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I will reply to you very easily as well that I strongly disagree with you because I have developed my own mindset which transforms myself into a robot when I enter a trade.
I already easily overcome my emotions even if I am losing, because no matter how good you are, you will lose. So why take it very seriously?
This is a business. There will be losses. Just cut them short. It's only possible when start thinking like machines. It's not impossible. That's all.
Of course we all know that we have them. Yes, you can trade robotically (once you understand yourself and your strategy). Case in point: You place a long trade with a stop below your signal candle (for instance). You walk away. Come back and see that you got stopped out. Sure you will not be happy... Emotion!
But the entry was mechanical if you placed the trade according to your strategy.
You may have made a highly probable trade, but like Mark Douglas said..... "You don't know"!
On a side note, there sure are a bunch of smart and intelligent contributors on this site, even if they see things different than I do!
Pretty much all the info I've seen so far was that paper trading is useless and is indeed, useless. However, there is on case where it might be useful but it all depends on yourself on how you will implement it and if you try to cheat - you will be cheating yourself. The strategy is that you trade paper as you would be trading real money. If you got paper account with 1m $ - reduce it to 25k and go from there with executing all your ideas and trades as it would be your real money. You have to be really obsessed about paper, otherwise there is no point. I'm not sure if this would work for every individual as from my experience, no pain could be compared when it comes to real money. I remember back in March last year when rona bitted the world and russians were fighting with arabs (opec) and when I was positioned myself for one oil company to go long based on positive outcome from one event - I managed to call event right, and got up by 400, however, for some stupid greedy reason I decided to wait longer, just in case it will go up. The next day I was -600 and couldn't stand the pain anymore and just liquidated position. Later, for about next 3 days I was so frustrated that I cannot remember when I felt so bad any time before in my life. Whatever I tried to do, did not help. However, after few days "the mind" finally accepted the loss and learned something what I would never ever do again. Now remembering this event, I can't imagine experiencing same thing if that was paper, not real $.
I never understand the reasoning for journal trades? Why not just trade everyday and see if the account balance increases over time or decreases. If account balance increases, I am doing it right. If account balance decreases, I suck, get better.
Can you please understand the purpose of spending so much time journaling trades?
But the real difference is, I never walk away after placing my trades. I always finish whatever trades I am in and then accept the end result, knowing consciously that these are all random probabilities which I am trying to work on based on the best strategy I found recently and may or may not be favorable in my end goals.
Yep, I certainly agree. It seems that early on in our trading life, that emotions run higher because they are the body's way of letting us know that we are taking a risk that could hurt us. When we get tired of being "emotional", then we start to look at our trading more pragmatically. Once familiarity comes with thousands of hours of screen time (as in my case), the emotional strain seems to fall away. Then cometh the more robotic trades. We(I) start to look at the math of winners vs. losers.
I did use the "walk away" as an example. I personally don't walk away either. Most of my trades last for about 90 seconds. So, if this trade does not work, then I am looking for the next.
Let's go on the assumption that "you suck" or are in a drawdown or are "off". Where do you go to start fixing it? How do you know what you were doing right in the first place? A journal seems pointless when you are raking it in, but is indispensable when you are working through your errors or looking to figure out where your trades aren't playing out. If you want to trade like a professional, then a journal is key. Your P&L doesn't say much at all. Heck, I can throw darts and hit winners randomly. Doesn't mean I'm any good.
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90%+ of the trading platforms out there will fill you INCORRECTLY, aka, the moment it was touched. If you have a good sim/LIVE platform and you are not losing EVERY DAY... then trade the Micros. The Micros will have your heart & mind in the game because it's LIVE, When that's not an issue you can graduate to the ES?NQ, etc...
