TradeQueen Daily Journal

I've gotten myself into something much deeper than I could of ever imagined.

While I've lost a ton, still I have no regrets for trying.

My goal set from this point forward is to slowly recoup my losses and continue to learn the tactics to gain advantages and become a successful day player.

The positive here is everyday I learn a wealth of information that can put me on track.

The immediate goal for tomorrow, Monday 5/9/11, is to minimize the surprises and find the better gains. Until then...

TradeQueen,

Looking back at my post as wordy as it was I noticed that it really didn't contain any information that someone could apply in any practical manner. Not sure that this one will either...lol...but I did want to provide some further explanation of what I meant by developing a trading method that minimized the fear and that was built backwards concentrating first on Psych, then Trade Management and lastly the Setup. I don't think it can be done in one posting so this may turn into a continuing piece.

I need to share another story so that you can understand the method behind some of my madness when it comes to the psych side of trading.

Many traders have read the book Trading in the Zone by Douglas where he describes that moment where you are like one with the market. Where you executed your trades flawlessly and seemed to know what the market was going to do even before it did it. You knew when to get in and which trades to avoid. Whether or not someone had read the book is irrelevant anyone who has been trading for any length of time has experienced this at one time or another.

When I polled different traders about this several things became true across the board. First I would ask them how did it feel? Did it feel effortless, were you stressed, was it fun. In every instance the trader spoke with enthusiasm telling me that they felt no anxiety whatsoever, they were not hesitant to take action and that they genuinely enjoyed themselves (isn't this what we want from trading). Also it was always a profitable day for them. I was easy to solicit responses from them once I got them to remember that time for me. They would go on and on and tell me the trades they took or how much they made. Then I would ask would you say that was your best day of trading or at least one of them? Of course the answer was yes. After discussing the feeling of being in "The Zone" and reminding them of what they had just told me about how great it felt, how effortless it was, how easy it seemed. I would ask them the following question (AND HERE'S THE KICKER)...Sooo on the next day of trading did you wait until you had that same feeling of being in the zone BEFORE you pulled the trigger on your first trade???...resounding answer NO! [pause here for dramatic effect] Next question why not? You had just told me how great it was, how easy how profitable....I would get no real answers just mostly excuses.

So now I'm thinking of ways to get people into that place where they performed at their best before they take ANY trade.

What about practice swings? A baseball player warms up in the batters box before he takes a pitch. In fact in any sport of any kind there is a warm up period. A golfer takes a few swings, a quarterback throws a few passes and even a race car driver gets in a few laps.

If we were to look at trading like a sport I think it would be the only one where the contestants don't engage in the ritual of warming up first. Why do these athletes routinely go through this excersise? They must've done it a million times before. They do it so that they can achieve more focus, prevent stupid errors and most importantly to get into rhythm. Would not these same things be advantageous to trading?

Unfortunately this does not seem to be the case. Most new traders only put as little time as they have to into SIM trading (I am not referring to back testing) in their rush to get to live trading. Then once there they will not return to SIM until they are forced to once their account has been blown up and they are awaiting for the new funds to hit the account and then its right back to live trading

So my question is..what's wrong with taking a few practice swings everyday in SIM before trading with real money?

Yes we may miss out on some potential trades that turned out to be winners, but we may also gain some valuable information such as, are particular setup isn't working well today, or I'm really not in the right frame of mind today to be trading, or in the absolute best outcome...the SIM trading practice swings helped put us in The Zone first before we pulled the trigger on our first real money trade.

I have a few more volumes about Psyche to cover before we move onto Trade Management. This is not meant to completely cover all topics thoroughly but highlight what I believe to be some of the important ones.

I know you can't tell yet but hopefully by the time I'm done you'll be able to see how I have built a trading methodology working backwards from Psych to Setup.

to be continued...hopefully

Originally posted by myptofvu

...If we were to look at trading like a sport I think it would be the only one where the contestants don't engage in the ritual of warming up first. Why do these athletes routinely go through this excersise? They must've done it a million times before. They do it so that they can achieve more focus, prevent stupid errors and most importantly to get into rhythm. Would not these same things be advantageous to trading?

Don't sportsmen warm up because the muscles need to be in a certain state to perform optimally and to prevent injury?

Wouldn't we compare trading to any other 9 to 5 job? i.e. your average office worker does not warm up their brain before they start making decisions and doing work at 9am. They already know what they need to do.

There are however optimal times of the day when each office worker is more performant and that will vary from person to person. Perhaps traders should try and isolate that time of the day when they are more profitable. I think I remember BruceM saying that trades late in the day were not as profitable for him.

Just playing the devils advocate here...

TradeQueen;

Stay above the noise ... for clear thinking ... leave the chickens in the coop ...

That post ^^ is not directed at anyone in this forum ... just a general
observation .... there are peeps that will only project negative crap ... stay above that ....

The surprises will always be there, but the losses can always be minimalized by better risk management and even more prudent money management.