Why do people journal? What good has come of it? What bad has come of it? Why read a journal? What good has come of it? What bad has come of it? I've thought of starting one, but imagine it would only bruise or bolster ego. As things are, I am mostly detached from the account balances.
It's generally good to write things down -- studies have shown about the positive power of tabulating your life or schedule. You tend to stick it to more, has more meaning to you -- and you can reflect on it later. stays ingrained more. In this day and age, I guess everything is digital -- but I'm thinking more along of the lines of traditional pen and paper. -- a real journal. When I was really into working out/body building in the late 90's...I would write down my exercise sets/reps,on what days,what supplements to take,food proportions,timing,etc etc -- and I had great results. But as for Trading, I have never kept a real journal per se -- only loosely in my mind I suppose. I would only review my online account/trade statements.
I kept a journal for a long time, mostly of reviewing my trades and notes going forward. Reviewing was helpful because sometimes with a little distance you see things differently. Notes going forward are good because after awhile I realized I was sometimes writing something very similar again, which meant the problem was more a matter of discipline than knowledge. I also think it's good because you're simply putting more time and effort into trading, keeping your brain working on it for more hours a day. Lastly a journal of your trades is like your personal data set, and can be a part of figuring out what you are good at, and what you are able to do.
So am I. I concentrate on executing (and sometimes on researching and further developing) my trading plan efficiently and reliably, and don't look so much/often at the bottom line. I do much better, that way, than when I used to have the opposite approach. And (in my case) being pretty Asperger-ish makes it relatively easy to do, I think. I think the common reasons include, but aren't limited to, these ... 1. It's a way of being honest with yourself and holding yourself accountable 2. It's a more effective way of analyzing and reflecting on what worked and what didn't than not keeping a journal 3. It's a way of getting input, questions, insights and suggestions from others that wouldn't otherwise be so readily available 4. It's "sharing" and offering something back to a community that's been helpful to you 5. It tends, overall, to enhance objectivity and to diminish subjectivity
I do many of these things on my own, I really mean why do people journal here at ET? Of the three respondents so far, none of you appear to have a journal here...
That's certainly much better than not doing them at all, in my opinion. But I think that perhaps three (and definitely two) of the five reasons I offered above can't easily be served that way, really? I think typically for the five main reasons listed above. Perhaps some additional ones, too, but I'm not so clear what they might be. I don't, here, because I haven't been here very long, and mine therefore happens to be elsewhere. I know that's also true of some other members here.
There's hundreds of reasons why someone may one to journal and the same for why someone wants to read journals. Instead of going through every reason...I'm going to mention one reason. I remember once looking at a print out of an old (5 years old) brokerage statement of one particular trading day. That print out had id numbers, trade entries/exit, position size, trading instrument, profit loss info and a few boring stats that I don't even care about. Looking at that statement, it did not tell me what trade strategy I used on each trade. It did not tell me what my thoughts were for each trade. It did not tell me what was occurring in my personal life on that particular day or during those trades. It did not tell me any market context info for that particular day. It did not show a chart for that particular trading day. Simply, I had no useful feedback information that could be used going forward. Ever since that trading day, I know maintain a personal trading journal. I include all the info above that was missing along with anything related to my mind, health and other typical stuff you would see in a typical "diary". To me, that type of journal gives me a wealth of useful information about me as a trader and how I interact with the markets than just a brokerage statement alone. By the way, why do people journal here at ET ? I prefer to look at it about why do people NOT journal at ET and do it elsewhere ? 1) Better moderating elsewhere (blog and locations dedicated to only journals/diaries). 2) Better journal tools than ET's format that allows you to integrate those tools into your journal or integrate your journal into other tools. 3) Ability to make your journal private or public anytime you feel like it Seriously, there's a lot of nice free and fee base journals online with incredible tools especially for those wanting more privacy. Most of which allows downloading your journal for further safe keeping. Yet, if you're seeking an audience or need help with your trading...you obviously need a more public resource at a trading forum but you'll just need to deal with the nuisances of such a public journal.
How do you do that? Is that a new feature of ET? I mean I know we can make private threads, I am just not sure if we can switch between the two.
I see. I just log it and it shows the most recent posts, so I didn't see this was under "journals," so it didn't occur to me you meant on this board. I wouldn't journal here because of all the frustrations of putting stuff on the internet. I don't have the time or interest to sort through (essentially) anonymous comments on my trading. It's for me, not for public consumption.
Conversation is about journals "elsewhere" or about why traders do not journal here at ET. Thus, many free and fee base journals/diaries have tools like change your journals from private to public anytime you want. In comparison, as mentioned, traders that journal here at ET mainly do such because they want an audience or they need help or they believe it will keep them more focus because they know that other traders read their journal.