Kreslik.com - traders community since 2006

For the past three weeks I've been trading like an amateur and just before I did the most pointless trades, essentially emotional trades trying to catch imaginary moves. I'm not even trading to my rules and methodologies. Pretty much I'm tilting, just like the poker term.

It's so disappointing, been trading live for about five years, though I don't frequent forums much as it clouds my judgement unfortunately. Heck I even remember TRO's never lose again thread on babypips.

I've been slowly, consistently making small profits with excellent money management and just solid trading overall. Yet past three weeks have just been dreadful. No confidence, taking out profit too quickly, knowing I may be wrong yet holding in-case I'm right, not following my plan. Worst.

I'm down 9% from highest high, and today just lost 4% from doing stupid s**t. Instead of realising that may have not been my best entry and take out close to break even, which is what I would usually do. I held and lost a little. Entered and lost a little etc x10! thinking a trade is going to be a big winner every time, until I realised what I was doing and stopped. This hasn't happened to me in about 2 years to be honest.

I don't have any trading friends (Not many 25 year old's trade and I don't like talking about it as people always ask the same ridiculous questions, or ask for help and don't apply it. It also tends to make a woman's vagina dry haha so I keep my mouth shut.) and would like some mental support.

I've had days were I lost this total amount money in a day so it's not the money that has me frustrated, it's just snapping out of this negative state and trading competently again.

I don't really have any questions as I already know what to do to snap out of it, only annoying part is the daunting task ahead.

Honestly, it feels good to get it out. I guess I could ask, what do you guys do when you realise you're not trading competently?

Thanks

Take a break ..

Get away from the screen for a few weeks,months if needed ..

Come back with fresh eyes and a clear mind .

A stop loss at the daily high/low is the min req. for trading currency; you really should have a stop at the multiday extremes.

Forex is volatile, keep an eye on ~2 minute charts & the other on a 15 or 30 minute chart.

Short term charts are for small moves and long term charts are for large moves; don't try to hold for big pips without a stop at multiday extremes, just take profit and move on.

Example of a short term trade, with a multiday stop, morphing into a long term trade:

You can trade a short term chart with a small stop within the daily range if a few conditions are met:

1) you know that you are going for small pips and will not let the trade run even if it looks like it is going to.
2) you reduce your risk to 1/3; if you risk 4% per trade with multiday extremes then you risk 1.333% without multiday extremes.
3) you quit for the day after three losses.

I tell you all of this because maybe you are not as solid as you think you are.

Levendis

If i was in your shoes.

1) Ask myself question where did things start go wrong? before i did anything. Try to pinpoint where things started to turn. You may not know answer striaght away but it will guide you sub consciously.

2) pull my trade plan apart and put back together make sure i under all concepts and execution of the plan.

3) I would look over my trade journal for periods where i was making good trades. Then compare that period to bad trades im taking. Looking for differences.

4) if by this stage i still havent got a clue. I would go back to my trade journal and go back over the losing trades i made and rerun my trade plan and rerun what i was thinking at the time of trade. Looking for any clues.

But from reading your text it sounds like something pyschological has creeped into your trading mind and is now play merry hell with your decision making. Maybe you can benefit for this book -The Daily Trading Coach: 101 Lessons for Becoming Your Own Trading Psychologist. The book is sum total of thie blogsite that author created http://www.becomeyourowntradingcoach.blogspot.co.uk/

Its great book and has helped me to maintain a health balanced relationship with my trading mental environment. Alot traders just focus on negative things or thing they do wrong. When you want to be building yourself up, building confidence and maintain it on a daily basis.


I do whole lot:-
trade journals, emotional journal, set goals, grade my trades according to my plan.

All this keeps my mind clean and on track any problems crop up i spot it straight away and correct it before it grows into issue.

anyway thats what i would do.
BB

First step is admitting you are a Kluge:

Kluge

Once we admit that we are Kluges, we are open to learning what we were doing wrong and how to improve.

On the other hand, if you believe you are an experienced trader of 5+ years and lost 9%...4% in a day, than you are not being open to the idea that a much more experienced you exists in a future yet to come.

We may say that an intermediate trader "falls off the rails" but that can't be said for experienced traders. Experienced traders don't lose like you described...

Its interesting watching that video from TRO about a KLUGE. Im studying Rudolf Stiener and critical thinking. He well know from his book on philosopy of freedom. Thoughts and thinking are key to higher development.

I can see many parallels beween the two.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudolf_Steiner

Free Course on
http://www.philosophyoffreedom.com/

and bunch free audio books
http://www.rudolfsteineraudio.com/

Some one might find it interesting. Its aimed esoteric development but skills of observation and practical thinking can be applied to trading.
BB

The only person that read my post correctly was bettlebox. You sir/madame have confirmed the worst of what I had suspected.
The other replies assumed it was a technical aspect of my trading, which it wasn't. My analysis was correct, I essentially did not follow through with my plan then realised I was correct, which led to frustration. Though thanks for the advice.

This is what happened -

I had noticed some strength on the Aussie about two weeks ago where I did buy however it didn't progress as well as I thought and took out a small profit (First arrow). It continued down so thought maybe I was wrong.

I would now only just watch it every second day and seeing how price was reacting. To me it looked like strength was building up yet price was going down. It made a run up and failed so then thought nothing of it.

I look yesterday after the Aussie news and see that it's going back up to the resistance point. This to me confirmed the strength so I bought at the top with the fear of missing out on the move and hopes it will keep soaring up. I instantly put stop loss to where the x sign is, risking around 3.5% (~75pips) and a take profit of an initial 50 pips, where I would have adjusted if it looked strong. I said to myself I'm going to hold it for at least 24 hours.

However my nerves creeped up on me and I was just looking at my chart like a hawk. Price did not continue to move up and I was getting nervous. I added some smaller lots because I was so sure it was going to push higher, yet it stagnated. Even though price never went close to my SL, I didn't want another loss and took out when some news occured and drove price down a little where I exited with a loss of 1.5%.

After that price came back up and I guess I just thought had to gain it back.
Coupled with my failed entry of shorting EUR/USD where I was patiently waiting about a month for the weakness to play out, I was trying to catch the trade again. I was essentially on tilt at this point making some entries when thinking price would reverse and then it reverses on my position and I would take out multiple mini losses.
After I posted on here I turned the computer off and only opened it up before to this.



Yep, I just needed to stick to my original plan and I would have been a happy man.
I seriously think I have some anxiety or something when it comes to long term trades (Longer than an hour tbh, my trades are usually short and sweet). For some reason I was thinking 'what if it just tanks on me'. Instead of just having the conviction in my abilities.
Oh well.

Wow TRO has lost some weight!!

Also I never said I was an exceptional trader haha. Just solid, though I do have a few leaks. Purely mental game problems, absolutely nothing to do with the technical aspects. Probably need to read my Trading in the Zone from Mark Douglas again.