Tips on the Mental Game

[hkrahra]

Quote from oldtime:

right, so how'd that go when you were dating girls? When she asked you, "You want to get out of here and go back to my place? My parents are gone." Did you look at your notes and tell her, "How bout we go out for a coke? I know a great place where the kids are swell!"

ND is a female.

aaaahah

 

[hkrahra]

she may date girls though,hard to say.....

 

[macroman]

Quote from jokepie:

1. find out your comfort zone - risk, trade frequency, time frames etc.
2. devise the plan.
3. only trade what fits your plan and ignore everything - news, TV, voice in ur head.
4. take breaks and dont forget to breath


Just noe that if you feel uncomfortable, on the edge and it seems like a race. you are not there yet.

G

i am more like above. would add

5. devise trading to fits in your life schedule and not other way around. This is for me around 1 hour a day.

6. put in a bet and enjoy it.

7. Do not listen to anyone how to do things. I use 10% of the highest balance equity bets. So 10 net losers I am done. 1% is for HTF. 1% makes me sloppy & sleepy.

8. make effort to produce 70%+ winners at 1:1 risk reward. 30 trades a year is fine. Slow and easy. Enjoy.

9, Reward yourself.

 

[NoDoji]

Quote from hkrahra:

Price runs back and forth for a reason.Do you have an IDed reason for that?

Yes, that's what my trading plan is based on, ID'd reasons for price swings.

But I don't care about price running back and forth in the middle of a price bar that hasn't closed yet. It'll either hit my stop loss, reach my target (where I can choose to hold for more), or hit a set of stop-and-reverse orders if indicated.

I've heard from and observed many traders who quickly move stops to break even on trades that immediately run in their favor. In their mind, they feel they are protecting themselves against unnecessary losses.

When a trade immediately runs in your favor that's a pretty good sign you've just joined the winning team. By moving your stop to break even, you're not protecting against unnecessary loss, you're denying necessary gains. I've never seen these sorts of traders exit a trade early that immediately moved against them. Heck no, they hold that baby until the bitter end. If you hold losing trades for the full loss, you'd better have mastered the mental game of holding favorable trades for the full profit (or more).

If I moved my stop to break even as quickly as I've seen many traders do, yesterday alone I would've denied myself 98 ticks of profit on oil futures.

Quote from ghinghana:

Plan meticulously, execute fearlessly

Wow, you distilled my 100+ words into just 4. I'm humbled.

 

[oldtime]

Quote from NoDoji:

Yes, that's what my trading plan is based on, ID'd reasons for price swings.

But I don't care about price running back and forth in the middle of a price bar that hasn't closed yet. It'll either hit my stop loss, reach my target (where I can choose to hold for more), or hit a set of stop-and-reverse orders if indicated.

I've heard from and observed many traders who quickly move stops to break even on trades that immediately run in their favor. In their mind, they feel they are protecting themselves against unnecessary losses.

When a trade immediately runs in your favor that's a pretty good sign you've just joined the winning team. By moving your stop to break even, you're not protecting against unnecessary loss, you're denying necessary gains. I've never seen these sorts of traders exit a trade early that immediately moved against them. Heck no, they hold that baby until the bitter end. If you hold losing trades for the full loss, you'd better have mastered the mental game of holding favorable trades for the full profit (or more).

If I moved my stop to break even as quickly as I've seen many traders do, yesterday alone I would've denied myself 98 ticks of profit on oil futures.



Wow, you distilled my 100+ words into just 4. I'm humbled.

yep, when you're flat and planning it all out you had a risk reward in mind. If you start moving stops around in the heat of battle, especiallly to breakeven then you have just messed up your risk reward ratio.

 

[hkrahra]

Quote from NoDoji:



If I moved my stop to break even as quickly as I've seen many traders do, yesterday alone I would've denied myself 98 ticks of profit on oil futures.

Ok then,lets make some more money this week.Who needs the stops

 

[BobbiDigital]

I recently read a book, "Thinking Fast and Slow," that talks about how the brain works. System 1 is the intuitive snap judgment and system 2 is the analytical problem solving part.

While the necessity to have a trading plan, as well as react to price, has been discussed I never heard it articulated to a point that made sense. Now it does. When I am stuck trading while my brain is in system 2 I can't part with the plan to react to price because I'm too busy predicting where it 'has to go.' When I trade in system 1 without having a plan in place the bigger picture isn't accounted for and I'm far too easily shaken out or ready to take off a winner.

IMHO the key is the ability to flow back and forth between the two. To have 'flexibility' that I've heard RN and others talk about. Interesting.

 

[emg]

there is no tips on the mental game for small traders. the reason is, u are under capitalized and have not trade in the "house."


treat trading as las vegas

 

[emg]

the best tips on the mental game for small traders will be:

get a higher education degree (MIT) and work in the house




work in the house and learn the mental game. When u graduate in the "House" u be able to open an account $500,000. Learn the game in the "House" and not by all these fake teachers/educators.


HIGHER EDUCATION!

 

[Redneck]

Quote from BobbiDigital:

I recently read a book, "Thinking Fast and Slow," that talks about how the brain works. System 1 is the intuitive snap judgment and system 2 is the analytical problem solving part.

While the necessity to have a trading plan, as well as react to price, has been discussed I never heard it articulated to a point that made sense. Now it does. When I am stuck trading while my brain is in system 2 I can't part with the plan to react to price because I'm too busy predicting where it 'has to go.' When I trade in system 1 without having a plan in place the bigger picture isn't accounted for and I'm far too easily shaken out or ready to take off a winner.

IMHO the key is the ability to flow back and forth between the two. To have 'flexibility' that I've heard RN and others talk about. Interesting.

BD,

Flexibility

Ability to flow from one TF to the other – always knowing how price on the smaller TF – is moving within the larger TF
Ability to switch from long to short…. short to long – without hesitation
Ability not to judge, nor form an opinion – but simply go along
Ability to take small losses quickly... but be bored stiff while waiting for a profitable move to hit a target... or a setup to emerge

Flexibility taken to the extreme – you simply become one with the mkt…, or more specifically – one with the price of whatever you’re trading

Think of the freedom.....

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Whenever I lose – it is not because price went against me… It was simply because I was not on board with price

Silly me

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I trust price so much…., that if God himself came down and told me to enter one way or the other… and price told me differently….

I would have to decline him… respectfully of course – but decline him nonetheless

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btw – Thank You for mentioning that book Sir – think I’m going to read it

RN