Iterative Refinement
- Thread starter Spydertrader
- Start date
The important first steps in this learning journey...
1. don't trade yet. don't even sim. (this is the instruction given since the beginning of the futures journal.)
2. observe the market
3. draw your channels
4. annotate... pt1, pt2, pt3...
5. draw your Gaussians
6. annotate more... VE, FTT, BO, FBO, Sym, FTP, FBP, IBGS... etc.,
7. (the most important part) Post your charts daily.
You will see the difference in one month.
I guarantee it.
ESM8 Daily Chart March/ 25/ 08
I did all that last year.
When I wasn't trading (didn't even have an account open) and just drawing channels, watching, annotating volume it all made sense and I was confident in how I was seeing the market.
Actual trading has been a different story thus far.
Just so i'm clear.
Are you guys (cnms, tums, callmate, spyder, etc or whoever posts on here) consistently profitable? Up every day? 4 of 5 days a week or whatever?
I really hope you guys and girls are. I hope you're all killing it.
At least then I'll know its just me and more work needs to be put in.
This is a journey...
What you really need to ask yourself is...
do you think this method works? and
does it work for you?
You said you have done all that charting thing last year...
I remember seeing one or two of your charts, but do not recall what you have done to them.
On the chart you posted today... I see you have progressed to Step 3.
Maybe you do not believe annotation is important?
I can tell you, if you can pick money off the chart, annotation is not important.
Obviously there is something missing between the signals on the chart, and your timely analysis, decision and action (MADA).
Where is the missing link?
Looking at your chart, I won't know if those signals made their way into your observation in real time. If they did, I am sure you would have exploited them accordingly.
p.s. If you had labelled your chart, at least we can look back and learn the reasons of your mistaken FTTs, etc.
I guess, you can't really describe what you did in any of your failing trades because you don't have yet a process you're repeating every time. So you can't really say that you're following whatever process, and that it fails 50%, 80%, or 100% of the time.
Suggestion: Tomorrow for every trade you'll be taking, immediately after you close it write down a detailed description (volume gaussians, trendline brakes, formations, OHLC breaks, ES and YM, etc.) of what determined your entry, of what determined your exit. Take a screen shot immediately after your entry, and one immediately after your exit. Don't worry if because of it you'll be missing some trades. At least you'll have something to discuss about.
Suggestion: Tomorrow for every trade you'll be taking, immediately after you close it write down a detailed description (volume gaussians, trendline brakes, formations, OHLC breaks, ES and YM, etc.) of what determined your entry, of what determined your exit. Take a screen shot immediately after your entry, and one immediately after your exit. Don't worry if because of it you'll be missing some trades. At least you'll have something to discuss about.