Quote:
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Originally Posted by Soul-Trader2004
Hi Mate,
had a look at your other thread - a lot of it is mumbo jumbo to me mate, never really did use fibs and certainly not 200+ levels etc.
I'm sure it all makes sense TR02 and i'm sure after this amount of time in the market you are starting to develop that 'second sense' of what's going to happen - I have had that before too and lived off it for a year or so.
However, this is my reasoning:
Your style of trading is still 'seat of the pants' trading - even though you use longer timeframes it still relies on you as a trader to make the decisions and to feel the market.
to make this happen you have to study the charts a lot and you have to get yourself into the 'zone' as douglas calls it.
When you are in the 'zone' you are unstoppable - I know this, ive been there many times and thoroughly enjoyed it. However this is what i see is the trouble with 'zone' trading.
After six months, of which let's say you spend 3 months of it in the 'zone' (if you are lucky) , you look at your account.
you ask yourself - ok, i made $£20,000 which is brilliant - how exactly did I do it so i can replicate that for the next six months?
thein lies the problem faced by every single discretionary trader - replicating the results relies on your gut instinct - in effect it relies on the correct balance or testosterone, homones , blood pressure, etc - basically for you to be in the 'zone' all these things must come together for your brain to function properley and keep you in the 'zone'
And that's the problem.
I know one guy and this is true - he was a wall street trader and he was a magician in the markets (not forex btw) - for 2 years he was in the top 5 of wall st traders - and he blew it.
how did he blow it? - he just could not replicate what he had done for the past 2 years - it's that simple. He lived and traded on his nervous system.
Now i know you will say "i dont do that" - but your other thread clearly shows that you do go on feeling and if you go on feeling then your trading relies on you feeling good and being in tip top health.
Don't get me wrong TR02 - you are trading EXACTLY how you should be for the length of time youve been in the game - i believe you said this is your second year and that's about right - you will spend year two trading with discretion and making headway and even into year 3. You have to do this anyway to get there as a trader so you are doing exactly what you should be doing.
but when you change (and you will) you come back to me for another chat. and congratulations by the way - around 65% never get to year 2 - now you have to beat the next odds - 85% never get to year 3  |
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Where
were you when I was here as a newbie?
Man did we struggle to get answers during that time.
This is outstanding critique.
I cannot deny that I am a discretionary trader and your expression, "seat of my pants trading" is right on the money. Your point about "feeling good and being in the zone w.r.t. testosterone, etc" is deadly accurate.
So many times, and so very easy to remember, on days when I feel down or out of it, its a slog and a grind to trade and even bumping up the timeframe does not help. This is when I make both silly and big, costly mistakes.
Yes, readily agree, discretionary trading requires vasts amount of brainpower, reviewing and re-looking at the charts, sometimes several times over just one timeframe.
Slight correction -- I'm basically still in my first year of
active live trading. I started May 4, 2006 and it wasn't until September that I came into my own -- relatively speaking.
Thanks for the lesson.
By the way, what 200+ levels were you referring to? (see top of your post)