A Beginner's Mind

While I appreciate the thought that you put into your reply, this is not evidence. This is guessing. As far as I can tell from the plan you posted, you have no data or stats regarding the observation phase of your study. Therefore, your plan is nothing that can be followed, much less trusted. A sufficiently-detailed plan can be followed by anyone who picks it up, unless he's stupid. I must confess that I have no idea what it is you're trying to do, though there is always the possibility that I myself am stupid.

However, given your continuing failure, I suggest that you really don't have a clear idea of exactly what it is that you're looking at when you open up your chart for the upcoming session. If that's the case, and it appears to be the case based on your posts and your charts, then you are nowhere near the point where you might benefit from the Straight Line thread or any other thread which details an actual approach (as opposed to bluster).

I suggest you stop trading now and begin again at the observation phase, only this time create a much more structured approach for yourself. If you have replay, use it. Determine whether price is going up or down. Determine when and where this movement began. Determine when and where it changed. If it reversed, determine when and where that happened. Do this until it is no longer a puzzle. This may take a few days or a few weeks. When you believe you are in synch with these movements, then begin asking yourself "why?" at these changes. This represents the beginnings of explorations of support and resistance.

There's more, but this will take a while, perhaps a great while depending on how much you have to unlearn. But you're not going to improve until you've gone through it. If you'd rather not, then I suggest you look for an entirely mechanical system. If you do go through it, you will then be able to provide a complete answer to the question of whether or not you can reach your goals through daytrading or if you must look to other forms of trading or look outside trading altogether.
 
Quote from Huyang:

DB:

Now i am answering your 2nd question. I had been day trading ES for about one year. I know the biggest enemy for my trading performance is inside myself and i am willing to challenge myself and correct those mistakes or bad habits. Those good days i was focusing on the trading process and doing the right thing instead of worrying about loss or pursuing profit shows that i may have the potential to trading consistently. Moreover, I believe (which could be wrong) the fundamentally day trading or swing trading are the same, because fundamentally traders' behaviors and motives are the same. With my limited trading experience, i really cannot see there are or are not big difference between different kinds of trading fundamentally. Please help to share your insights on this matter. Thank you very much.
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See the post I just made.
 
With regards to placing a stop, it makes more sense to me (at least these days) to adhere to the rule of fire-and-forget and then walk away from the computer. It's best to place the stop at the time of your entry. Once the stop is placed, it's never a good idea to modify or widen it. Otherwise, you'll only create a bad habit (as for me, been there and done that). If your stop gets hit, so be it. Go back to the drawing board to see where your analysis was off and start over.

And here's food for thought. Speaking of analysis, a good entry* shouldn't require a large stop. It's usually the bad entry that requires the largest stop. That is, where you get in will either make or break your bank account.

*Good entry is based on good timing. Even if you technically get into a great setup, you could still lose money if your timing is either too early or too late.

Anyway, just my worthless 2-cents.
 
Quote from schizo:

With regards to placing a stop, it makes more sense to me (at least these days) to adhere to the rule of fire-and-forget and then walk away from the computer. It's best to place the stop at the time of your entry. Once the stop is placed, it's never a good idea to modify or widen it. Otherwise, you'll only create a bad habit (as for me, been there and done that). If your stop gets hit, so be it. Go back to the drawing board to see where your analysis was off and start over.

And here's food for thought. Speaking of analysis, a good entry* shouldn't require a large stop. It's usually the bad entry that requires the largest stop. That is, where you get in will either make or break your bank account.

*Good entry is based on good timing. Even if you technically get into a great setup, you could still lose money if your timing is either too early or too late.
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Schizo: Thank you very much for your kind assistance. I am taking action to correct my bad habits of widening my stops as written in my action plan even when now i am not trading for some time and in the future i will be starting to trade again. I have to unlearn this bad habit. I agree, a good entry does not need a large stop.
 
I suggest you stop trading now and begin again at the observation phase, only this time create a much more structured approach for yourself. If you have replay, use it. Determine whether price is going up or down. Determine when and where this movement began. Determine when and where it changed. If it reversed, determine when and where that happened. Do this until it is no longer a puzzle. This may take a few days or a few weeks. When you believe you are in synch with these movements, then begin asking yourself "why?" at these changes. This represents the beginnings of explorations of support and resistance.

DB: thank you very much for your kind help. I will follow the advice in the below from the link. I am starting the first step.

First step: purely watching the market; Make notes of what you see and what you think you see

Hire yourself to do a job

The job is just to sit there and watch the bars form, to watch the buying and selling waves, the pokes and prods and feelers cast by buyers and sellers looking for a trade, not to create or test a strategy, not to make money, not to learn the "secrets" or the "tricks", just to develop a sensitivity to buying and selling pressure. No indicators, no MAs, no nothing but price bars/points and volume bars.

Don't rush to draw conclusions. Throw away your crutches and focus on what the auction market is really all about. The market is not out to get you. The market is not out to trick you. Buying pressure is buying pressure. It lasts as long as it lasts according to who wants what. Ditto for selling pressure. Rather than focusing on avoiding getting screwed, focus on the pressures and the imbalances between them. Don't trade. Don't conclude. Just watch.

When you get tired, stop. Come back. Begin again. When you're done, review your notes.

Second step: exploring support and resistance
Look for those areas in which change took place. Formulate some hypotheses as to why those changes took place in those areas and not others. Don't force the Ah-Ha. Just let it come.

Begin with what appears to apply to whatever market you're trading. If it's in a trend, focus on retracements and continuations (a continuation being the logical result of a successful retracement). If it's in a trading range, focus on reversals. And so on.

Third step: develop the strategy thoroughly.
Develop the strategy thoroughly, with all the accompanying tactics. Test it. Learn it. Get comfortable with it.
 
You misunderstand my role in all this. At first you wanted my help in applying the principles of the "straight line" approach to your trading and I suggested that you open up a journal so that you could explain your trading plan, at which point I could offer suggestions in modifying that plan to incorporate the Straight Line principles. However, since you don't have a thoroughly-tested, consistently-profitable trading plan, you're nowhere near ready to get into method tweaks.

This is not a course, and these charts are not homework that you submit to anyone. Unless you can find a mentor who is prepared to walk you through the entire process, this is a do-it-yourself job. If you want an idea of how it works, I suggest you look at Game's journal. Though he hasn't taken all my suggestions and he doesn't trade the way I do, the process he's gone through and continues to go through is pretty much what any successful trader has to go through.

There are nearly five thousand posts in the Wyckoff Forum at TL, most of which include charts that address the "price action" approach. There is also Wyckoff's course. As for the "straight line" approach, both threads here offer detailed instructions on how to implement it, the second of which puts them all at the beginning of the thread. But none of that will do you any good unless and until you read it. And once you've read it, it's up to you to determine what among all that you've read deserves further study. When you reach the testing and experimentation stage, you'll want to know something about the "scientific method". You can find out all you need to know about that by googling it.

If you find that you can't make price action work, there are many other approaches to investigate. I suggest you maintain this journal during the process so that others can comment and make suggestions. But whether you maintain this journal or maintain a private one, this is work that must be done if you are to make a living at trading. That few people do it is the chief reason why so few succeed. Whatever path you take, however, will take more than a few days or even a few weeks. It may take months. Or even longer. Accept that from the very beginning.
 
Quote from dbphoenix:


this is a do-it-yourself job. If you want an idea of how it works, I suggest you look at Game's journal. Though he hasn't taken all my suggestions and he doesn't trade the way I do, the process he's gone through and continues to go through is pretty much what any successful trader has to go through.

And once you've read it, it's up to you to determine what among all that you've read deserves further study. When you reach the testing and experimentation stage, you'll want to know something about the "scientific method". You can find out all you need to know about that by googling it.

That few people do it is the chief reason why so few succeed. Whatever path you take, however, will take more than a few days or even a few weeks. It may take months. Or even longer. Accept that from the very beginning.
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DB: I believe Game's journal should give me insights on how i should go through those necessary steps before reaching the testing and experimentation stage and beyond. I asked your advice on the way to write notes during observation phase so that i am doing it in a right way because i feel i have done lots of things incorrectly by working hard on wrong things or in wrong orders. I believe Game's journal should tell me the answer. Thank you very much.
 
Your annotations aren't entirely clear to me. Suppose you do enter the trade at those "best price, scary entries". Where are the stops? Where are the target exits?

Are you sure those were the absolutely the most ideal places for entry?
 
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