Anyone else hit the burnout point with trading?

tango29 said:
I've been at it 17 years fulltime and I do well enough to pay for kids educations, the house , etc, but the last couple years I am hitting a wall of feeling sick and tired of doing this day in and day out. I've looked into expanding into different things like more complex option work, but can't get my interest going enough to really learn enough to do it well and right. I've been reading about spread trading and thinking about it, but again just not making the full commitment. I have adapted my trading over the years to different market conditions and have rewritten the trading plan a couple of times, and/ or made edits to it, but other than keeping me alive trading it just has gotten boring.
There are days I really more or less dread sitting here another day watching the bouncing ball. I have thought about finding another job, but with my experience being 17 years working for myself trading I don't have much to put in a resume that says hire me. I also see a big pay cut coming to get at least some kind of job with my experience. That's not the end of the world, but at the same time I don't really like the idea of a possible significant cut in extra spending and savings.
Outside of when the kids were doing athletics and I'd go to the events, or with our youngest traveling for club soccer, I have pretty much become a hermit with this job. To be honest I'm not sure that bothers me tremendously, but at the same time I doubt it's a healthy way to live.
That's my whine for the day. If anyone has any thoughts how they got past the burnout I'd love to hear it. Heck if you just want to write something abusive go for it, I'll live.
Peace, Bob
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It should not have happened in this market( last 4 months). Market was exciting. Boredom in trading comes with losses. It is always exciting when money is being made. Once you start making money it will go away. Find stocks from the sectors which are trading with market and a lot of things are happening in them. Right now if you search you will find plenty of them.
More complex you make trading, it is going to be more boring. IMO.
* I am 5 years younger than you are in trading.
 
Try physical activities that shift your focus from trading during that activities. Jogging will not cut for that. Gym will not cut for that. You may try sports and farming. Farming is the best because you will have alternative income too.

How many hours you normally spend for trading per day?
 
KCalhoun said:
Been there, best fixes after 21 years that helped:

Change physical layout of where you trade; update desk area, add another monitor, change chart layout etc

Take a few days off

Test new trade strategies
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Did you read anything he wrote? How is getting a new monitor going to help lol?
 
wrbtrader said:
Further, it is a Pandemic...see a professional just in case you're confusing "burnout" with "Depression".

I was burnout back in 2010 and started taking more family vacations, making sure I don't spend my weekends with my hobbies, working out and vacations with some of my ex military buddies.
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Burnout isn't as easy to solve as taking vacations unfortunately. I've hit extreme periods of burnout programming.

The only thing that really solved it for me was finding the reason and then fixing the reason. Taking time off just made things worse as the existential dread of going back to work approached.
 
Spend 2 hrs a day at the gym . As somebody said if your coining cash its fun . If your making little or losing it's crap.Back in 2002 i went like 27 straight weeks with a min of $30k a week . It was surreal and fun .Now i did this with a $200k account and 4-1 margin .
 
Been trading since 1978, yes several times of burnout. Each time I went radical way of change by getting jobs most people would not attempt or do. Been truck driver and trade from the bunk, diamond currier was boring of hopping planes, went to wind turbine tech school and learned to fix blades-don't look down. Take parachuting up, very fun first 100 jumps, knees hurt now or learn to fly plane. But I wouldn't take some mundane job, that be like trading again. Work at others till they become a job then quit and trading be fun again.
 
tango29 said:
I've been at it 17 years fulltime and I do well enough to pay for kids educations, the house , etc, but the last couple years I am hitting a wall of feeling sick and tired of doing this day in and day out. I've looked into expanding into different things like more complex option work, but can't get my interest going enough to really learn enough to do it well and right. I've been reading about spread trading and thinking about it, but again just not making the full commitment. I have adapted my trading over the years to different market conditions and have rewritten the trading plan a couple of times, and/ or made edits to it, but other than keeping me alive trading it just has gotten boring.
There are days I really more or less dread sitting here another day watching the bouncing ball. I have thought about finding another job, but with my experience being 17 years working for myself trading I don't have much to put in a resume that says hire me. I also see a big pay cut coming to get at least some kind of job with my experience. That's not the end of the world, but at the same time I don't really like the idea of a possible significant cut in extra spending and savings.
Outside of when the kids were doing athletics and I'd go to the events, or with our youngest traveling for club soccer, I have pretty much become a hermit with this job. To be honest I'm not sure that bothers me tremendously, but at the same time I doubt it's a healthy way to live.
That's my whine for the day. If anyone has any thoughts how they got past the burnout I'd love to hear it. Heck if you just want to write something abusive go for it, I'll live.
Peace, Bob
More...
I find that having a second job/interest that I can work while the ball bounces helps a lot.

Take some university/night classes. They can be related to trading, like Computer Science, Mathematics, and Economics, ir something completely different, like Psychology or Genetics.

It also helps to get involved with a local charity. Work with a church or food bank.
 
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