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What do you guys/girls do in order to improve your trading? Anything particular that improved your trading more than other methods?
Read/reread favorite trading books
Document and review trading mistakes
Practice entries on market replay
Practice marking up charts and observing behavior [S/R, trendlies,Swings]
Modify trading rules
Watch trading videos
More?
Can you help answer these questions from other members on NexusFi?
Become familiar with the instrument you are going to trade; know your enemy. Watch the markets in real time, preferably in the time frame you are going to trade it. Dont trade just watch. Know its habits. Keep notes on when it is most volitale and the most passive.Draw trend lines and support/resistance. Watch the indicators you will be using. How do they interact with the price action. Look for patterns; triangles, pennants, breakouts etc.
If you watch it enough you will be able to see what is coming with a higher degree of certainty.
Hindsight being 20/20 its always easier to mark up a chart from yesterday and have a perfect trading day. Its harder to do it in real time because you dont know where the price is going to end up. Remember you are trading in real time so it makes sense to mark the chart up in real time. Use past charts to get entry ideas and use real time to see if you can identify them.
I notice that you trade currencies Silver Dragon, what are your favorite pairs to watch? Also, did you start off watching one...then moving on to others?
When I trade, which does not happen as often as I like, my primary focus is EUR/USD. I am learning the GBP/USD and AUD/USD. I focused on EUR/USD when I started Forex. Each of them are very different to trade. If I would have tried all 3 of them at once I believe I would have failed. There is just to much to learn. Most of the traders on Big Mikes have a single instrument they are really good at. Then they dabble in others.
use a basic chart and note classic support and resistance
use multiple time frames e.g. 5min, 30min, 2hr, daily
mark trendlines and channels
watch watch and watch some more
when you are done watching, watch some more.
if you are about to enter a trade and are not sure, don't enter.
Don't gamble...wait, watch, and learn.
Don't look at P/L...look at the chart and what price is doing.
If it helps, don't use a DOM, focus on the bigger picture first, smaller picture last.
continue to watch, take notes. It takes a lot of time, patience, and a handle on your emotions.
I haven't read very many books on trading and I never focused too much on sim.
However, I have a pretty good handle on framing price, emotions, and patience.
Trading for me is really about watching and waiting.
Practice those first and foremost and you're off to a good start IMO.
In other words, patience and simplicity is your best friend in this endeavor.
1) Learn to wait.
2) Trying to understand when market is due for changing state from Imbalance<->Balance.
I should not have market them 1,2,3...they all are equally important.
Second is very broad......very obvious and ultimately the only truth behind every trading style.
Trading is such a complex endeavor (for me at least) I find the best thing to do is drain my brain of all trading related stimulus. Sometimes it's for short periods of time. Like during the day I'll step away and do something completely mindless for 15-30 minutes. One of my favorites is to blast some punk rock and get my own little mosh pit going.
For medium term brain drain I'll exercise 3-6 days a week, 1-2 hours. Watch every SF Giants baseball game, etc...
For long term brain drain I'll get away for the weekend, no trading related stimulus for 2-3 days.
I find that when my mind is not immersed in the moment of trading is when I have my best ideas and make breakthroughs that ultimately lead to improvement.
"In order to excel, you must be completely dedicated." -- Willie Mays
I think having a plan is a big help. You can have a general trade plan that outlines your method, time frames, money management, markets etc, but a game plan each day for day trading or longer if you swing trading etc. Do the homework the night before. What levels are you interested in going long/sort. The next day see how the market behaves at those levels and trade your method accordingly.