these every single day? mind centering exercise psycho cybernetics meditation EFT tapping meridian points or yoga, chakra etc etc etc
I've been in your shoes. Here're some ideas that might help you: 1. "...gets me to close the trade when I'm in a little draw down", this happens because you feel fear of significant loss potential, due to lack of confidence in the trades. Only way to increase confidence, is to gain knowledge and become (at least more) informed. 2. "I get influenced by other traders from the group chat..." This doesn't work, as mentioned above, deep down you don't really have much faith for the group chat opinions any ways, or you would've held positions til the wheels fell off. 3. "... and then the trade goes by my initial bias." Make decision to only take trades where you "know" will likely make money. Until you can achieve this level of understanding, knowledge, you shouldn't expect to be net profitable over time.
. Thanks for your advice. Been meditating before but not as much, now I'm focusing more on it, I've red Phycho cybernetics twice, The chimp paradox, and a great book called Trade mindfully by Gary Dayton - which actually is talking about not trying to get rid of the emotions but instead learn to use it to our advantage, and I've got another bunch of personal development books on my list waiting to be red so I'm working on it, I'm slightly starting to see some improvements. I'm also beginning to see the importance of journaling plus a healthy risk management. I've realised that there's so much more work to do when it comes to trading, apart of just learning the technicals and fundamentals, and I'm seeing the positive side of this journey in the sense that if the trader is willing to devote the time and effort, will improve as a person alongside the financial improvement so there are multiple benefits to it. Thank you!
Thanks for the suggestions, I've realised how important this is, knowing when to stop trading and knowing how much to trade, also the use of percentage instead of the amount helped a lot. I had a poor risk management and this plays a major part in a trader's journey, I guess that most traders have to go through it and learn the hard way before implementing and respecting the right rules. The group chat is the one from the trading course I've purchased, not gonna ditch it but instead I've started to engage less with it, and to stick to my plans and rules. Thank you!
Thanks for the thanks! I confess the above was my simple "aha" moment that turned trading from a completely scary random thing into something resembling a business. I might have been overly harsh on the group chat (though I'm not fond of trading education in general). We're social creatures after all. We're also both here on ET. But it's imperative to treat random people's unsubstantiated opinion as the trash (to you) it is, even more so in a space where they are 100% talking their own trades.
Hey, great advices, thanks! During this lockdown I'm having enough time to stay in front of the charts and put the effort on every aspect I need to work to. Already seeing slight improvements, so I'm hoping I'm on the right track. Like you said, it must be the cycle that most of the new traders go through, so now I embrace it and I'm beginning to have more patience with more realistic expectations. Thank you!
Hey, I appreciate your reply! I'm beginning to see how important it is to sit and wait for the right trade set-up, patience plays a huge role in this business. Before I used to place trade after trade, feeling that I must always have an open position if I am in front of the chart. Rules are set for a reason. And with the proper risk management, the fear of losing dropped significantly. I'm exited for this journey, and I'm looking forward to the end of the year to look back at this and observe the changes. With the actual slight improvements, I'm confident that it'll be for the better! Thank you!