First time in the Flow…

[NoDoji]

Quote from Onra:

I trade on and off, due to my burnout.
I have to be very careful and disciplined not to trade and focus for more than 1 - 2 hours, because it ruins the rest of the day and the day after that.

Last week, my friend told me he had to "build stamina". I'd never thought of it that way

Quote from Onra:

It scares me to get started in the morning, without a clue or an edge and just watch...
When I finally start to see patterns; pushing and pulling, I get more relaxed and just dive into the water, which always seem shallow.

FWIW, this is still my experience every day. I finally learned to pull the curtain on that part of me and let the relaxed "odds are in your favor all day every day" part of me do the trading.

 

[J.Joseph]

Quote from Onra:

Thanks Daring,

It was trending in those weeks, so you may be right there...
I have to wait for more uncertainty in direction and low volatility.
If I survive that, well...

That's true and definitely a factor. But here's something you may not have considered. A psychological study that I read about in a book called "Scream Free Marriage" says that when emotions are heightened to the point that you have to actively suppress them or let them out, the part of your brain responsible for reasoning and logic actually shuts down.
In other words, emotional "real" trading leads to mental fog and emotion free "virtual" trading allows you to think clearly.
The paper trades you did were done with a clear mind. Had you done them in real life, you may not have had a mind clear enough to make the right decisions. But maybe you would have. The question is, can you trade that well in any market? Trending or swinging? Volatile or not? Virtual trading is the test for me because it is done with that part of my brain still active. If I can't do it virtually, I don't have a winning system.

 

[oldtime]

Quote from J.Joseph:

That's true and definitely a factor. But here's something you may not have considered. A psychological study that I read about in a book called "Scream Free Marriage" says that when emotions are heightened to the point that you have to actively suppress them or let them out, the part of your brain responsible for reasoning and logic actually shuts down.
In other words, emotional "real" trading leads to mental fog and emotion free "virtual" trading allows you to think clearly.
The paper trades you did were done with a clear mind. Had you done them in real life, you may not have had a mind clear enough to make the right decisions. But maybe you would have. The question is, can you trade that well in any market? Trending or swinging? Volatile or not? Virtual trading is the test for me because it is done with that part of my brain still active. If I can't do it virtually, I don't have a winning system.

I don't know if this helps, but it's a real bitch when you lost in four hours what you use to make in a month.

Not too bad until the Holidays come around, and you have to be there with all the wives dressed up, and everybody else has a stable income, with probably a raise each year regardless of how bad the company is doing.

And the funny thing is, they think you are the cool guy who escaped the rat race.

I finally got so tired of everybody thinking I was making a killing, that when anybody asked, I just quietly said, "I'm involved in the financial markets."

 

[Onra]

Well, the fun didn't last forever, as you might have guessed...
I guess I owe everyone an update

My strategy was based on scalping out 2/3 of my position.
So the tension if a trade works or not, lasted only brief.

The rest was used for a swing.
That forced me to stay alert, but relaxed; either go with the flow or get out.
Succes follows succes; if the trades are going well, you don't feel upset over (small) losers.

So, a gradually changing environment works best for me.
The feeling is gone in chop or volatile big swings.

 

[oldtime]

Quote from Onra:

Well, the fun didn't last forever, as you might have guessed...
I guess I owe everyone an update

My strategy was based on scalping out 2/3 of my position.
So the tension if a trade works or not, lasted only brief.

The rest was used for a swing.
That forced me to stay alert, but relaxed; either go with the flow or get out.
Succes follows succes; if the trades are going well, you don't feel upset over (small) losers.

So, a gradually changing environment works best for me.
The feeling is gone in chop or volatile big swings.

yeah, funny thing about that, and I don't really have a logical explanation.

The two things that really hurt me was number one

1. Trying to get out on a trailing stop

and number two

2. Scaling out of losses

to the point where I didn't even want to know what the truth was, I just know it took something that was profitable into a very consistent quick loss

and the funny thing, doing it on the other side, for instance, scaling out of profits has been ok

this trading can be a very mysterious thing

I only have two rules, never use trailing stops, and never scale out of a loss

and I have position on since 2013 that is just a constant aggravation and loses me money everyday

and I am thinking about just scaling out of it, because I can't take it anymore

so that shows you how much my rules are worth

hopefully, just talking about it will get my head screwed on back straight, and I will do the right thing

 

[speres]

Quote from Onra:

Balancing for months on the edge of profitability, I experienced something strange for the last two weeks.
I had many successful trades that didn't seem to cost me much stress or uncertainty.

Instead of enjoying the process, I went paper trading after three days, fearing that this couldn't last very long.
But my careless "demo-mode" made things only "worse"; the winning streak stayed.

Now, I feel excitement and uncertainty for the coming week …;

1. There is no "flow"; I was extremely lucky; my mediocre performance will soon return.
2. It finally snapped and it should continue until I change, due to pressure, greed or fear.

I only trade EUR/USD based on price action and do around 5 - 10 trades a day.

Who experienced something similar and what's your advice?

Thanks.

I remember it hapenning to me too. Bit of a moment isnt it.

An all new world is opening up to you now so to stay fluid
you need to diarise , screen shots etc and capture what youve seen

 

[cornix]

That's normal. You likely incurred serious stress during your long way to profitability. When you got positive result it feels like "too good to be true" and there's fear it may be just coincidence.

Don't put the pressure on yourself. Instead try to think logically. You had a good streak on both live and demo? Great! Does it have enough trades to constitute significant sample size (theory of probability says 30+ sample size constitutes unlikely random event)?

If logically you see you unlikely delude yourself then only thing left is self-confidence. This should be gained by... trading.

Demo, small size live or large size live, doesn't matter so much. Just need to make more trades so that new, winning experience forces out old, losing experience.

Good luck!

 

[murray t turtle]

Quote from oldtime:

yeah, I've been through the same thing

[1]I about got laughed off the board when I asked, "Is it wise to reduce size after extreme profitability?"

[2]also, is it wise to increase size after a seemingly improbable string of bad luck

one thing I know for sure, the worst thing is to switch strategies in the depths of drawdown. And many do. They start out with the idea of what their max drawdown should be, and if the strategy gets off to bad start they ride it down and give up, then switch to a new strategy, only now with a reduced account size.

they say, sometimes when you are wrong, not only are you wrong, but you are exactly wrong

I've been through streaks where I couldn't hit the broadside of barn, and streaks where I couldn't miss

============
[1]If extreme profits were based on extreme size;
sure. I never pay much atterntion to willingly ignorant laughs like those,, that would laugh @ a question like that.

[2]No ,,no way;
trends tend to persist,persist longer than most all figure,, incliding equity trend

 

[jack hershey]

Quote from Onra:

Well, the fun didn't last forever, as you might have guessed...
I guess I owe everyone an update

My strategy was based on scalping out 2/3 of my position.
So the tension if a trade works or not, lasted only brief.

The rest was used for a swing.
That forced me to stay alert, but relaxed; either go with the flow or get out.
Succes follows succes; if the trades are going well, you don't feel upset over (small) losers.

So, a gradually changing environment works best for me.
The feeling is gone in chop or volatile big swings.

you may want to examine what is going on for you.

Several syndromes and pysiological adverse effects are now permanent in your makeup.

The most devistating for you is the Lizard Syndrome it is long term.

shorter terms effects show up in about all the time you are in a trade (not too much of the RTH).

Hyperventilation.

Hypocapnia

Lactic acid production

Metabolic acidosis.

The cause is not knowing what you are doing. Often this is called stress.

your trading syptoms are:

Early exits

freezing

peeing more frequently

tired

not sleeping

a 25% increase in breathing rate.

the psyiological problems are:

increased CO 2 retention

pH screwed up

less O2 reaching your brain.


If you continue as you are for more than 2 weeks, you can incur permanent psyiological changes.

Some people are not meant to be traders. Your body below the neck is an important indicator you are trying to ignore.

CO2 retention in the brain is a bad idea.
the normal lactic acid is 4% and you are probably running @ 30%.

 

[Onra]

:eek:
This is going to kill me...