This is why you are where you are. Curiosity - are you net positive this year yet? The best of LUCK to you. Make 'em pretty, Chris
Day 14 Play the GAME... Trading is purely a statistical game. You have to maximize your winnings while cutting out your losers short. You have to have the discipline. You have to stay on the safe grounds at all the time. No time for mental lapses, no time to be timid. I think I'll be even more disciplined as soon as I burn all my trading journals from the past. I have it all, everything thing on 17 1.5" binders. I thought I might as well read my journals before I burn them all... once and for all. I was going to keep them forever. Like, I could look at it when I was 68 or something and marvel at my stupid mistakes. But, no time to marvel any more. No more pasts, no more dwelling on pasts. Mistakes are mistakes, you have to put them behind you completely.. and move on, go on.. I finished reading 3 binder full of my journals. I got 14 more to go, and this is just my first year of trading.. Yeah. .SO MANY stupid mistakes. I just can't wait for me to get through them, and make a huge bonfire out of them. God, I am so looking forward to this. I WILL NEVER EVER MAKE A TRADING MISTAKE, MENTAL/DISCIPLINARY mistake never ever again. # of Disasters: 6 1) I need to go to sleep early enough everyday so that I can wake up at 7:55 am EVERYDAY. Even on weekends. I stay up real late, on say Friday night, and then all my sleeping pattern is out the window. Then, I stay up real late into Sunday night and wake up real late on Monday morning. I woke up at 8:30, but still I was a bit hurried that I forgot to check my trading checklist, and to get everything in order. I been doing this for a while, and I need to quit doing this. 2) NEVER EVER MOVE a STOP Don't even touch it anymore. It was an end result of me not doing other things well.. I need to pay much better attention to the numbers on my screen. I need to be focused on my entries.. only take the best trades where you won't be tempted to ever move a stop. 3) Never add more to a loser. 4) Never add more to a HUGE LOSER. 5) Never ever add more to an even bigger loser. 6) Never ever add more to an even bigger loser. It all started with one bad trade entry. This is why you have to be wake up early. Be prepared. Eat breakfast etc, and be completely ready for the day. I need to treat it as a JOB.. Be ready to get to work real early. This is my JOB. YOU HAVE TO PAY ATTENTION to what you're doing. The key to being disciplined is never breaking your discipline. Not even once. I broke one rule, moved a stop on a shaky entry.. I still had a chance to get out with a STOP+ -3 ticks, but I stayed in. Not good. You have to get the hell out of a trade just when you realize that you are breaking your rules. I cannot believe this is the same shit that I used to do.... when I was just starting out. NO MORE.. This is the last and final time I'll ever do something like this. I SHOULD ONLY trade 1 contract till I can consistently make money. No more adding more cars to losing trades, or winning trades. Just stick with 1 contract ONLY.. ONLY ONE.
hmmm .... interesting cause i threw away all my stuff relating to stocks.... have no use for it. Got rid of everything thats not related to YM.... deleted all makt web sites... links... etc, on my desk top not related to YM... streamlining..... focusing... Yeah thats a good idea Ripley!
Day 15 you can see everything you need in PRICE I decided to drop: 1) News 2) $TICK 3) FV .....eventhough at first when I started using them, I felt like they were the missing pieces to my puzzle. All of those definitely helped, and they certainly were my training wheels. I like to believe that I am past that stage and time to move onto the next stage. Here is a fascinating stat: Only 5% of accounts with $5,000 would survive 1 year of trading. I like that, the odds are yet again against the undercapitalized n99b... # of Disasters: 2 1) Get the feel for the markets. Get in touch with the market.. & know what kind of market that you are trading.. & stay away when you are not supposed to trade. Sometimes a winning trade can be a trade that you never took. WAIT for high % trade setups. 2) Trade only 1 contract at all times. Stay consistent. Do no add more to winning, or losing trades. And do not on the whim, take on more cars. Just trade one and stay consistent. Thoughts: (couple of quotes I wrote down, and I don't have the sources.. & I am sure whoever said those will only be proud if someone actually use what they said to achieve something) The market will always let you in on the losers; the market's job is to keep you out of winners. Dump the dogs & ride the winning tide. It is okay to lose your shirt in this business, just don't lose your pants because that is where your wallet is. It is okay to lose, buy don't lose everything because then you have nothing left to come back with. Preservation of capital & equity growth are the most important aspects of trading. The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand and the determination that, whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand. Vince Lombardi. The harder you work, the luckier you get.
I used $tick for awhile and it was helpful for micro scalps; however, I was too dependent on it, which negatively impacted my trading when my targets were more than 1 ES point. Now I just focus on price.
I may be mistaken, but I think that your journal is creating too much of a build up. I am wondering if it may actually end up being detrimental to your trading. If you have a plan, then trade it. If you don't have a plan, then build it. You are not going to digest anything if all you are doing is chewing gum. And that is how your posts read to me.
Ripley, Why are you so focused on not making any mistakes ever again? Mistakes are inevitable. Aren't you better off facing them and learning from the experience? Since you want to treat trading as a job, you should view mistakes as the cost of doing business. SBS
Trust me.. Mistakes will always be there. There is no shortage of mistakes. It is just that, some entries can be a lot better. There are places to go short, and to go long etc. Which I kind of ignore at times due to my trading is highly discretionary, and also because I like to always have a position in the market. Some trade managements can also be a lot better. My goal is to make the least amount of mistakes as possible, and I got a long ways to go.