Pardon my typo's, I don't have time to proof it. Not that it would make much difference anyhow
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Pay close attention to rising levels of resistance and falling levels of support. Fading penetrations of these levels offer good risk/reward trades. The faster a support/resistance level is falling/rising the higher the probability of the trade if a penetration occurs. If you are trading futures don't even consider trading breakouts, but many here on ET would disagree strongly with this. That's perfectly fine if they can make it work. I suspect you won't be able to but I could be wrong.
Your order of priority goes as follows:
Money Management
Risk Management
Timing
Timing the market consistently is impossible. If you make this a priority you are destined to fail. Your stops will get triggered right at the tops and bottoms of the market and even if you winners outpace your losers there's no gaurantee you can make more on your winners than you give up on your losers.
You need to take ane extremely close look at your personality. If you don't understand your personality weaknesses and/or strengths you cannot formulate a trading plan that incorporates <b>you</b> into it. You are the pilot of whatever method you choose so if you don't fully understand yourself you'll never fully understand the plan. What are you defects? Impatience, ignorance (as far as knowledge is concerned), aggressiveness? Your answer may be no to all of these but you certainly have some personality traits that are counter-productive to profitable trading -- we all do.
For example, my biggest character defect is impatience. I just cannot wait for the market to reverse. If the market is moving I want to be trading. I'm sure you can appreciate how detructive this was to my trading career. I didn't have a chance until I incorporated that problem into my trading plan. I fixed this by developing the willingness to take triggers at the exact tops and bottoms of the market and having a plan B for when they failed. If a profit is offered to me I just flat out take it. I don't want to wait for more profit (at least on the full line) because I don't have the patience to do so. If you can find these kinds of problems and fix them you have a chance.
Read "Trading in the Zone," by Mark Douglas as many times as it takes for to live, eat, and breathe, thinking about how you can get to "The Zone" This book is very, very dry at times. You have to be willing to get through those parts. If you can you will be rewarded for it. Personally, I've read this book about 8 times and I will never stop referring back to for as long as I trade. This book acts as my trading coach. Even Tom Brady -- arguably the best quarterback in the game -- has a coach. Many coaches in fact. Trading is a dedication to life long learning. It can be done!
Quote from rquerry:
I'm new to trading futures, but extremely dedicated to becoming successful. I may have to change careers in a few years! I'm looking for some experienced advice on education options. I'm willing to put in the time, but would like to skip stupid mistakes by getting a good education. I"ve already experienced the pain of a $5000 schoold that didn't do anything to prepare you for real trading. I've been following threads on ET about another group (TTM) that I almost bought into but posts on here have not given them much praise, I've heard both sides of "indicators are good/bad", no way to learn but experience and hard knocks. Not sure I believe that or hope that is not the case. I've been an educator for 15 years and I know the power of a good foundation and education. I would welcome any comments, suggestions, advice on good educational programs, resources and also any thoughts on indicators to assist the new trader. I also know that thoughts vary on chart and platform packages and would like advice.
I'm going to do my part and keep learning and reading on this forum, I just wanted to look for some specific help.
