How to overcome the inability to accept small losses when wrong on trades?

[qxr1011]

Bar interval is of little relevance to me. For example, the ES rally high on 4/18/2018 was 2718.50. That will be the high no matter how your chose to display the data

but meaning of that high may be different depending on which chart one looks on, especially how that high was achieved and therefore how it can pullback or develop further

even if its the high of all times it may mean different thing on different charts

 

[zenemini]

but meaning of that high may be different depending on which chart one looks on, especially how that high was achieved and therefore how it can pullback or develop further

even if its the high of all times it may mean different thing on different charts

The meaning will be whatever meaning the trader gives it. You and I view the markets differently from one another, which, of course, is an important characteristic of markets. All that matters is that we each are happy with the outcome of our respective views. Best to your trading.

 

[murray t turtle]

My solution to that problem is unconventional and the pros here will laugh at me:

1. Gave up day trading and moved to swing trades. Then in 2013, moved to swing trade options exclusively.

2. Only trade stocks I don't mind owning. Many of my mistakes became my long term holdings.

3. Examples: MSFT, GOOG in 2007 became long term holdings.

4. Read IBD O'Neil, stop-loss and got out of FB, AMZN, BABA in 2014 instead of converting to long term holdings.

Best wishes to you.

%%
Good points. Dr MM 's Psychocybernetics, by Medical doctor is a good read, but that + other psychobabble writer never helped me.DR MM did well to note king Solomon, but i would invest much more than one page...... Trading is much more like medical science, time requirements, analyze time takes years like for a medical doctor. Speaking plainly ,any sunday, saturday, day of the week
AS far as ''feeling terrible shame'' that is normal; trading is not like buying a lottery ticket, in 5 minutes. It much more like a medical doctor taking years; + those that did not borrow money to do student loans/medical ed , are in much better shape.

 

[eves_banished_children]

If it was someone else's position would you be able to trade them into a more profitable one ?

There is a moment in time where you have appraised the situation and have lucid thoughts about what is apt to happen next.

Why does it matter that its you who made the entry when you see its time to move ?

 

[_eug_]

Since making this thread, I have decided to close up my futures trading account and re-evaluate everything. It really felt like I was in a gambling state, rather then a trader mindset so I put a stop to it before I do more damage to my self and my capital. I need to shift my focus to capital growth / preservation rather than to make income from my daily trading activities. I believe that this is what is messing with me the most as I have no other source of income at the moment. I live in Thailand now so the living expenses are minimal anyways so its not that big of a deal but I am used to making good money working a corporate job back home. PS. I did not quite my job to become a trader, there were other reasons for quitting.

I've been long stock index ETF's since 2010 dollar cost averaging in when I had a job and I have no problem with longer term investing. Its more of the shorter term stuff that I am not psychologically equipped to handle. I am thinking to shift my focus to swing / position trading stocks if we break out above January highs and the bull market continues. Otherwise ill go flat in my ETF's and sit in cash for a while.

 

[eves_banished_children]

Since making this thread, I have decided to close up my futures trading account and re-evaluate everything. It really felt like I was in a gambling state, rather then a trader mindset so I put a stop to it before I do more damage to my self and my capital. I need to shift my focus to capital growth / preservation rather than to make income from my daily trading activities. I believe that this is what is messing with me the most as I have no other source of income at the moment. I live in Thailand now so the living expenses are minimal anyways so its not that big of a deal but I am used to making good money working a corporate job back home. PS. I did not quite my job to become a trader, there were other reasons for quitting.

I've been long stock index ETF's since 2010 dollar cost averaging in when I had a job and I have no problem with longer term investing. Its more of the shorter term stuff that I am not psychologically equipped to handle. I am thinking to shift my focus to swing / position trading stocks if we break out above January highs and the bull market continues. Otherwise ill go flat in my ETF's and sit in cash for a while.

The most responsible post I've ever seen here.

 

[tomorton]

Since making this thread, I have decided to close up my futures trading account and re-evaluate everything. It really felt like I was in a gambling state, rather then a trader mindset so I put a stop to it before I do more damage to my self and my capital. I need to shift my focus to capital growth / preservation rather than to make income from my daily trading activities. I believe that this is what is messing with me the most as I have no other source of income at the moment. I live in Thailand now so the living expenses are minimal anyways so its not that big of a deal but I am used to making good money working a corporate job back home. PS. I did not quite my job to become a trader, there were other reasons for quitting.

I've been long stock index ETF's since 2010 dollar cost averaging in when I had a job and I have no problem with longer term investing. Its more of the shorter term stuff that I am not psychologically equipped to handle. I am thinking to shift my focus to swing / position trading stocks if we break out above January highs and the bull market continues. Otherwise ill go flat in my ETF's and sit in cash for a while.

The principles involved are absolutely right. When price is in a consistent uptrend, you should be long, and when there isn't as trend, you should be in cash. This is the foundation: the shorter-term stuff is optional / cosmetic.

 

[NOMDeX]

Mindfulness meditation. Brainwave entrainment may make it faster for you, though you'll need to figure out if it works for you as research says about 85% humans respond positively to brainwave entrainment.

Evaluate the net results on a bunch of trades (as per your system) not every trade.

 

[eves_banished_children]

The principles involved are absolutely right. When price is in a consistent uptrend, you should be long, and when there isn't as trend, you should be in cash. This is the foundation: the shorter-term stuff is optional / cosmetic.

My opinion ...

It starts with understanding what wealth is (friends, family, peace of mind, possessions, being out in the sunshine ...)

Next taking a position in forex, because every equity, commodity, and bond market is priced in a currency, forex is the ocean upon which everything else exists. Everyone has a forex position, even if it's just "cash in the bank" (i.e. their local currency in a banking institution in the country where they reside)

Next determining your own attention span, how often you are able to sit and make decisions about what positions you are going to take, etc, because that drives the time window that your positions and trades should be. Obviously you aren't going to want to scalp if you're only looking at the markets once a week.

Next develop some kind of basic long term positions, where you want to be when you essentially aren't paying attention to what is going on, do you want to be holding some kind of cash, short term treasuries, longer term treasuries or corporate bonds, cd's ...

Next figure out the tax implications of everything you're doing ...

In my opinion those kinds of things are foundational, before you even move on to ...

NEXT ... you can start focusing in on shorter periods of time. The shorter the period of time, the more attention your trades and positions require, and the more potential there is for both gain and loss, especially when employing leverage. Do you have the attention span and time to sit down once a week and change positions, once a day, once an hour, once a minute, to automate to trade by the second, millisecond, nanosecond ? The shorter the period of time, the more trading is going to be a "job".

Edit, and if you don't have some kind of feedback mechanism to determine whether you are making things better or worse by trading shorter periods of time, then that's a problem. If day trading for a year leaves you worse off than if you had just bought a 1 year treasury, what's the point ?

I think it's very responsible for the poster above to back off from short time frames and focus more on the underlying positions s/he is taking. Everyone should probably do that from time to time to gain perspective, take a vacation, etc.

 

[_eug_]

What I was doing before is looking at longer inter day Time charts and CVB charts for shorter time frames and looking for shifts in momentum on shorter time frames (head and shoulders, inverse head and shoulders, DT, DB) as we approached important price Zones (Accumulation / Distribution). Basically I would get long on retests of accumulation zones and short on retests of distributions zones. I did not have any specific rules but rather an understanding of how the market moves and would look to read the chart and price action on the fly.

At this point though for me to continue to trade futures does not make sense even though I know I am onto a proper understanding of charting and price action. I lost about 10% of my liquid net worth over the last year and a half of active trading and I am not ready to lose more.

I have been looking at stock charts of well known companies and it looks to me like there may be something to buying all time highs as they break out of long term consolidation zones. Kinda of a Darvas boxes type of approach. Instead of trying to catch turning points like in the futures markets. Honestly at this point I would be totally satisfied with making 20-30% return per year for my efforts. That would let me live comfortably and also to grow my account as long as I avoid living in first world countries.