How do you plan for a side project?

[Aquarians]

Sorry but I have to part. There's possibly a job for me where I'm asking an absurd figure for an absurd problem. Just today at work one guy noticed a newspaper I'm reading and he really thought it was from like 1992 or something. No, it was from last week.

There are problems in this world that transcend not decades or centuries but Facebook!

 

[tomorton]

It's almost a year now since I started working on both my job and my trading software during the same day. Several lessons I learned:

1) There's never going to be a better time than exhaustion after 12 hours of day job (8 hrs regular time, 1 hour lunch break, 3 hours commute). If you rest, you will indeed wake up refreshed in the morning, just in time for another 12 hours in the Gulag.

2) Rinse and repeat. After a while you figure out you'll either die in the Konzentrationslager or you gotta fucking find time for working on your exit.

3) Goto 1: the hours you put after the 12 you put for the Corporation are not, in any way, similar to the hours you put for the Corporation. If you don't get that, you'll die.

OK, that's my experience. Yours?

Get into long-term trading. Check your charts after the close, set your orders with stop-loss for each, then go to sleep, then go to work and do the job, then find out what happened tomorrow night. Trading will not suddenly become easier if you lose the job and still have to pay the bills.

The real problem is stripping a strategy back to such a simple level that you can trade this way, and this has to happen in the planning stage, not while you're in trades. Remember, the rule is "Ready, Aim, Fire", not "Ready, Fire, Aim".

 

[fan27]

@Aquarians I can relate with your struggles. I started to rewrite my trading software about a year ago. Back in 2012 I built a web based backtesting platform and what I am doing now is a rewrite of that. It's been a long road brother. While my day gig does not sound as demanding as yours, I am a part time pro drummer and have a family which consumes considerable time. All that being said, I am almost at the point where I feel my technology idea is marketable and I have enough in savings to potentially ditch the day job. Hang in there man!!

 

[ET180]

It's almost a year now since I started working on both my job and my trading software during the same day. Several lessons I learned:

1) There's never going to be a better time than exhaustion after 12 hours of day job (8 hrs regular time, 1 hour lunch break, 3 hours commute). If you rest, you will indeed wake up refreshed in the morning, just in time for another 12 hours in the Gulag.

2) Rinse and repeat. After a while you figure out you'll either die in the Konzentrationslager or you gotta fucking find time for working on your exit.

3) Goto 1: the hours you put after the 12 you put for the Corporation are not, in any way, similar to the hours you put for the Corporation. If you don't get that, you'll die.

OK, that's my experience. Yours?

12 hours per day is a bit too much to do almost anything else on the side. Your work will drain you. Is there a job that you can take which pays the same and does not require a 3 hour commute? I would absolutely hate throwing away 3 hours of my life everyday commuting. Other option, find an easy job that allows you to work on your side project while at work.

 

[Soon2Bgreat]

Subaru brakes (calipers, rotors, pads, rusted wheel studs, all the way 'round)

Subaru...be thankful it's not head gaskets

 

[Stocktracker]

Hehe, I did not mention just any old cola, I mentioned the one and only...

Drink that poison and soon enough you do not have to worry about the corporation, the 3 hour commute or the side job! Like they said " a long way to heaven and a short way to hell"
good luck!

 

[Aquarians]

>> Is there a job that you can take which pays the same and does not require a 3 hour commute?

It's called security services, in short SS.

 

[tommcginnis]

AhHA! A Subaru. That is your Achilles heel. I mourn you.

"Nooo-oooooo!"
Aw, mannnnn. Subys are awesome.
(As long as you don't expose the paint to .... rain, snow, sunlight, wind, dust, car doors, heavy leaves, dark matter...)
(As long as you can see in the dark.... since you will quickly end up with a singular headlight as the only point of illumination on/in the entire car, and you'll learn to wear a headlamp whenever you drive at night, so you can see interior switches, speed/RPM, gearshift, etc....)
(As long as your spit contains corrosion-breakers like WD-40, as every electrical connection will di-electrically blob out on you.)
(As long as your breath is hot, dry, and plentiful, so you can act as your own Defrost, cuz what's in the car SUCKS and couldn't blow out the candles on a newborn's cake.)
(As long as you are made OF MONEY, since every time you go over some sticks or a hard gravel road, your CV-joint boots will sense the movement, and self-destruct, casting the lubricating grease they contain all over Creation, whilst exposing your axles to THE WORLD which, like the paint job, it hates.)

Yeah. Subaru. It's love. It's fuggin love. Mutha fuggin love. Suby. Sheeesh.

 

[speedo]

Comes a time where you have to either decide to jump into the deep end or drag your chains back to the cubicle.

 

[tommcginnis]

It's almost a year now since I started working on both my job and my trading software during the same day. Several lessons I learned:

1) There's never going to be a better time than exhaustion after 12 hours of day job (8 hrs regular time, 1 hour lunch break, 3 hours commute). If you rest, you will indeed wake up refreshed in the morning, just in time for another 12 hours in the Gulag.

2) Rinse and repeat. After a while you figure out you'll either die in the Konzentrationslager or you gotta fucking find time for working on your exit.

3) Goto 1: the hours you put after the 12 you put for the Corporation are not, in any way, similar to the hours you put for the Corporation. If you don't get that, you'll die.

OK, that's my experience. Yours?

A second thought:
Trading is a lot like competitive running -- the moment you slack off to "rest," the rest of the world is (training, researching, teaching, reviewing, growing, challenging...), and may thereby be leaving you behind. The *moment* you're resting, your competition won't be.
Jeeeeez.

"Side projects"??? Only as they are useful to provide rest/break/relief from trading.

10 years ago, I could scalp.
5 years ago, I could lay weekly credit spreads like a farmer planting wheat.
2017?? Phew! This week, vol has "exploded" to nearly it's historic average.
(I'm going to repeat that last line, as it's rather impactful.....)
...This week, vol has "exploded" to nearly it's historic average.

If you're not always developing, experimenting, testing, mulling, cogitating.... you're going to get a method that works, and then it won't, and you'll get bled, when that next market "season" comes.