Maintaining discipline

Rinse and repeat. No drastic behavior change during trading hours this week.

Even though I still broke 2 rules every day, I am conscious that I am breaking rules. Yesterday I actually manage to use stops in 1/3 of my trades.

I am sleeping earlier every night, and taking breaks every 45 mins based on the alarm I set.

Outside trading hours, I am reminding myself for a change more and more. Maybe with enough nagging from myself, I will gradually get a hang of it...


So far, I have gathered these suggestions. Posting my thoughts on each of them:

- Meditation: I understand the usefulness of meditation in recognizing emotions and cultivating discipline. I attempted to meditate before I started trading actively. The problem is that meditation is spiritual to me and I feel guilty about using meditation to help me in my financial success.

- Post-it notes: I have a few, and I will make more.

- Hypnosis: Any suggestions? There are many sites that looks like scam to me. Also found a couple of spirals on Youtube. I am not sure how hypnosis is different from positive talks/NLP. I guess I am up for trying if that's what my brain needs.

- Books: I have read Trading in the Zone, and now reading The disciplined reader. I read http://traderfeed.blogspot.com/ occasionally
I will keep on reading because 'cos I think the right words at the right time will strike me.

- Keep Trading Journal. I cannot make myself write down every single trade I make every day. I tried on two occasions (every time I reread Elder's book), but the journal was never kept more than a month. Ultimately, I guesstimate from my equity curve. 'Cos when I am in trouble (like past two weeks), the account either goes sideways, or down. I can envision myself using a program that streams my trades from my broker into a Journal, and I annotate daily like what I have doing on the board. Here are some finds:
www.stocktickr.com
http://www.traderdna.com/
Not ready to pay $40 for it every month though.
 
http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/f37/steenbarger-shull-and-hirschhorn-discuss-peak-3649.html

Here are some notes from Denise Shull's presentation:

Impulsive or Compulsive trades are due to pent up emotions. Find a way to get it out of the system.

Emotions cannot do anything. It is our physical action of taking a trade that results in consequence.

Ways to prevent unplanned trades. During trading hours:

1) recognize emotions
2) lean into the emotions : close eyes, and focus on feeling. Where do you feel the emotions physically? back, gut, shoulders?
3) divert emotional energy :
- take a physical break. leave the desk instead of clicking. expense emotional energy by moving physically.
- type into a journal
- audio record stream of thoughts

Outside trading hours:

- write down five childhood memories and the emotions associated with the memories. We will find that during trading, many of the same childhood emotions reveal.
- find trading plan has to match personal emotional make up
 
Quote from nimble:

http://www.traderslaboratory.com/forums/f37/steenbarger-shull-and-hirschhorn-discuss-peak-3649.html

Here are some notes from Denise Shull's presentation:

Impulsive or Compulsive trades are due to pent up emotions. Find a way to get it out of the system.

Emotions cannot do anything. It is our physical action of taking a trade that results in consequence.

Ways to prevent unplanned trades. During trading hours:

1) recognize emotions
2) lean into the emotions : close eyes, and focus on feeling. Where do you feel the emotions physically? back, gut, shoulders?
3) divert emotional energy :
- take a physical break. leave the desk instead of clicking. expense emotional energy by moving physically.
- type into a journal
- audio record stream of thoughts

Outside trading hours:

- write down five childhood memories and the emotions associated with the memories. We will find that during trading, many of the same childhood emotions reveal.
- find trading plan has to match personal emotional make up
More...

"Maybe you see yourself in one light whilst trading places different demands upon you which are in conflict."

Can you rephrase? Not sure what you mean here.

Hi nimble,

With this latest post of yours you are begining to see what I am driving at.

We all need to get negative emotion out of the firing line.
Sometimes easier said than done if you have no prior experience in say the arts or sports.

regards
f9
 
Nimble,

If you don't follow your own rules, how do you know when they don't work? Either set in concrete a set of rules to follow for a defined period, or try different sets of rules on a sim.
 
Hi Psh,

My problem is I have set of concrete rules and I have problem following them.

I see that when I break them I get into trouble. So why do I break the rules? Sometimes it is because I think I can do better than the system ;) Some times, it is pure auto-pilot.

Basically right now, I just want to follow one set of rules. It is problem in my head that I am trying to fix, not my system or my rules.

One may suggest that perhaps the system doesn't suit me. That's not the case either because I can follow it more than 90% of the time..., but it is the 10% of the time when I break rules that I end up with big loss.
 
Today was an excellent day in terms of discipline. Followed every single rule...

In the weekend, I did some soul searching as Shull suggested. I identified exactly the mentality I grew up with, and how they are giving me reasons to break rules.

Before I started trading today, I reminded myself of my plan. Every time I want to take a trade, I asked myself it if was according to my plan and rules.

The week is young. We will see how long this consciousness last.
 
4 trades today. Broke 2.

In one of the trades, "Took profit early".
In another trade, "Average up".

Stops were in place all the time.
 
I think you should hit your hand with a hammer every time you break a rule, or pay someone to do it.

This way you will not be able to trade until you heal up. Also, if you start to trade with your feet, then yes, you must smash your feet with the hammer.

By knowing that you are about to cause yourself intense pain, you will stop making mistakes.

I used to take both of my hands and make a fist. Anytime I made a newbie mistake, I would start pounding myself in the head.

This has helped me alot. Now to curb overeating, I punch myself in the stomach every time I eat more than I planned.
 
Fed day. No trade today.

Don't ask me how many times I had to resist.

Tomorrow, I need to stay in inline and not overtrade.
 
Quote from nimble:

Fed day. No trade today.

Don't ask me how many times I had to resist.

Tomorrow, I need to stay in inline and not overtrade.
More...
Even on Fed Days you can usually get some good action up until 2:15pm ... just sos you know.
 
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