Thinking is 95%

mikeriley

mikeriley

This is of course just my humble opinion (I'm trying to be humble):)
The more I trade the more I realize I'm not just trading the markets,
but trading against myself or with myself. The end of last year I started
making some bone head mistakes and went into a slump.

Part of my strategy is to hold a position for a certain amount of ticks.
For some odd reason, I got into fear-based trading, and started closing
my positions or trading out of positions before they reached my target.

The drawdowns were no worse than before, but I kept closing the damn trades.

My P/L turned to sh@t from this activity. The worse part I was trying
to find blame with activities outside of trading. I even told my wife
maybe it's our cat influencing me to make mistakes and we should
get rid of it. My wife responded by getting another cat! LOL:wtf:
Cat pics posted below.

I stopped trading for a few weeks and only played in simulation.
After much introspection I realized I had changed my thinking
style when in a trade. I have a mantra I repeat in my mind
when trading. Without realizing it, I stopped using my mantra.

The mantra is harmless, but it keeps me in a trade.
As soon as I started using my mental mantra again,
my trading started improving.

I believe, at least for me, trading is 95% thinking
and psychology. The rest is strategy/tactics
and risk management.

Tuxedo cat name is Ben - Ginger cat name is Lucky
our cats.jpg
 
mikeriley said:
This is of course just my humble opinion (I'm trying to be humble):)
The more I trade the more I realize I'm not just trading the markets,
but trading against myself or with myself. The end of last year I started
making some bone head mistakes and went into a slump.

Part of my strategy is to hold a position for a certain amount of ticks.
For some odd reason, I got into fear-based trading, and started closing
my positions or trading out of positions before they reached my target.

The drawdowns were no worse than before, but I kept closing the damn trades.

My P/L turned to sh@t from this activity. The worse part I was trying
to find blame with activities outside of trading. I even told my wife
maybe it's our cat influencing me to make mistakes and we should
get rid of it. My wife responded by getting another cat! LOL:wtf:
Cat pics posted below.

I stopped trading for a few weeks and only played in simulation.
After much introspection I realized I had changed my thinking
style when in a trade. I have a mantra I repeat in my mind
when trading. Without realizing it, I stopped using my mantra.

The mantra is harmless, but it keeps me in a trade.
As soon as I started using my mental mantra again,
my trading started improving.

I believe, at least for me, trading is 95% thinking
and psychology. The rest is strategy/tactics
and risk management.

Tuxedo cat name is Ben - Ginger cat name is Lucky
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Good Morning mikeriley,

Great write up. I think we all have our personally issues with trading in generally. I respect everyone trading journey in the reach for success and trading goals obtaining.

For me, I believe, 100% of trading for me is recovering drawdown and getting account back growing upwards. All that other stuff risk management, trade method is easy. 3 losses in row happens, then the real battle and fun begins.

There is no getting around it, we have to fight strongly when trading and passionately love being a winner everyday and the master and king. We have to want to be best. The winner of everyone. This is a business of being the master. My thought process is always every day "ES, I am going to kick your ass today and win"

Everyday must be a winner when trading the NQ and ES. No such thing as a losing day. This is the only way to master the trading and we have to hurry up and do it. Because if we take forever, the brain start thinking we are losers and our family and love ones will say we are losers traders, what is taking you so long to be millionaire. We must have plan to show them million dollar account or close to it.

Trading the ES and NQ is about becoming rich as fast as possible.

The problem us a traders have is, we do not want to believe what I just say. We want to play with trading. This is not play time. this is serious warrior jungle fighting. Get to a million dollars in one year, are just face defeat year to year.
 
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Hi there SimpleMeLike,

Everyday must be a winner when trading the NQ and ES. No such thing as a losing day. This is the only way to master the trading and we have to hurry up and do it. Because if we take forever, the brain start thinking we are losers and our family and love ones will say we are losers traders, what is taking you so long to be millionaire. We must have plan to show them million dollar account or close to it.
More...

I like your attitude about winning every day. I also find
your perspective about losing interesting.

A book that resonates with me when it comes to
handling losses is Tom Hougaard's book "The Best Loser Wins".
If you haven't already, you might find it an interesting read.
 
mikeriley said:
Hi there SimpleMeLike,



I like your attitude about winning every day. I also find
your perspective about losing interesting.

A book that resonates with me when it comes to
handling losses is Tom Hougaard's book "The Best Loser Wins".
If you haven't already, you might find it an interesting read.
More...
Hello mikeriley,

Nope, reading books is a waste time sir for me.

There is nothing complicated about what I said. As a day trader I am here to make money every day. Period. I am here to be rich. Period. I am here to be rich in one year. Period. Nothing can help, unless you have the purified edge and reach these goals already and you got to show me and teach me how to do it. Or you have an algo already doing it.

We have to stop reading books and just get simple. We have to get all that stuff out of head.

The goal is to

1. Feel good everyday by winning in day trading.
2. Making ALOT of money every single day
3. buying nice things in the personal life and eating the good food to show our rewards from being a master trading.
4. Making 1 million dollars every year.

Period. Nothing can help you with that besides someone already doing it. And since that is uncommon to find such a trader, we must be the trader.

Reading books is useless. Noone writing books will help you. get rich, and hurry up. because if you not hurry up and keep reading books, you will be near like 65 years old, still trying to get better and stressed out. Nope, we need to get rich now. And what better way to get rich is the NQ and ES markets. That is why it is exist to get rich.

If you not making $100,000 a month trading NQ and ES, then its not worth it to do daily. You be too stressed.

Recover drawdown and win everyday, stare at the chart.
 
Hi SimpleMeLike

Just be aware that the author is someone already doing it
as proven on his Live Trading Telegram channel.
He does shares insight on what it takes to gain an edge in the markets.
I've learned to glean insight and wisdom from successful traders.

To your trading success.
 
mikeriley said:
I even told my wife
maybe it's our cat influencing me to make mistakes and we should
get rid of it. My wife responded by getting another cat! LOL:wtf:
More...
As much as this is perhaps 50% a joke, I wonder about the other 50%. Your suggestion was certainly irrational, since the cat should have no influence at all, except of course if its a distraction, and in which case, simply closing the door to keep it out would have been a good solution. But the fact that you're expressing a concern to your wife and she doubles down on what you identify as the problem means that perhaps one day it will be the wife that has to go!

No joke there either. If your wife isn't supportive of what you're doing, and instead tries to sabotage you, you're gonna have a much bigger issue than simply not hitting your original profit target.
 
NoahA said:
As much as this is perhaps 50% a joke, I wonder about the other 50%. Your suggestion was certainly irrational, since the cat should have no influence at all, except of course if its a distraction, and in which case, simply closing the door to keep it out would have been a good solution. But the fact that you're expressing a concern to your wife and she doubles down on what you identify as the problem means that perhaps one day it will be the wife that has to go!

No joke there either. If your wife isn't supportive of what you're doing, and instead tries to sabotage you, you're gonna have a much bigger issue than simply not hitting your original profit target.
More...
Hello NoahA,

I agree on this. Keep the women out of our trading business. They only bring extra stress anyway.

They want to see us making millions and no debt and them having nice things. They can not help us in trading, unless they already rich.
 
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