Tactics to Become a More Patient and Disciplined Trader

[sroehling]

I started trading a few years ago, and I'm primarily a longer-term position trader with stocks. Through trial and error and learning from others, I've adopted numerous tactics to become more patient and disciplined:


To summarize:

1. Avoid using market orders
2. Use alerts to watch stocks for you
3. Log out of your trading platform during market hours
4. Use dedicated accounts for specific strategies
5. Use a smaller experimental account for learning and strategy development
6. Favor systems with lots of entry signals
7. Backtest your strategies (and move towards systems trading)
8. Use smaller position sizes (big one for me)
9. Use checklists to score trades
10. Just keep on trading

For me, there's been no "silver bullet" to become more patient. I've had to work on this from multiple angles. I've also become more patient just by gaining experience and through repetition.

The list above is tailored to my style of trading, but I'd be interested to know if others have some tips, tricks and techniques they've used to become more patient.

 

[murray t turtle]

I started trading a few years ago, and I'm primarily a longer-term position trader with stocks. Through trial and error and learning from others, I've adopted numerous tactics to become more patient and disciplined:


To summarize:

1. Avoid using market orders
2. Use alerts to watch stocks for you
3. Log out of your trading platform during market hours
4. Use dedicated accounts for specific strategies
5. Use a smaller experimental account for learning and strategy development
6. Favor systems with lots of entry signals
7. Backtest your strategies (and move towards systems trading)
8. Use smaller position sizes (big one for me)
9. Use checklists to score trades
10. Just keep on trading

For me, there's been no "silver bullet" to become more patient. I've had to work on this from multiple angles. I've also become more patient just by gaining experience and through repetition.

The list above is tailored to my style of trading, but I'd be interested to know if others have some tips, tricks and techniques they've used to become more patient.

%% Check list;
market order$ work fine/exits with multimillion+ average day volume + care[Limit order entry works fine; but like IBD [Investor's Business Daily] warns= dont quibble over a quarter + miss the move.So true..........................................................................................

 

[MarkBrown]

wow where to even begin on this topic? myself i focus on pre-market hour and up to pre-lunch hour, thinking surely i can focus for 4 hours. yet i still have to set alerts, electric shock device, loud noises like babies crying and telephone ringing etc. i want some adderall so bad but then i would own the world and that would be no fun.

 

[murray t turtle]

wow where to even begin on this topic? myself i focus on pre-market hour and up to pre-lunch hour, thinking surely i can focus for 4 hours. yet i still have to set alerts, electric shock device, loud noises like babies crying and telephone ringing etc. i want some adderall so bad but then i would own the world and that would be no fun.

%%
IF you like ''shocking stuff'';
SQQQ+ TQQQ can have shocking gaps/ moves/trends LOL,

 

[EsKiller]

I started trading a few years ago, and I'm primarily a longer-term position trader with stocks. Through trial and error and learning from others, I've adopted numerous tactics to become more patient and disciplined:


To summarize:

1. Avoid using market orders
2. Use alerts to watch stocks for you
3. Log out of your trading platform during market hours
4. Use dedicated accounts for specific strategies
5. Use a smaller experimental account for learning and strategy development
6. Favor systems with lots of entry signals
7. Backtest your strategies (and move towards systems trading)
8. Use smaller position sizes (big one for me)
9. Use checklists to score trades
10. Just keep on trading

For me, there's been no "silver bullet" to become more patient. I've had to work on this from multiple angles. I've also become more patient just by gaining experience and through repetition.

The list above is tailored to my style of trading, but I'd be interested to know if others have some tips, tricks and techniques they've used to become more patient.

This is all a joke right ? Or is this a troll post aimed at dumbing down our IQ ?

#1, Fast moving action right at the open, market orders are a must.
#2 not all of us trade stocks
#3 How is logging out of our trading platform during market hours going to help with discipline if we need that platform to make trades ?????
#4 Honestly, I think #4 makes u less disciplined. One account per asset class if anything.
#5 Makes u less disciplined.
#6 Lots of entry signals, again, less disciplined if your plan isn't ironclad
#7 How does this involve discipline ?
#9 How does this help discipline ?
#10 Again, how is this discipline ?

 

[sroehling]

wow where to even begin on this topic? myself i focus on pre-market hour and up to pre-lunch hour, thinking surely i can focus for 4 hours. yet i still have to set alerts, electric shock device, loud noises like babies crying and telephone ringing etc. i want some adderall so bad but then i would own the world and that would be no fun.

Yes, for trading intra-day, I can definitely see having a block of uninterrupted/focused time would be very beneficial. I don't day trade, since it would conflict with my personal schedule and other obligations. If you know you have an upcoming business meeting or personal commitment (e.g. drive your kid to school), then I can totally see how someone could have FOMO and rush into a trade.

 

[murray t turtle]

This is all a joke right ? Or is this a troll post aimed at dumbing down our IQ ?

#1, Fast moving action right at the open, market orders are a must.
#2 not all of us trade stocks
#3 How is logging out of our trading platform during market hours going to help with discipline if we need that platform to make trades ?????
#4 Honestly, I think #4 makes u less disciplined. One account per asset class if anything.
#5 Makes u less disciplined.
#6 Lots of entry signals, again, less disciplined if your plan isn't ironclad
#7 How does this involve discipline ?
#9 How does this help discipline ?
#10 Again, how is this discipline ?

%%
# 1; so true on market orders/liquid markets. Dont quibble over a quarter + miss the move.
#10 sounds like an error/big error[ keep trading/action addict]; unless he has real low hit rate- then it could make sense, its a low hit rate/profitable.,

 

[Ayn Rand]

You are either one or the other

Your strategy is buy and hold. So find other things to do. Tennis, golf, women, drugs, whatever ...

"I started trading a few years ago, and I'm primarily a longer-term position trader with stocks. Through trial and error and learning from others, I've adopted numerous tactics to become more patient and disciplined:"

If you are a longer term position trader how do you get more patient??

You either buy and hold or are in on every tick.

I am going to give you a clue. There is a strong positive bias to the market in general but not necessarily any one particular stock until there isn't.

Why? (There maybe a rotation in and out of certain stocks but for market as a whole.)


Lots of people get a percentage of funds under managements.
It is easier for everyone when stocks are going up.

Stocks will only truly go down when

A major leverage situation blows up.
So form of geological disaster takes places.

All the rest of the up and down is just the slicks taking a little out of everyone's pension plan.

 

[sroehling]

%%
# 1; so true on market orders/liquid markets. Dont quibble over a quarter + miss the move.
#10 sounds like an error/big error[ keep trading/action addict]; unless he has real low hit rate- then it could make sense, its a low hit rate/profitable.,

Yes, perhaps the title for #10 could be better. These are all taken from personal experience and in the context of being a longer term position & swing trader (the article itself provides more context too). By "just keep on trading", what I mean is not to become less disciplined and over-trade. Basically, over time, trading has become more natural and I've become less jittery with entries and exits, and experience & screen time helps me skip sub-par trades.

For #1, my preference is to use stop-limit orders for entry, but with some leeway to not miss the move. Or, I'll sometimes enter a position mid-day or towards to the close with one of Interactive Broker's "IBALGO" order types to try to improve vs a plain market order. I definitely like the "don't quibble over a quarter" quote; this definitely makes sense for IBD-style trading, where the primary timeframe is daily/weekly, and there's more margin for error with entries.

I hope the above provides some clarification. Thanks for the feedback.

 

[Snuskpelle]

Medium's trading articles as shit as a rule (possibly there is some exception). Hope you can improve their level. I don't really agree on a bunch of the points in OP however.