struggling trader needs help
- Thread starter rnaugin
- Start date
First of all you will never learn to trade if you are consistently thinking that you must become an expert trader in the next couple months because you paid the tuition.
Trading is in no way like that. You don't need to lose a certain amount of money or change major parts of your personality. You need to change your attitude. Once you change your attitude you can then start moving forward.
Your attitude is of a spoiled little child feeling entitled to win the US open because he took three months of golf lessons. The spoiled little kid then throws temper tantrums daily on the course whenever he doesn't play like tiger.
Your attitude needs to be one of passion. You need to tell yourself, accept and believe that if you die a profitless trader then you die. Once you can form apathy around your corrupted perspective of perception and total dedication to the only thing that matters in trading then you may start to see some progress.
Your perception of reality and passion for success in one area is the same as everyone else who makes 50k a year at a 9-5 job. Lose it as soon as possible.
Trading is in no way like that. You don't need to lose a certain amount of money or change major parts of your personality. You need to change your attitude. Once you change your attitude you can then start moving forward.
Your attitude is of a spoiled little child feeling entitled to win the US open because he took three months of golf lessons. The spoiled little kid then throws temper tantrums daily on the course whenever he doesn't play like tiger.
Your attitude needs to be one of passion. You need to tell yourself, accept and believe that if you die a profitless trader then you die. Once you can form apathy around your corrupted perspective of perception and total dedication to the only thing that matters in trading then you may start to see some progress.
Your perception of reality and passion for success in one area is the same as everyone else who makes 50k a year at a 9-5 job. Lose it as soon as possible.
After about ten years of screen time and a couple of cycles you will get the hang of it.
Nothing worth while is ever easy. Plan on a decade.
Nothing worth while is ever easy. Plan on a decade.
In addition to a journal, I chose to go with a headset and screen recording software (camtasia).
I record everything while trading, and talk my thoughts through. What my reasons are for taking a trade, what I am hoping to see/not see, and so on.
Saturday and Sunday, I sit down and review my trading sessions.
The fastest way to improve your trading is to learn from your mistakes. The more mistakes you make, the more you have to learn from, so don't despair too much. Many great traders went bust at some point (better early on than late).
The only people who fail in this line of work are those who are unable to learn from their mistakes.
By watching the recordings, I am able to remind myself that even properly analyzed trades (as per my standards) don't always work out. As long as I feel that taking the trade was justified, I am able to brush off losing trades and move on.
Losses bother everyone. Who the hell enjoys losing? Winners don't let losses affect their next move. I think a big part of trading is just convincing yourself that you know what you're doing and will know what to do when presented with an opportunity.
How a trader convinces himself varies. Personally, I don't feel that I am in the proper condition to trade unless I put in significant amounts of screen time. Some guys have no problem sticking to an hour a day (or even less). I am not one of them. I don't need to ask myself if I am doing enough...I just know whether or not I am.
Final tidbit, be comfortable. Some way, some how, figure out what style you are most comfortable with. Nothing else will have as big an impact on your trading.
I record everything while trading, and talk my thoughts through. What my reasons are for taking a trade, what I am hoping to see/not see, and so on.
Saturday and Sunday, I sit down and review my trading sessions.
The fastest way to improve your trading is to learn from your mistakes. The more mistakes you make, the more you have to learn from, so don't despair too much. Many great traders went bust at some point (better early on than late).
The only people who fail in this line of work are those who are unable to learn from their mistakes.
By watching the recordings, I am able to remind myself that even properly analyzed trades (as per my standards) don't always work out. As long as I feel that taking the trade was justified, I am able to brush off losing trades and move on.
Losses bother everyone. Who the hell enjoys losing? Winners don't let losses affect their next move. I think a big part of trading is just convincing yourself that you know what you're doing and will know what to do when presented with an opportunity.
How a trader convinces himself varies. Personally, I don't feel that I am in the proper condition to trade unless I put in significant amounts of screen time. Some guys have no problem sticking to an hour a day (or even less). I am not one of them. I don't need to ask myself if I am doing enough...I just know whether or not I am.
Final tidbit, be comfortable. Some way, some how, figure out what style you are most comfortable with. Nothing else will have as big an impact on your trading.
Taking a loss quickly when a strong setup fizzles makes no dent on the psyche of an experienced trader. I just told a friend that I feel way better about a well-managed losing trade than I do about a winning trade that I stumbled through like a drunk idiot.
This is a double-edged sword. Comfort level was a huge factor in getting me into enough successful trades to begin making a living at trading.
But, it also prevented me from cutting losses quickly enough, because I am often so confident in my setups that I'm certain certain the trade will eventually move in my favor. This results in either larger than necessary losses, or winners that I stumbled through like a drunk idiot.
I'm still working on this flaw.
:eek:
Have some daily trading rituals might help. It will get you more disciplined.
1. Before Trading Session
2. Before entering trade
3. Monitoring trade
4. After trades
5. After Trading Session
The Art of Speculation
1. Before Trading Session
2. Before entering trade
3. Monitoring trade
4. After trades
5. After Trading Session
The Art of Speculation
I totally agree with âRedneck traderâ, ârnauginâyou're not committed, you're conflicted.
I'll only add that most responses to this post (apart from âRedneck traderâ) are giving you solutions but in my opinion you need to develop self-awareness and they won't help you and will keep you in a trap.
You're self-sabotaging yourself, playing psychological games with yourself and the market is ideal environment for such games. My advice is to start working on self-awareness and deal with underlying issues. Perhaps find a decent psychologist who could see through the illusion you're presenting in your post. Your post is very paradoxical, out of touch with reality, and hopefully a decent psychologist should see through that and help you overcome those issues.
If you don't want work on your issues then other alternative is to trade with total discipline which obviously you cannot do because your actions are reflections of what is going on inside of you. Your approach is not working and won't work, you've got to be totally honest with yourself.
All the best
==============Quote from rnaugin:
Hello everyone,
I have been reading this board for quite some time, but this is my first post.
I am a struggling trader, and I hope that by posting here I can pick up some advice and encouragement to keep going. I also hope that by airing this publicly I might be able to narrow my focus and solve it.
It is a firm goal of mine to make a living trading. I am very committed to it. I have been trading on and off for the past 14 years, between job contracts. Total calendar time spent on trading related activities is probably 1.5 years.
I "know" enough now to be successful. In fact I "know" enough about trading to write a very credible response to this post, should I choose to masquerade as an expert.
Over the last calendar year, I've kept detailed notes on my trading and have addressed several important issues. However there is one thing that I just can't seem to overcome:
Revenge trading. I hate losing.
This is a tough one for me. My first loss of the day is pretty easy, I take it mostly in stride. However, it upsets me somewhat and I start to rush a bit. The second loss is usually due to obvious stupidity on my part, and that makes me really mad at myself. Then I start looking for anything that looks remotely like a setup or just take impulsive scalps.
I only quit when I reach my "point of unbearable pain" which is sometimes more than 10% of my account. After than I am defeated and depressed and ready to give up.
It sounds easy to say "just don't do that". But I can't describe how powerful the impulse is to "fight back". My hands shake and my heart rate goes up. I can't think clearly. I know in that moment that I MUST stop trading. Only rarely can I actually walk away when that happens.
I am a very emotional, impulsive person by nature. Not to give the wrong idea, I am also responsible, stable and intelligent. But trusting my gut, making snap decisions with limited data and taking risks are strengths that have set me apart from the crowd and have lead to success in other areas of my life.
I feel like I should be able to overcome those traits to trade. I don't overtrade for the excitement, as gambler would. I don't enjoy overtrading at all. It's just REALLY hard to stop myself when I am facing a loss for the day.
Oddly, this has only been a problem for the past year or two. Before that losses didn't bother me as much, I thought of them as tuition. But I think it's starting to sink in that I might not actually be able to do this.
I would really appreciate serious suggestions by people who have have overcome tough, personality based trading obstacles like this. As I said, I am very committed to making this work, but I'm at the point where I need some outside perspective.
I'd also really like to hear from people who have fought their own demons and won.
M-Trader;
You have part of it-keep records
Especially what you profited on [real estate, jobs, businesses strong trends];
what you didnot profit on[emotional based real estate transactions......]...................................
Revenge[emotional/ lottery/get rich quick]]trading is wrong risk /reward ratio;
but it takes some longer to learn than others. ABC news should be ashamed of themselves for promoting lotto winners with -out listing the odds.
Buying Lotto is a stupid tax on math as Dave Ramsey says
i couldnt agree more.
consistent profitable trading is the opposite of gambling. the former is dull, repetitive and boring while the later is fun and addictive.
unfortunately you cant have both. either you want to make money while getting bored to death or have fun while destroying your bankroll. you chose.
"revenge trading" or "hate to lose" mentality signals that you're gambling, which it is a losing proposition.
i'll sum up what you need to do:
1. you have to lock in an <b>edge</b>, either technical, statistical, fundamental, etc. without an edge, there is no way to make money in the long run.
2. you have to set up a <b>money management</b> plan that prevents considerable DDs, i.e. risk per trade 0.5% or less. without MM, even the best edge is eroded by substantial DDs and eventually leads to blow up.
3. <b>discipline</b> - stick to you guns no matter what, as the money management will assure that in any circumstance, the potential losses are contained. a good edge with proper MM but lacking discipline minimizes returns while increasing risks.
these are the foundations of any successful trader out there. you need nothing else to turn your trading around. sadly, if you fail at any of these, you'll never make it because from a statistical standpoint, there is no way to win a game in which the odds are against you.