" I will follow my rules, I will take my stops, I will be disciplined and i will work with the market....NOT AGAINST IT! Professional mind control is the key"
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Disappointed myself, by closing at resistance around the VWAP. I do things like that more often than I care to. And keep no record of percentages when I am wrong or right. It "should" break 95.75, but...
And that self-doubt, or self-criticism... even the thought that somehow I am responsible for knowing or not knowing what price will do is insanity, or vanity, or ego. But that is where I beat myself up, if I am going to. Guilty of not knowing...
If the trade later proves to have gone tremendously in my favor, that would feel like I made a terrible trade. If price stops where I exitted and blows to 93, that would feel like I made an incredible trade. Silly, but inside there is some driving force that I feel. And am trying to pinpoint.
Now is the insidious part... I was RIGHT this time. And that little seed will get planted and come back in ways I could never expect had I not been through it so many times...
What that can do, is cause me to exit on fear again next time. Or, I exit and am wrong causing a deeper feeling of regret because somehow I converted a winning trade with no expectation of outcome (correct) into a winning trade where I feel responsible for the outcome (incorrect). For example, I look back at the chart and se I got near the bottom of the move, and got out near the top of that swing, and feel "good" about it. Like it was something I could really control.
For my personality type, it is almost impossible to enter something like trading and not see it as a competition, a challenge, but then to see it as such and not be able to take control of the outcome is a hard lesson. Working on it. Getting better at it. But such a contrast.
And trying to dig into that concept is the purpose of this journal. And, the process of becoming an intuitive trader.
I saw in the book Mind Over Markets they offer labels of "Competent", "Proficient", "Expert". To me those titles seem to involve the same concerns I am having, that all could evoke ego. "Intuitive" seems to feel more correct.
Patience, not so much. Patience suggest that I "need" to get in, and am holding myself back.
"Listening". If I am "trading", I am not patient, but rather I am already trading before I am in the trade. The patience is when the market is closed, or it is overnight and I would like to participate but am in unfamiliar territory. Between 9am and 2:30pm, if I am watching, I am trading, even if I am flat.
Look at the volume spike, see how it came back for a test of the low and the volume is higher than before, and the wick shows absorbtion. Look back over time and see where price was accepted and trust that it should at least get that low before you start looking for that.
The TRADE was that price will break 95.75 (day trader pivot) before it breaks 95.20 (some place I accepted as a stop loss based on what I would risk on the trade). I was not willing to find out at the VWAP. The INITIAL stop loss had nothing to do with a profit target, only to do wiht an emergency stop and allowing for room for an additional spike down, with the expectation being that the high volume would catch it.
What I wish I would do, is use that as a short entry and target 95.30. And on a deeper level, that irritates me. But I choose "certainty" over uncertainty. Today I could not even challenge the daily VWAP, knowing that the "odds" somewhat preferred me taking what profit was immediately before me. But also knowing, or believing, that hitting 30% wins would be better than 65% wins.
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle” - Sun Tzu
I would add to that, if you know the enemy, but not yourself...
“One may know how to conquer without being able to do it. ” - Sun Tzu
And that is most likely related to the knowing yourself part.
I do feel I know myself very well, have put more thought and effort into that knowledge than woiuld be considerd common, or even normal. And yet still, there is always some version of me that I am missing, some subconscious direction that is guiding the things that are more apparent.
I am starting to find a place in me that responds to being "right" or "wrong", that has a weird hold on my approach to trading. In the book, Psycho-Cybernetics, I recall discussion of the brain's self-guiding mechanism, like a guided missle, that constantly makes corrections based on feedback. The entire process could be viewed as a series of mistakes that ultimately leads to success. I tend to gravitate towards being "right" as an indication that I am headed the right direction, but have started to touch on a part of that that is not conducive to the direction I want to go in trading. In theory, I would prefer to be wrong more often.
I brought my laptop to bed tonight. Not that unusual. But it is for the past few months.
Logged into futures.io (formerly BMT), had something "great" to document. As if the pursuit of phenomenal trading were, itself, the holy grail.
To me, documenting the inner conversations reveals a lot. Markets do what they do. The incredible majority of those who study the markets, fail miserably. We all show up to the same movement. And, profit is not best served engineered.
So, if it can be theorectically agreed that human intuition could play a huge role in the last few calculations that end in the top few %...
It is cold tonight in Florida. "Freeze Warnings" on the local news. My "pack" moved from the living room to the bedroom tonight, the three of us are addicted to body heat when it gets below 50 degress outside. My dog tried to snuggle my laptop off my lap and into the floor. And in enjoying that moment, I forgot what I was going to say here.
Actually, short only under 97.00. But holiday volume is almost impossible for me to read so finding an entry is doubtful today. Selling 96.30-96.60 is probably my only interest right now... but it is hard to sell in light volume.
The previous chart shows resistance levels as if the March contract were going to continue. However, since today I am rolling to April, and since April was trading higher, I have never really put that much thought into how to blend SR levels in higher timeframes. I changed the rollover date in Instrument Manager from the 19th to the 16th, to the 9th, and then built SR using what was shown,and with each change the stucture was different. And attempted to consolidate my thoughts here several times, then deleted them again.
I have always allowed the data to rollover automatically, but have never attempted to notice if the reactions occured at different levels in relation to the prior month data, or if the levels were not as responsive within the first few days. But it seems like, wwith April trading at roughly 50 cents premium, any response should be at a higher level, if at all.
This NinjaTrader roll over fiasco is getting rather a joke!
You would have though they would have got it right by now
My data has been driving me mad all morning....given up now. Have to work with what we have got
NinjaTrader 8 had better have all this issues sorted or ill be looking for a new platfourm
" I will follow my rules, I will take my stops, I will be disciplined and i will work with the market....NOT AGAINST IT! Professional mind control is the key"
The following user says Thank You to greenr for this post:
It is a condition that should be given some thought though. April traded at roughly 50 cents higher, and that wreaks havoc with indicators and prior structure, at least within the closest timeframes.
I just reloaded data and it seems they have finally pulled there finger out and its correct now
" I will follow my rules, I will take my stops, I will be disciplined and i will work with the market....NOT AGAINST IT! Professional mind control is the key"
Support today looked less a matter of buyers and more an absence of sellers. Voume was far from convincing.
The ES rise had appeared to have a firm correlated hold on oil, and caught shorts with nowhere to go into the pit close.
Later comment: I shoulod show that in percentage ratcher than price. What occured was significicant from a momentary trading perspective. I never tried it today, but I did watch and said to myself, "this is probably going to happen." But the intensity once it crossed above the daily VWAP. It never did get out of IB until the last few were squeezed out.
Chris, a very close friend of mine, just sent this email tonight. He was responding to one of my journal entries;
"I just watched "Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations"… one on Mozambique, which was fun because he had gone to places that I had been.
Tony, near the end of the show states, "Every once in a great while, something comes along… a moment, an hour, or a few where everything is magic, where suddenly it is good to (be alive) again… really good. Seeing something and feeling something really rare and extraordinary… a once in a lifetime thing that we will never really be able to describe… never be able to share with anyone who wasn't here… never be able to experience again… this… this is one of these moments."
He worked in the Peace Corps, then hitchhiked through Africa for another 2 years. I got this photo of him when I went to visit for a couple weeks.
Trade 2 was based on volume and watching the T&S. @nd enrty came on a retest that helped confirm.
I had to close the trade though when someone knocked on the door, and now not sure I can get as good of an entry to risk giving back what I have. Net 42 on the day, may quit.
"Zone 1" was broken, and in a big way. Looking for a short swing entry, currently preferring 95.50 - 96.00, or 94.20, but with FOMC coming not really sure about any of it yet.
Got into a quick scalp frenzy, 4 RTs, a bad habit that resurfaces occasionally, and netted a loss of 5 ticks from my high this morning. The movement was so fast, and I would make a decision and change my mind, which is not where I want to be at all. That is truly indecision, confusion, weakness. Dopamine addiction.
The rush of dopamine is something my doctor mentioned, and what prompted me to put more emphasis on meditation. And more waiting. The right moments are easier to see when there is more space between them.
Back to this; It might seem like a weird thing to post in a trading journal, but I have noticed that all kinds of things outside of trading have the potential to have an effect on trading. Being in shape or not, eating well or not, sleep patterns, exhaustion, drinking, emotional states, level of calmness, financial stress, etc. In the "had something in common" comment, have you experienced anything similar?
It turns out I was way off target as what the issue of the day would be. It was not the stop loss, but the inability to stop worrying about my position. FOMC day weirds me out some, even when I deny that it has any impact, and I knew that going into the day. It brought more scalping, less confidence, more anxiety. I could not trade with the calm that I would prefer.
In a short trade for about 3 hours now. My trade desk is set up in the main area of the house. Several times I have walked by, sat down, stared at it, considered moving my stop to + anything, or closing the trade, or moving the stop higher. That energy is not good.
No, not laughing... shameful, that I do not always allow myself to not care about the outcome.
Or rather, my mind argues that I have to care, in the fact that it is a goal, or maybe better, a focus. And yet not be hindered when it goes against me, not to allow that to change my opinion, no, position, the next time...
The target had been set at just above a high-confluence zone. Possibly a little too close, but the target was hit. But now that zone sets up a long potential.
Net 38. Trading entirely from the long side, I had nearly every trade come back on me to some degree, would be up 30, close +10, up 22, close BE. It might seem like the easier thing would be to sell the market, but for me I prefer to have structure (today's was higher level) and I do not agree with going against high-level SR until it breaks, which today's did not.
I also often find it easier to read volume at a head-on collision than at a continuation. One of those things about trading where I give up one thing to have something else. High accuracy, lower profit, high profit, lower accuracy, etc.
Had I used 15-20 tick targets I would have done very well today, and I need to keep that in mind for the future. I noticed in an early post this morning I did expect a wild day, and it was.
The lower end of support did put up a fight, but there was too much fear in the equities market for CL to go any distance.
That was what went through my mind as I waited for a swing trade to work out. The "Ahhhhh" part is lack of patience and dealing with the unknown for longer periods of time. The "lol" was faking that I was kidding about being nervous and impatient.
But, I sat through it, went to bed and let it ride. My stop was too tight, I would have done better to leave the stop where it was when I entered and make the market take me out, one side or the other.
Beer-thirty... 8:30pm for me, but glad it is that time of day. And I brought my beer to my trading desk tonight, to sit and watch the market do little or nothing, or digest my new screen layout with two less screens than I once had, they sit in the corner with the cords wrapped up, backups maybe, but not wanted anymore.
And it feels good to have reclaimed something I had lost for awhile; a love of watching the market. I sit here looking at the 1 minute chart, reliving certain moments as if the chart were photographs of today's activity. Trying to decide if I am coming to the market a buyer or seller tomorrow, or if I know yet, and if not deciding what would define that for me in advance. At this moment, I remain a buyer, but if this zone breaks I am not attached to that side.
The buying at the lower end was strong, creating the feeling that I have backup around the 92.70-93.00 range, defining my potential risk a little better, or possibly giving me a chance to get in at a make or break point for a high RR. This 93 area has W4 potential, theoretically one of the easiest waves to define entry, risk and reward. Assuming I would hold overnight, through weekends, etc. But still, having some idea where it is going from here doesn't hurt me in my 15 minute rides.
I had at least 3 trades hit 20-30 ticks and then come back on me today, and while it is not my first choice, it did not frustrate me. By giving the trade that freedom, I also liberate it to go as far as it wants. That concept of trying to predict the future can be maddening to someone who wants to understand and engineer everything to perfection.
ES is in a place I do not understand very well... That has me taking a step back. It tried to make Wave C but was refused at 1380. I am leaving the chart analysis of ES up for awhile, need to make some more room for a shorter timeframe ES.
I did not look at a chart for months, and was always worried that taking time off would cause me to lose something I had learned. But, like riding a bicycle, or for me more like skiing, the time away could be years and in a few days I am at 90% of where I once was. And in this activity at least, much, much clearer. More relaxed. Less intense. Still feeling issues related to uncertainty, but now more from a position of knowing that is ok. There is nothing wrong with not knowing. There is nothing wrong with being wrong. Making or losing money, within limits, does not change that much in regards to what matters to me.
Seriously, if I look at ES as being in W7... 5 is more common, but 7 happens... what would a correction look like from that? A retest of 1380? A washout of 1340? Consolidation around 1450?
Now that I have been watching MP for awhile I am getting your language a little better. And @greenr's as well. MP provides a reference basis that is daily, helping to give better definition to chaos and/or expectation. Obviously still just watching, not getting anything from it. But allowing the concept and the visual to sink in. The indicator I have used really drags on my resources though. I may be doing something wrong. I did set Calculate on bar Close back to True, and that helped a lot, but it is still a memory hog. Any thoughts?
" I will follow my rules, I will take my stops, I will be disciplined and i will work with the market....NOT AGAINST IT! Professional mind control is the key"
OK, 2 scalps, net +10 on the day. Very disappointing compared to what I was expecting, but it was my choice to enter, to exit, to not re-enter, etc. And, there was not a guaranteed outcome...
"not fair" is not accurate. There is no "fair". Every day provides an opportunity, I choose how to meet it. I knew the trend appeared to be down. I knew the major daily trade advice came out with short side preferred. Catching a reversal can take several entries, and I did not have time today to stay at it.
" I will follow my rules, I will take my stops, I will be disciplined and i will work with the market....NOT AGAINST IT! Professional mind control is the key"
No problem! Glad to help. If you can figure a way out to create NVPOC lines until they're touched that would be great! I just draw them manually and delete them when hit. I would love to see if it's possible to carry the previous day's value …
If not worth a try possibly when your trial has ended
" I will follow my rules, I will take my stops, I will be disciplined and i will work with the market....NOT AGAINST IT! Professional mind control is the key"
The following user says Thank You to greenr for this post:
Just as I was getting so comfortable with dropping two monitors, my latest crush on Market Profile has left me with no room to move on the 3 monitor setup I was so proud of.
If I am going to trade live, I feel like I need what I "know", and that involves look, colors, chart size, everything really. Having jockeyed my setup across the US, using various hotel televisions as makeshift trade desks, I know that even something as superficial as screen resolution can change the "feel" for me. And, I admit, I am too "feely" of a trader. I know now a lot more of why...
I have not been a big fan of changing indicators for quite some time. I would mess with them, but always felt I was creating a disadvantage. And, indicators are only as good as the past anyway. The core concept is Up or Down, not that complex.
I came back to trading this time with a minimal setup. no range charts, no RSI, just combined a few things I knew on a 1 minute chart, used whatever timeframe I liked, zooming out to daily and into 10 minute to define SR, watched volume, and let her fly. Part of it was being ready for a fresh start. The other part, purity. Trading is not where near as complicated as the mind allows it to be. Emotion, motivation, ego...
I really am liking the concept of Market Profile, after having studied it briefly and turning away previously. What I just picked up recently about it, is that it combines the best information that is out there regarding trade; STRUCTURE AND VOLUME. In fact, it blurs the lines between the two.
I printed out a chapter from a PDF of Mind over Markets, and went through about 40 pages with a highlighter, spreading charts across my kitchen countertop to sort them differently than the book had.
Having watched the market like a mad-man for over 5 years (and I say that with great hesitation), I felt I had started to develop a sense of market movement, personality, expectation. But what I did not get until just recently is that I allowed that data to just reside in my head, with certain labels, but no real definition or structure.
Priinting out those maket profile charts, then having it start to sink in that these are patterns and behaviors that I already know very intimately, but now am offered a way to define and organize that information in ways I had not even considered. There are seven types of days, for example? WTF? News to me. And in the book I am reading, that is "Novice" level.
And that made me smile. That gave me adrenaline. That humbled me, and inspired me.
What once seemed like an over-abundance of information to choose from in the path of learning to trade, has been set on a course of, understanding what I want to learn, and why.
If anyone reads this thread, and it has intentionally been designed so it will not be overly encouraging ( I get self-conscious), that statement may not seem that significant. But I can say with complete assuredness that to me it is groundbreaking.
And, as I wait to pick my wife up from a Pink concert, @Big Mike, seeing futures.io (formerly BMT) after a long break, and seeing how it has changed over time, my brother-from-another-mother, you have a cool place here. I scrolled through the titles of trading education videos, as if it were the Netflix of trading. And the things you are sending in motion will be historical. Beautiful Mike.
"Oil in New York has technical resistance along its 50-day moving average, around $93.62 a barrel today, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Futures halted a rebound near this indicator on Feb. 22. Sell orders tend to be clustered close to chart-resistance levels.
Iran’s revenue from crude sales has declined because of the sanctions, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in a speech aired on state television Feb. 23. The nation says its nuclear program is for civilian energy and medical research, while the U.S., the European Union, and other members of the United Nations Security Council suspect it has a covert atomic weapons program.
Recent discoveries of uranium resources have almost tripled Iran’s reserves of the radioactive fuel to 4,400 tons, the Islamic Republic News Agency reported Feb. 23, citing Fereidoon Abbasi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran.
The Persian Gulf nation is installing more advanced centrifuges that will multiply its uranium enrichment capability, the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency reported last week, adding that it was unable to conclude that all material was intended for peaceful purposes."
The high pivot at 93.63 broke sending crude higher in the ON session, but then failed to act as support for the RTH trade. I did net 37 ticks today from the long side, but the trade went nowhere after I had closed it, and then price came back to retest the minor inverted LSP. That is my new make-or-break point for crude, and I will not change my higher timeframe long bias unless 92.40 fails.
@Private Banker alerted me to the fact my data was off due to rollover. I am guessing this is not the first time, but I never realized it before. Similar to the realization upon reading the first 50 pages of Mind over Markets, where I am again labeled a "Novice", twice in the same week I am reminded that despite the 7 day a week education I pursued for 5 years, staying humble is never a bad approach.
I am not put back by the thought that there is so much to learn. In fact my personality almost requires that environment. And, I have crossed the hump where I know I am not completely in the dark.
I pulled two wins out of CL today on the long side, which in hindsight seems unlikely, but the VSA rules that have somewhat formed on their own, the mind's automatic response to pain avoidance maybe, seem to give me at least 10-20 ticks even on a freight train. And, whether it ultimately proves to be correct or not, without some view of higher timeframe direction, which I determined to be lukewarm long, up until today's ETH close, where would the faith to trade come from to begin with?
What is always somewhat frustrating about analysis on multiple timeframes, is that many times wave structure can be debated from either side. While on the 120/360 minute I was following a potential W4, tonight on the 30 min I see a possible W5 completion. And, both are possible. "Technically", the higher W1 has not been broken, and while W2/4 similarity would be preferred, it is never a definite. But down has now become rather convincing.
However, I had said earlier that if the pivot broke it would sway my bias, and that did occur. But, nothing is ever definite in trading, and tonight I cleared the analysis to start over...
I am determined to get something out of the volume ladder view, and have messed with the settings for over an hour, trying to see if I can interpret one part at a time. Right now I am going to try just seeing the heavy areas.
My trading has been relatively good since I started back, percentage wins rising, familiarity gaining. Even though I still have a very busy schedule. I have projects underway in New Jersey and Baltimore, and probably going to Austin still this week. And, trying to keep up with my study of market profile and volume ladders, while maintaining my torturous workout schedule with my wife. But in all of it, I am very calm today compared to where I had gotten just a few months back. And happy.
EDIT: I just noticed something is really wrong with my NT report. I blue-screened today also. Something is off with my computer.
I closed a trade today that I should not have. No, I closed several. I bought CL within 10 ticks of the LOD, at an area that had confluence, volume confirmation, and at the direct intersection of an area I said the day before was my focus. But then took profits when I felt it was "enough". The target was initially over 100 ticks away. Then, after EIA, I went back in (within maybe 15 ticks of where I had gotten out) and then got impatient with consolidation, and closed. While I did re-enter, and held to target, the issue that arose dealt with patience and uncertainty again.
The TurboFire thing has already gotten easier. My wife is a great motivator and is doing it with me every time. The Holosync meditation audio now has a workout version, which might be a way to multitask maintaining the right mindset. Feeling good and positive has a measurable impact on my trading. I am assuming the regular intense workouts will only help with that.
I decided to start participating in a popular thread here, and noticed tonight that I jumped right in hard, almost dominating the posts today. I am so used to keeping my own journal and keeping to myself that I just do things automaticaly, but as I went through that thread tonight I felt a little self-conscious about it. Not sure how to figure out where my place there should be. But I do enjoy being there with other traders more than I thought I would. I think on that point I have found myself much more than in the past.
The market profile study is almost like someone just gave labels to something I already knew in a way but never organized, and is sinking in very fast. Or I think it is. It is not a new way of thinking even, just a new way to explain it. And it gives order and confidence.
