Dan,
candledude, what exactly IS an ego? do everyone have one? do I have one? how would I identify it??
fact is, there's really no such thing as an "ego"... it's just another bit of unnecessary Freudian pyschobabble fluff. just substitue the word "mind" or "brain" for ego.... that way we can take a more "scientific" (not strictly scientific) approach to problem solving..
Daniele I don't really know exactly how to take the above statement, you sound almost as if you are saying that since you cannot put your finger on it, than it can't exist
Of course the word is a label for something that transcends physical matter. Put your finger on "love" or "soul". Yes you are right Dan I can't very well take my ego out, put it on the table and poke it with a finger. BUT what is the point Dan???
Do I feel everyone has an ego??? Yes.
Do you have one??? YES
How would I identify it??? hmmmmmmm, maybe I start by relating it directly to the game of trading, since this is a trading forum...
Have you ever had a string of winners that caused a sensation of complacency or worst yet euphoria??? You start to get a little cocky or overconfident... start pressing a little harder... maybe risking more than you usually do on a trade... maybe blow a stop or two... Now on a rational level we know that every edge or system applied to the market will have a random distribution of wins and losses on a micro-level, but what exactly IS it that causes us to indulge these nasty emotions???
Ever blow a stop Dan??? Play moves right by your stop and yet you freeze and do nothing... On a rational level we know that we will have losses, we are traders and that is the game right... yet sometimes for some reason we just can't seem to accept a loss... we start to indulge hope, as if the market owes us something or is here to accomodate us...
Did you ever get in a play in one direction, market does not accomodate it but sets up in the opposite direction instead... You close the play but simply can't see the other side... In hindsight you know that it was an ecellent set-up in the opposite direction and that the play should have been spun, yet while the play is setting up on "the hard right edge" we can't see it...
Ever indulge in revenge trading??? Down on a day, had some bad breaks due not to anything you did, but maybe just chance... Now on a rational level we know there will be days like this, but that something inside of us compels us to try and trade out of it... you start to have what I like to call "cognitive illusions", seeing set-ups that are simply not there...
Ever cut a winner too short Dan... You get into a position and it starts to move in your favor and you know on a rational level that you must hold on and ride it for what its worth, yet that something inside of us, spawns that nasty emotion fear, and suddenly we get so attached to the position and to the fear of it snapping back and taking away your gains that you go and do what you know you shouldn't and grab the gain prematurely... After the play you sit back and can see more clearly now,because that thing is no longer attached to the play and you see it go another 3 or 4 R's in your favor...
Bro give it a name! Freud and Jung called it ego... Ancient sages called it the "I" sense, what ever... The thing called ego is indeed spawned from the mind, and if you want to call it brain or mind, call it that... A label is nothing more than just that, start to call the little nasty shit publias, it is still going to perpetuate the same errors over and over and over again...
these are just some that came right off the top of my head Dan, but I am sure that you and all the rest of the traders on this board have at one time or another engaged in at lest one of the examples I posed above...
You know the funny about your questions and the statement youmade above is that it was soooo on point with the way these sages felt that you could not even understand... they all felt that the existance of an ego was simply an illusion and that it was NOT there true nature! That is what the Tao Te Ching is all about, what The Bhagavad Gita was all about, and what the teachings of buhdism is all about... The irony in this entire discussion is so thick that one who understands these teachings has no choice but to sit back and laugh! If you understood or at least picked up a copy of one of these books and read it before you started passing off judgments about them you would never have asked the questions you did...
PEACE and good trading my friend,
Publias
candledude, what exactly IS an ego? do everyone have one? do I have one? how would I identify it??
fact is, there's really no such thing as an "ego"... it's just another bit of unnecessary Freudian pyschobabble fluff. just substitue the word "mind" or "brain" for ego.... that way we can take a more "scientific" (not strictly scientific) approach to problem solving..
Daniele I don't really know exactly how to take the above statement, you sound almost as if you are saying that since you cannot put your finger on it, than it can't exist
Of course the word is a label for something that transcends physical matter. Put your finger on "love" or "soul". Yes you are right Dan I can't very well take my ego out, put it on the table and poke it with a finger. BUT what is the point Dan???
Do I feel everyone has an ego??? Yes.
Do you have one??? YES
How would I identify it??? hmmmmmmm, maybe I start by relating it directly to the game of trading, since this is a trading forum...
Have you ever had a string of winners that caused a sensation of complacency or worst yet euphoria??? You start to get a little cocky or overconfident... start pressing a little harder... maybe risking more than you usually do on a trade... maybe blow a stop or two... Now on a rational level we know that every edge or system applied to the market will have a random distribution of wins and losses on a micro-level, but what exactly IS it that causes us to indulge these nasty emotions???
Ever blow a stop Dan??? Play moves right by your stop and yet you freeze and do nothing... On a rational level we know that we will have losses, we are traders and that is the game right... yet sometimes for some reason we just can't seem to accept a loss... we start to indulge hope, as if the market owes us something or is here to accomodate us...
Did you ever get in a play in one direction, market does not accomodate it but sets up in the opposite direction instead... You close the play but simply can't see the other side... In hindsight you know that it was an ecellent set-up in the opposite direction and that the play should have been spun, yet while the play is setting up on "the hard right edge" we can't see it...
Ever indulge in revenge trading??? Down on a day, had some bad breaks due not to anything you did, but maybe just chance... Now on a rational level we know there will be days like this, but that something inside of us compels us to try and trade out of it... you start to have what I like to call "cognitive illusions", seeing set-ups that are simply not there...
Ever cut a winner too short Dan... You get into a position and it starts to move in your favor and you know on a rational level that you must hold on and ride it for what its worth, yet that something inside of us, spawns that nasty emotion fear, and suddenly we get so attached to the position and to the fear of it snapping back and taking away your gains that you go and do what you know you shouldn't and grab the gain prematurely... After the play you sit back and can see more clearly now,because that thing is no longer attached to the play and you see it go another 3 or 4 R's in your favor...
Bro give it a name! Freud and Jung called it ego... Ancient sages called it the "I" sense, what ever... The thing called ego is indeed spawned from the mind, and if you want to call it brain or mind, call it that... A label is nothing more than just that, start to call the little nasty shit publias, it is still going to perpetuate the same errors over and over and over again...
these are just some that came right off the top of my head Dan, but I am sure that you and all the rest of the traders on this board have at one time or another engaged in at lest one of the examples I posed above...
You know the funny about your questions and the statement youmade above is that it was soooo on point with the way these sages felt that you could not even understand... they all felt that the existance of an ego was simply an illusion and that it was NOT there true nature! That is what the Tao Te Ching is all about, what The Bhagavad Gita was all about, and what the teachings of buhdism is all about... The irony in this entire discussion is so thick that one who understands these teachings has no choice but to sit back and laugh! If you understood or at least picked up a copy of one of these books and read it before you started passing off judgments about them you would never have asked the questions you did...
PEACE and good trading my friend,
Publias
RS
