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I think this is a good idea also. I used to change my system and chart time frames fairly often as well, but realized that you need to give yourself time to actually master one system. I've personally seen people do this and they never give themselves the chance to practice one thing.
I think about this alot right now. I've come to the conclusion that I need to put my system--and so far it's a losing one-- through its paces to find out when it works and when it doesn't. If it's my behavioral antics that dull the edge...or maybe the edge doesn't exist. At this point point I feel like I need to thoroughly crash and burn it into a smoldery ash pile (in sim of course) before I discard it or tweak it. Because how else can you be sure? But at this time I need to have some sort of certainty that what I have works or doesn't work, before it's discarded or tweaked. Maybe I'm wrongheaded in this. I'm still in the padawan learner phase of this...but I've decided to be patient with it.
I finished up about $50 today. That's the good part. My early morning trading was terrible and I puked all over myself during that selloff. Oddly I navigated the trading range (from 700 to 830 PT) pretty well--picked off a few scalps, almost getting back to even. I then proceeded to puke all over myself again during the sell off that started at ~1100 PT. But I caught a piece of the rally off the double bottom in the afternoon to get into the black. Today...I just can't post a chart with my trades on it...It was such a shameful display of trading and I would rather avoid that type of embarrassment...haha! Just know that all the rookie mistakes were made. I posted my results from today to kind of leave a flavor of how the day went. Glad this one is over!!!
+10/t on two trades before I had to head out the door to work. I quickly exited my second trade because my higher time frame chart seemed ominous for shorts. I think I rushed my entries a little but that's easy to say in hindsight. Whenever I look back at my trades at the end of the day it feels like someone asking you to sketch the mona lisa from memory in pitch black darkness. When the lights come on sometimes you get a women, sometimes you get an airplane. It feels just like that!
Decided to go live today because I was taking too many trades on sim outside of my trading plan. I wanted to see how I would do if I only took my one setup that I KNOW works. On sim, I found it too tempting to take trades outside of my strategy using 'experimentation' as justification. I thought that going live would provide the proper incentive for executing per plan...OR punishment for not executing.
So over 9 trades, all 1 lots, in ES and RTY I managed to eek out a profit $2.24. But more importantly I managed to not blow up my account on my first day of trading live futures ...Without going into too many details now, today I learned another instance where my setup does not work. I'm not sure I would have had this insight in sim.
Here are my results for today...the commission figures are wrong though. I was able to include commission on two of my ES trades but couldn't figure out how to include commission on my RTY trades. BUT I figured the $2.24 profit is net of commission...
Some pretty glaring problems. I feel like I have a better sense of what I need to improve after today's LIVE trading.
In my opinion, that's not a good reason to go live. If you can't discipline yourself in SIM, how can you expect to discipline yourself and make the right decisions live trading? I'm obviously no expert, I'm just looking out for you- as soon as I read this I thought of myself and the sneaky rationalizations I pull, like I did today. This is a crafty game and you can play tricks on yourself. Just be careful!
Hey Zachary thanks for checking in! I understand what you are saying and it makes sense to me. My rationale for trying live trading probably doesn't cut muster (if cutting muster is a thing) on its face and it doesn't help that I didn't really flesh out my rationale in my previous journal post.
The feeling was that I had taken sim trading to the limit for now and it has fulfilled its purpose...for now. Sim allowed me to try a bunch of strats most of which were losers at least when I tried them. Sim has allowed me to experience situations when a strat works and when it doesn't. Sim has taught me that counter trend trades are bad for me. Sim has taught me how to prepare for the trading day and helped me develop a pre-trade routine. Sim has helped me develop entry and exit strategies, ATM strats. Sim has allowed me to develop a set of principles to trade by and a trading plan. But there is one massive problem with sim...
It's fake. It's a laboratory setting. There are some things that measure out OK in the lab, but won't in the real world. Like letting a winner run is very different when there is real cash at stake. Fear and greed are real life things that are muted in the laboratory. Keeping a stop in place, entering/exit, waiting for a trade are all different animals outside of the lab with the real account balance in the...balance... These are the things I wanted to test in the real world even if it costs a few bucks. I'm not done with sim. I'll probably go back and forth depending on what I'm working on.
I'm a rookie trader so I don't know the best approach. And I would not recommend anything I do to anyone. I would be interested to hear what some of the veteran traders in this forum have to say about all this. But for me, now, it seems right.
it's fake because you treat it that way. Did you set the balance the same, the fee the same, the number of contract the same, the method the same, the hours of the day the same? One day you may have to take the sim environment seriously but I guess for now live learning seems way more exciting than sim.
...Without going into too many details now, today I learned another instance where my setup does not work. I'm not sure I would have had this insight in sim. 
