I'm currently reading VinceVirgil journal And this journal actually was the main reason for me to buy Elite. Worth every dollar. He trades CL using Mack's PA method with some minor changes. For example, Vince often uses limit orders. I believe Mack uses them as well but for some reason he talks about them only if signal bar is too big. Limit orders are really great thing. They can tremendously reduce risk. It's kinda aggressive but sometimes it's really rewarding. If it's a low risk, you definitely take it.

I reviewed my trades for this week and got the following:

NQ - 2 days
Went nowhere (congestive) - 1
Trades only for scalp - 4
Entered too early - 3
Missed signals - 7

CL - 5 days
Trades only for scalp - 3
Bad bars after entry 3
Missed signals - 15

I wasn't profitable at all, only 1 green day but it's okay. I'm learning.

I move my stop to breakeven when LL or HH occurs and then move them after every new LL or HH. I think maybe it's better to not to scalp if you can trade only one contract. But then you should be ready to have many BE trades when you was correct about move direction and stop price and still you didn't make any money or even get a few tick loss. But if you can trade 2 contracts or more. It changes a lot. Especially in range market when runners don't work. In a strong trending market you may say: why should I scalp? Yes, you're technically right but you don't know how long the trend lasts. Sometimes it looks like very strong trend but then boom it dramatically reverses. It doesn't mean you should have fixed targets like 15 tick on CL and 8 ticks on ES. (consider to place targets 1 tick below previous High or Low or smth like that) I think targets should be based on volatility. The market doesn't care about your fixed targets. You may do some modeling and say "hey, ES moves in my favor 4-6 tick based on previous data" But look at ES this week. Crazy volatility. Are you sure that 4 tick is good for you when you can easily have 40 tick scalp? That's why I think at this moment. I believe the trader should be flexible. Markets are never the same. Maybe I'm wrong I dunno ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

NQ is harder to trade than I expected. It much easier to get fooled on NQ than on CL. LBR310 doesn't help much to be honest. Next week I'll trade with it but then I think I will remove LBR310 and focus only on Price Action.


Things to consider next week
1. Limit orders technique
2. Breakeven stops
3. Conditions to exit if trade goes nowhere (or should I wait?)

Next week I try to explain every my trade. I actually did this when I reviewed whole week but NT8 decided to delete all my text and drawings on charts. Well done NT8 I'll write to support to resolve this issue.

CL - 3 trades/-21 tick

Trendline wasn't in the right place

Many journals on this site were abandoned, and I always wonder what happen to OP, does he still trade?
As for me I'm still on SIM fighting for consistency. And I take 1 live trade every month because Ninjatrader Brokerage force me to do so.
Or I get $20 fee which is stupid. I've traded like 4-5 months this year.
Still fighting my demons:

— ranges - much better that it was year ago.
I learned to pay attention to previous H/L.
I know where I can take trade and when it's better to wait.
But breakouts is still confusing.
Is it gonna be breakout pullback and new trend or it's just failure?
I think ranges are the hardest thing to trade.

— psychology (anxiety, fear of loss) - better than it was.
I have meditated everyday since August. 10-15 min. It helps a lot with anxiety.
Still have doubts in my ability to trade. Especially if have losing streak.
Or it's hard day when I don't understand what's going on.
Big winner sometimes on other side can make me happy. Which is bad. Still a lot work to do.
I read The Daily Trading Coach: 101 Lessons for Becoming Your Own Trading Psychologist
The best his book so far. He explains hard things simple and gives simple solutions. Much better than other his books. I should reread it.

— missed signals - still horrible.
Even though I perform much better I still everyday find excuses to skip 60% of my setups.
"Oh this risky, oh it's to close to previous high, this bar is bad" etc.
Those missed setups would change my statistic significantly.
Not even close to what I actually have.
And obviously there is no consistency if I take today this setup and tomorrow skip it.
The problem isn't psychology as I thought earlier.
I improved it, and nothing really changes with missed signals.
The problem is the rules of my method.

I went back in time years ago and looked at my old backtests, when I just started.
Here I use one single indicator and take every signal. Got some drawdown, less than 15% but still doing well.
Here I use one single pattern and again take every trade. Small drawdown but the problem is 5 signals/month on average.
Those rules are simple - clear logic like it's some kind of flowchart. If x then y. But they worked.
Sure, some of them struggled with range market and that why 60% of them I skipped.
I knew nothing about price action and all that kind of stuff. I just would be consistent with entries and exits.
But this transformation from backtesting to sim didn't go well.
I though "I need 1 more test to be sure" and "1 more" and "oh this method doesn't look good anymore, I need a new one" etc.
I don't know how many methods I skipped, but two of them was actually amazing. Too bad they for stocks which I can't trade.
And after all those years I'm discretionary price action trader who is looking for consistency with his entries.
It's kinda funny how I ended up when I started. Like really? I spent years and still didn't get it.
It's hard to accept this fact but it's true.
I learn price action for like 1.5 years. I understand every setup but doubts still here when it comes to enter.
Bc rules are murky, there is too much context. My method currently has 12 setups and 2 pages of rules.
I saw every setup at least a thousand times but when it comes to enter most of the times I will find a reason to skip.
Because context always has something.

And to be honest I already hate this method. Discretionary destroys me emotionally. It's too much pressure.
All I do is redraw my trendlines all day long. And guessing why market turned here and there.
"Bar by bar analysis". No, enough. I'm tired of this BS.

I wanna simple method with clear mechanic rules. Like a flowchart. And much less discretionary.
I want to be bricklayer. Same trades everyday. W/o overthinking and putting pressure on me. Let the rules trade for me.