Actually, after reading your prep work, I was determined that it was going to go up. A) I need to do my own prep work rather than riding someone else's coattails. B) I'm working on reading price - not making an assumption of what I think will happen. You'd think I'd learn... Yes even in sim I'm just using one contract. Do you find that using more helps a lot with gaining confidence as you can back one off (presumably collect profits), and let more ride? As always, your encouragement is appreciated, Niko.
Yes, you cant execute someone else´s prep-work. Less decisions to make under pressure. With 1 contract you have to exit and reenter too many times.
Today was a pretty good day on a few levels. A) The market moved and I was in on it. B) I entered some trades that didn't work out and I kept trying (that whole plugging away bit). C) I learned YET AGAIN to trust the SL/DL even when I'm uncomfortable. I didn't necessarily do this, but the SLA is proving itself to me time and time again. D) I was able to brush off my frustration from yesterday and allow today to just be today. The market doesn't care how I'm feeling - I just need to work my plan. Based on where things were with the overnight action, I figured that there'd be a push up to 3660, things would hang around 3620 or there'd be a drop back down to 3580. But, whether any of those things happened, I was keeping my mind open. The big pop up at the open wasn't a huge surprise as price had been moving up in the early hours just prior. I got out early, but due to the RET within the 0932 bar, it wasn't feeling like there was more and I figured I could always get back in. Because of the parabolic nature of the up move, I didn't feel like a 'correct' DL was in place for me to consider a break and a short. I was kind of on pause for a while even though I did eventually draw a SL. After my SL was broken, I looked for a long. I found one and rode it for a little while. I panicked somewhat during the 1003 bar and got out. Trying to get back in was likely a mistake, but I figured it could get to 60 and even move higher so I'd try again. With yesterday and the fanning of DLs and an immediate break, I just got out again. Small loss, but it wasn't a huge deal. Then I looked for a short and it took. I allowed the SL to be broken and gave price room to surpass the LSH. Didn't happen so I hung on. My first lesson of trusting the SL came at 1030. I had drawn in a tighter line and it was broken. I know I still have work to do with that, but it gets better each day. Even though I exited, when the next bar so oh so close to the SL but didn't touch it and started heading down, I placed a stop to get in again. I rode the wave down. The are around 1040 made me somewhat antsy but as I read in "The Box", the market was just moving sideways. I would have preferred it to keep moving down, but it wasn't moving up - just sideways. At 1100 is another place where me not trusting the SL got me in trouble. Having drawn a tighter line, it was broken. I was able to draw a DL and even had another trade triggered. But it wasn't meant to be - because the trend of the market was still short. It had seemed to me that price was having a hard time in getting to 3600, but in hindsight, I see the a retrace of some sort was needed after 10 minutes of pretty much nothing but downward movement. I've got to keep it up. More replay to come.
db is quite the proponent of the Zen thread. He suggested I read/study the first 43 poker rules. Well, 43 is a bit for me to chew right off the bat, so I figured I'd start with the first 10. POKER RULE #1: Learn to use inaction as a weapon. I think the first POKER RULE # 1 "Learn to use inaction as a weapon" is absolutely utmost important to traders' survival. That is why it is rule #1. Most of the time, market is indeed random, one can only win consistently by avoiding activity most of the time and trade only the few times during the day when a high probability trade occurs. It is our job as a trader to wait more than we trade. POKER RULE #2: Don't get irritated or angered by long session of folding. We are all playing probability over a long run. Understand it. Accept it. Mentally prepare for it. Keeping our head makes all the difference. It is on the top of my list. POKER RULE #3: If you've been folding a lot, for a long time in the game, and you're starting to think that maybe it's time you got in and played a few hands again -- that's not a good enough reason. Keep folding. Don't worry too much about missing a play. Any one-trade sequence is not supposed to make or break our trading career. But not waiting for the high probability setup will put us against the law of large number, which is ALL WE HAVE - then we are really all alone in Vegas. POKER RULE #4: Don't feel like a martyr when folding. Don't start feeling self-righteous about all this folding you are doing... as if now it owes you (because you've been so good, so disciplined, so patient...). This is a trap... As you keep folding, you must feel neutral about it. Whether you have been waiting for 5 min, 1 hr, half a day has no bearing to what is happening NOW. This is again - keeping our head and stick with the plan. POKER RULE#5: Sometimes others get to play and you don't... But the most important thing is this: you must be comfortable with this - welcome it. Make peace with this idea. Cross your arms and sit back. It is getting silly trying to catch every swing or worry about missing a move. There are thousands of markets out there and we are missing a play ALL THE TIME. The objective is executing the business plan with precision over a long run. Precision = Speed. Marginal trade will only bring chaos into the statistical equation. POKER RULE#6: To win at poker you must embrace the idea of breaking even... A distaste for breaking even can lead us into the valley of pressing and overplaying and other wrongful activity. We have to have a positive mindset for the long run. But one-sided expectation for a short performance interval is just going to chew us up. Breaking even or a loss is just one of the natural outcomes in a statistical run. This is the way our trading plan supposed to work given the nature of the game... it is not broken. The reason we have a plan in place is to help us focus on executing sound decisions under fire. Do not make it difficult by outsmarting our own plan. Pressing at the last hour to meet some number in our head is just out of place. POKER RULE#7: Regard patience as a central pillar of your game and strategy... Don't assign it a secondary or lesser role... Mark Weinstein interviewed in Market Wizards by Jack Schwager: "Although the cheetah is the fastest animal in the world and can catch any animal on the plains, it will wait until it is absolutely sure it can catch its prey. It may hide in the bush for a week waiting for just the right moment. It will wait for a baby antelope, and not just any baby antelope, but preferably one that is also sick or lame. Only then, when there is no chance it can lose its prey, does it attack. That, to me, is the epitome of professional trading." If by any chance that cheetah misses its prey, it doesn't deviate from the plan and starts picking any fight. It sticks with a strategy thatâs been tested for million years of evolution or we won't see that cheetah for long. POKER RULE #8: Keep plugging away. Expect nothing... There will be times when you play tight, keep playing tight, and keep on playing tight, and it still does no good... the bad cards just keep coming... You may have to just keep doing it until the end, with no reward at all. When there is no expectation, there is no fear of the outcome. POKER RULE #9: Don't fall into the "Now Trap."... Players want to win now, today. Results must happen now, in this hand, the one right in front of us... We assign a little more importance to where we are. We make it bigger, more important... But we do this time wise too - we assign things more importance because they are happening in the present moment... Yet giving greater importance to the present in the game of poker allows us to imagine marginal hands into good hands and good hands into great hands. POKER RULE #10: The long run is longer than you think... Playing only the best hands can be frustrating... Anger and irritability can arise. The emotions can be severely tested. This is where Zen comes in.
More replay - what else? This was another good session for me (1/14/14). SLA kept me out of trouble and that's always good. That's not to say that there weren't trades that didn't pan out, but the winners were better than the losers. Trusting my DL kept me in so much longer than I would have otherwise. I know it's just a line, but there's something about having a rule and sticking to it. Things seemed to be going along just fine at the open and then the pullback became quite fierce. In following the rules, I went short - and price just hung out there rather than really taking off. Price then took off - in the opposite direction. No RET for a while, but once there was one, I took it. There was some pullback, but it never went more than 50%. The DL was fanned and price kept marching up. After a 2nd fanning of the DL, price made a LH and that got inside my head. The DL had been compromised but the 2nd part of my rules is that the LSH would also have to be compromised and that had yet to occur. So I held. Price did pop back up and made a HH. So then I created a new DL and almost immediately it was broken. But price never went below the LSH. It creeped around for quite a while and I was trying to tap into some sort of Zen feeling, but I was antsy (red box area). I drew a SL figuring that if it triggered, that might be a clue. It didn't trigger. Price just kept on moving sideways and then slowly started creeping up. Sideways but in more of an up manner. When price moved, it did so with a bang. Then came the 2nd area where I was antsy (2nd red box). I drew a more long-term DL and price stayed inside which makes me trust the DL that much more. However, rather than just going predominantly sideways, price was definitely moving in a downward fashion. I played the same "will a short trigger" game and it wouldn't. So I kept holding. Almost like magic, price moved to the DL but never touched it much less crossed it. Price kept motoring on up, but yet again, price was far away from the DL and I started to lose focus. I created a tighter DL, price crossed it and went lower than the LSH so I exited. It was a good session. It's sort of strange to think that price really took off in a defined manner around 1000 - just like today. Not that I'm trying to make a correlation, but it's another reason to remain calm even if things don't go like wildfire at the open.
This morning was rather frustrating, but that's because a lot of movement didn't happen. After the last few days though, it makes sense that there'd be a day or so of rest/consolidation. The good thing is that aside from one move, I stayed on the sidelines. Staying out is progress for me. Getting in and trying to make something of nothing tends to be my pattern. The first 7ish minutes after the open created a lovely trading range. When price didn't make a HH at 0946, the hinge was solidified and price just stayed in that range for quite some time. The low was tested around 1030, but price didn't want to stay there for long. Finally it broke down through the TC mean, but again, it didn't want to keep going down to the TC low. I kept track of most of the RETs, but didn't try to make anything happen. In the CWS world, some of them would have worked. However, that would just create a new pattern for me. I need to just stick to the plan. Trade in the areas where I'll have the greatest chance of success - the edges. More talented or seasoned traders can go for the middle section. So - today was an exercise in patience. As db says, if it isn't easy, you shouldn't be there. Hell - that works for me. I guess it's time for more replay.
For the sake of accuracy, that isn't me, it was Teresa Lo, and it was "if it doesn't go, you don't want to be there." There is little if anything that is easy about trading. Or perhaps I should say making money trading (if you don't care about making money, trading is a cinch).
I think I overstated the gist of what was intended. In general, don't fight the market. If it's fighting you, get out.
As I said in chat, try not to forget the past three days. When it works, the market carries you along. When it doesn't, you can either fight it or wait patiently for the next opportunity. If you've experienced those opportunities in real time, you're much more likely to recognize them in future.
Lines - any lines/ all lines ARE based on price - skip the middle man and learn to trust price - then follow it like a beagle chasing a rabbit or not RN