A Beginner's Price Action Trading Journal (mostly es, Al Brooks style)

10/18 Wed
A productive day. Started compiling a playbook for myself.

5min recap
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60min plan
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HTF
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EoD summary table
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knowledge is available cheap; but not understanding.

take what everyone is told 'buy low sell high'

this is not wrong but as usual the whole story is not told.

the correct way for a trader is buy lowIN THE TREND and sell highIN THE TREND

so what is the trend? a bar -whatever time frame- visually shows a trend.

so take any bar and buy at low and sell at high......stops below the low and above the high

this gives a good RR.

i am not sure why Brooks had to write 3 books to explain this. Unless his idea was to confuse the hell out of the competition [who is us ]

he certainly confused me out of 20 years and 300,000 usd.
 
trading is not about being right and wrong.

it is about what you make, when you win and what you lose, when you lose.

it is about RR risk reward.
 
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padu, i'm just a beginner early in my trading career. for me, stage 1 is poor imitation, which is where I am today (stage 2 better imitation; stage 3 integration; at least that is my thinking). btw i trade so small with stops i have never been badly hurt.

i study and sample other approaches as well. i don't find studying anyone or practicing using their framework being in conflict with trading with common sense. quite the opposite, the more I sample the more common threads I see across methodologies, and the easier it is for me to read the market, stay focused, and be happy trading.

if you are worried about me falling for his fancy complex system, I can assure you that hasn't been the case with me. at this point, I really only practice two simple with-trend setups. I am not trying to make complex fancy setups, or worse, multi-layered game-theoretical PA analysis my edge. I have an inkling of what my edge can be. I prefer not to say at this point.

Al can be better at articulating some of his ideas, but I don't find him over-complicating any subject matter, certainly not on purpose. (I went from being confused often to not being confused by intraday moves in 2 months after beefing up PA studies.) If I had to guess, he is compulsive and competitive, he is trying to cover all contingencies at any given bar and sure to be a hardass with all his competition.

if you are worried about me wasting my time studying Al or anyone else (there are many of them). well, I personally don't find it a waste of time. Just stop worrying. Let me live and learn the lessons I will learn. I can handle some opportunity costs. TBH this has been nothing but a very enjoyable process so far (i guess that's what they call a passion). A solid win in my book.

cheers,

p.s., wrt giving away al's secrets, i don't even pretend i am... if anyone is seriously interested in checking out his style, his website and yt channel give away almost everything you need to redo what i post here for free, in a much more readable and digestible way. seriously my analysis is a very poor imitation and mixed together with stuff from many other influences. every day i get embarrassed re-reading my analysis on the prior session lol. if you read my journal, read it for its entertainment value ONLY. I'm not responsible for anyone's own trading decisions.

---

10/19 Thur

Interesting day. first half of the day (all the way up to jpow speech-induced TR volatility), was much easier for me to read than before. i was a little less on top of things in the PM after B60 and had to remind myself a few times i am one step away from being a c(nt.
Made some progress compiling my personal playbook. Very pleased with it and looking forward to making more progress this weekend.

5min recap
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5min (3day perspective)
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60min scenario planning
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HTF context
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my EoD summary table contained quite a bit of personal notes and stuff on my edge (early thinking) so i prefer not to post at this point
 
10/20 Friday

Very constructive and productive week! Good progress all around.
I am becoming more confident and more at ease with my real-time market read each session.
Must keep doing the legwork. something is working.
Build that basket of techniques to get in when I am more sure of what is going on is the next goal.

-Yesterday 4260 level was very useful today.

-An autumnal event at my place Friday evening, so abridged version of journal today

EoD Summary Table:
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5min recap
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10/23 Monday
Key learning: today i started "quantifying" (as much as I can call it quantifiable at this stage) and measuring my edge. I know when I use unreliable techniques to get in/out, I damage my edge.

5min Recap
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60min plan
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D1 bigger picture (SPY levels; from Sunday)
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EoD table
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10/24 TUE

Key takeaways today:
-60min plan is holding up well. continue to show promise in this TF.
-5min TA technique not there yet. keep grinding.
-daily journals: keep adding to section: reliable and section: unreliable. it helps.

EoD summary
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5min recap
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60min plan hasn't changed from yesterday, is holding up well. no update here.
 
10/25 WED

Good day.
Key takeaways: focus on real-time trend strength analysis and on level-context-pattern confluence is what appears the most reliable to me. lots of other isolated factors/tricks are too unreliable on their own to be helpful.
-recency bias: whichever element i study the most the night before, i look for examples of it everywhere the next session. this competes for my attention and focus --> can be counter-productive. with time and experience, it should get better...

5min exercise
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EoD summary
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60min/HTF plan
i don't think anything has changed since my expanding triangle ("Z after trend") context analysis over the weekend.
arguably the bears came down with some momentum today. 60min chart (cash, whole hour) saw just one bull body (the final one, close). trend favors a BO down to the downside. globex is selling off in asia session, which sometimes is a sign of weakness. HTF D1 technicals look good for the bears (can target another bigger island top if they can pull off a midway gap tomorrow). W1 is meh--lower TR support below and seasonality will turn in favor of the bulls soon.
bearish clues notwithstanding, 3/5 times when I have any preconceived notion, it backfires (on 5min that is). so I will trade what is in front of me. thankfully it has gotten a bit easier every day!
 
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