Smarta råd

Mvh Simon25Concentration is what you are really looking for. It was just a little way back that I first mentioned Active Concentration as an important, actually vital, aspect of character development for anyone wishing to progress in the discipline of trading and raise their proficiency to a level of true mastery. Consistent success. I am convinced that anyone who wishes to make the effort and put in the work, do the hard yards - use whatever metaphor takes your particular fancy - can become masterful in any chosen endeavor. We?re specifically interested in trading, but the skill development process is precisely the same for all disciplines of which I have any experience and knowledge. There are no minimum entry requirements other than your total and absolute willingness to work hard at it, to stay with it and to develop the correct mindset and attitude. This mindset is quite independent of trading which is why much of my writing will tend not to attract those who wish to find a quick fix to their trading problems or to find the one and only indicator they?ll ever need for all instruments in all markets across all timeframes and in all market conditions. If any of you on that particular path do find what you?re looking for - please do let me know. Anyway, back to concentration. There have been a few posts since in which I have veered away from this more esoteric area of trading personality development in order to ground what I am saying in a more basic mechanical level of trading functionality. I?ve done this as an attempt at finding common ground from which those that are interested can move forward with me. I appreciate some will not like taking what only appears to them to be a backward step. That?s fine. They either do or they don?t and they either will or they won?t. I have no control over any of this. I?m just giving you what I?ve got in the best way I can in the hope it helps. I don?t know if I?m doing it correctly - the right way. I don?t even know if there is a right way. I am making this up as I go along. I have never attempted to help other traders in this way, in this medium before. Some will welcome my lengthy posts as a welcome diversion from a trading career that has perhaps turned out for them to be less than the meteoric rise to riches they initially envisioned. And those who have tried and not met their, I suspect overly optimistic goals, are due a restful break too. But only from trading. The hard work is just about to begin.

It?s still a little early I feel to get into Active Concentration, but I do want to give you a starter into this very deep and difficult to explain concept by briefly bringing up the term ?Passive Concentration? for your review. By the way none of these terms exist, as far as I know, anywhere except in my head. There?s no course or programme (more of this later) to teach these as the ?standard? lessons of trading. There are none. If you think of a better word or phrase than me that meets your idea of what I?m talking about and makes more sense for you personally - by all means, use it. I don?t believe there is a one size fits all in this or any other worthwhile endeavor. Use what works for you. Mantra. I also mentioned more recently the phrase "Plan for what you want to happen". Awareness. Perception. These two are key. Intuition. Surprisingly. Only surprising in that it most likely will not be in any way or context you have ever imagined it might apply to trading. I could have covered intuition in the "Don?t Delude Yourself" post, but that would have been way too obvious - you would have been ready for me - seen me coming - and it would not therefore have worked. I wont be able to cover any of these topics in this post as there isn?t enough time (yes, I?ve just come back up here after writing the final part of this post and it?s already too long even by my standards). I?ll save these topics for future posts. I promise I will cover off all of these as we move into and thru Active Concentration.

Talking again of concentration, I have to mention an encounter I had with a professional musician. I know relatively few professional musicians. Those I do know, interest me greatly and all for the very same reason. While they inhabit the same planet as me, arduous activities with their instruments over long hours along with frustration, exhaustion and desperation which tend to weed out the hopeful from the amateur and finally from the professional - make their take on life quite different to mine. But only in relation to our respective primary fields of endeavor. This comes across in the way they comport themselves. If you?ve ever met a professional, you?ll have known it and recognized ?it? immediately. Even if you are not in any way involved or interested in their genre, or even aware of what that might be, you will have clearly and quite easily observed a certain presence. Something a little ?different? about them and their manner. That?s the interesting thing - totally different fields of operation yet there is a central and identical core of behavior and attitude and bearing, a recognition of which each has in the other which is as instant as it is ineffable. You know what I mean. We got talking about my attempts and frustrations at my current inability to do what I am doing on these boards in attempting to help those at the beginning of their trading career with the taking on board of what they needed to do to become professional in method, if not in name, in trading the financial markets. The fascination with systems themselves rather than the primary importance of development of the person, the Self in which the sought for excellence can reside. Flowery stuff. This chap, a violinist and conductor of apparent renown laughed at my intellectual impasse. Not in deprecation of my feeling of lack, but in pure and absolute recognition of my plight. He commented that it would be equivalent, he said, to amateur musicians discussing among themselves, with great passion and verve, the various merits of which type of string to use and where to buy it and how best to tune it without any basic realization they first needed to learn the nature of the instrument and how to play it and to acquire the knowledge of how to play it and to practice playing it. With amateur musicians though, there is an inherent understanding that to learn from those who were already professionals was the only way to progress to becoming professional themselves. He added that a musician only becomes truly notable in their execution of a piece and recognized for their ability once they have learned who they are and what it is in them that comes thru them and into their music. I don?t think he was trying to be deeply allegorical - just honest.

He did suggest by way of helpfulness that I suggest to you all at some juncture the use of baroque music with a steady 60 bpm at barely audible levels to assist with the rapid induction into the state of the master trader. I?ve never tried this, but you never can tell with these things. Maybe somebody needs to do an ?Accelerated Learning CD for Master Traders?? Not necessarily my thing. Now jazz is. It has a pleasantly discordant interrupt mechanism on normal thought processes. It?s free and still legal (for the moment) I?m not suggesting you get into jazz or play it at just audible levels while you?re trading, or feign an interest in it, but in passing, it does tend to cause a conscious bypass within me of those areas of my being that would otherwise be strung out from time to time. And never be fooled into thinking any trader is totally unemotional the whole time. No matter how experienced they are and how good they are, there will be times when the flush of a superbly managed trade, well played, where the target is hit spot on and just as you close, the price immediately reverses direction. Perfection. Sometimes, when this happens, the pleasure of your success and clear evidence of your sheer brilliance will filter up to conscious levels and cause a smile of pure satisfaction to appear. Equally, the grim reaper of traders? dark souls with manifest groan of momentous stupidity that bad timing along with risk mismanagement and complacent arrogance that come shortly after the question we sometimes ask ourselves "Why on earth did I do that?" will occasionally come sit beside you at your screens. It happens to the best. The master trader will "treat those two impostors just the same" and simply carry on as if neither happened. Never, ever beat up on yourself. Because then you?ll have to hide round the corner waiting to get even with yourself at some point. It never ends. Don?t do it. That?s how it all started in Sicily.

I?ve got a little exercise you can play with. You can play this one whenever you want. As often as you want. Until you don?t need to any longer. I haven?t ever done it myself. I?ve just devised it yesterday as a useful way for you to experience what a master trader ?mostly? experiences with all his/her trades. I?m going to suggest you don?t use real money - but I?m not your mama. It?s called the "Long/Short Exercise". Pick an instrument. Any instrument at random. Absolutely one you have not recently traded and of which you are quite unaware of recent price action or news. Zero expectations, knowledge of or feelings towards this instrument. Before you choose it and look at a 5min chart of the instrument (no indicators on your chart for this one please, just price - no volume) - before you look - choose either Long or Short. That?s important. When you?ve chosen entry direction, look at the instrument on the 5min chart. Immediately take the trade in your randomly selected direction. No cheating. Do not be swayed by current price action. Stick to your choice. Integrity. Honesty. If you feel unhappy with your chosen direction given current price action, take it as a positive indication of your better than average skills at reading market action, but do not switch. Note the price you got filled at. 60 minutes later - exit the trade. There are no stops and no targets. You either scratched, made a profit or made a loss. None of these outcomes were as a direct result of your trading - you did it because I told you to do it. Right? So, how do you feel about that trade? Neutral? Good. That?s the way you need to feel about ALL of your trades. The ones you put on yourself too. You wont always get it, but that?s what you?re aiming for. Why am I giving you all this personal insight into what a pro trader feels like or does when we know all the action is in discussing systems? Because the last thing you need to be thinking about is systems. What you might want to consider doing, as I?ve said in other posts, is to start thinking, acting and behaving like a pro trader - first. Do this exercise as often as you need to learn to disassociate from all your trades.

Before I get back onto talking about passive concentration, I pondered long and hard the comments of another poster on this thread regarding concentration. I thought about why it was I wasn?t taking a different approach in my posts to accommodate those whose concentration or attention spans were limited. And I am borrowing wholesale from the PM I wrote the poster on this. The thing is, the very essence of what I am trying to work toward is the development of the skill of focused concentration. Those who 'lack concentration' are the ones I'm talking to. My posts end up looking like they have been deliberately crafted to befuddle and confuse. They seem off-puttingly long posts by standards of these boards. It's just the way they come out - eventually. I think I can best get those who are not trading with active concentration to work comfortably toward attaining the mindset and the mental attitude which will help them develop more fully their trading skills within that mode. If he, or you, or anyone else is finding it difficult to concentrate on my posts, that's probably exactly what I was aiming for - I?m not sure. It?s possibly a good thing. I thank rudeboy for that feedback. But if you can?t see the connection between that young monk, sitting at the chessboard, hour after hour, waiting for the old master to make the only possible move open to him (from the young monk?s perspective) and the ability to commit in an flash to action or inaction, without conscious thought, then you?re probably on the right track. Benevolent, benign responsibility. As a mode of living, and trading and even as a mode of discourse. Inseparable. I?m sure there is a fancy word for this oneness of being as it applies to everything one does, but as my skills in this area (of trying to describe the indescribable) are virtually and obviously lacking, I?ll leave that to others.

For those who have already mastered the art of active concentration, a post like these of mine pass in a flash and is fully comprehended - almost as if they knew what I was going to say in the sentence after the one being read now. I know it, because I can see it in others. They are most likely also aware of the various devices I am using to push the point home, repeatedly in every and each post. Perhaps they could let me know because I am at a complete loss as to what I?m doing when I?m writing. The irony is, those who already have those skills will unlikely be reading this thread. And those that would possibly benefit from them most are unlikely to have the mental stamina to begin with to even start the process. It's difficult. And I?ve already in all honesty with you explained I haven?t done this before and don?t know any other way to do it than simply following my instincts.

Another poster came up with some excellent points too. Also borrowing from my PM to him, I?m not convinced his short précis of a post was any better/worse compared with my extremely awkward verbosity as it didn?t really help anyone with what it is I?m trying to get across get any further forward to where he/she needs/wants to be (consistently successful), or find out trading isn't for them, any quicker or any more easily or with less financial loss in my view. But points well put and clearly with positive intent. At least you didn?t have to wade thru oceans of words to get on to the next post. But I do want to develop pitscum?s thoughts a little further, a little more deeply.

With the other professions/jobs he exampled, there's a clear career development path, training, education. Signposts all the way. Opportunity to assess ability/suitability all the way. Not so with trading as an independent. You have no graduated career development path. There are no officially regulated training programmes for you to choose from. For instance, you might choose to learn to fly (pilot). You?d start off with flying lessons provided by a qualified flight training instructor and you?d put in the hours. Your ability would be assessed by your mentor and you?d get immediate and fairly obvious feedback on your abilities. You?d also experience the reality of flying and decide for yourself if you really wanted to carry on doing it. You?d take written tests and hands-on tests leading to your first solo. Further training and guidance is undertaken until you achieve a standard level of competence which is deemed adequate to ensure your safety, the safety of others and you are granted the privilege to fly a plane - in restricted conditions. VFR. You can then choose to progress with further training in simulated environments or by using special in-flight devices to attain the next significant level of aptitude - IFR. You can now fly in more difficult conditions where you can?t necessarily see what?s right in front of you. You need to rely more on more on your instruments and your instrument reading skills. Of course, from there you can choose any number of further flying career development paths; courier, navy; army, commercial and progress to multi-engine, rotary, jet and so forth. But each step of the journey you are subjected to further intensive training, guidance, mentoring, review, examination and in addition to all of this, you will be re-tested, depending on age, experience and flying milieu, on a regular basis. You are required to continue to develop your skills. It doesn?t stop when you attain your required level of mastery. You are still required to put in the hours to keep current, to keep your ?touch? to keep your eye in and to maintain standards. Just like a professional musician or a master trader.

Does any of this happen within the trading development of an independent trader in the financial markets? That is where the poster, helpful as his post was and with the obvious good intent of cutting to the chase to save everyone?s time from the horror of reading any more of my expansive verbiage, was a little too quick to post. He did not think thru what it was he was attempting to say. Having an intuition to be a grocer, dentist, geologist, pilot, and you simply go do it - there is no parallel with trading unfortunately. Just because you like to do those other things, you can?t ?just? do it (well, OK maybe the grocer you could. But even then you still need basic business training if you wanted to succeed). In all of them you are required to embark on training, education, practice, examination, review and certification. But any fool can decide they want to ?buy and sell? on the markets and go right ahead and do that. No controls. No balances. No checks. I wonder if that?s because all the other professions have impact (quite literally in the pilot?s case) or require the buy-in of customers/clients/others? Trading does not. You?re on your own. Useful thoughts and my thanks to the poster who triggered them.

Anyway, concentration. You?re walking in the woods. I tend to get lost in the woods often. Deliberately. When you?re off the well walked tracks and into the uncharted areas of any wood, things take on a different appearance. What you?re looking for are different types of tracks. Animal tracks. Not scat or paw-prints. Just the gentle indentations on the forest floor which indicate small animals have gone this way - a number of times before. You don?t necessarily know in which direction of course. But sometimes. Even those signs are clear. Anyway, they go this way and that often enough times to leave a visible track. But it?s only really visible when you?re not specifically looking for it - or at it. It appears, to me at any rate, as I?m looking over the entire landscape - which will be variable in depth and breadth as time passes and limited by my environment depending on how deep I am in the woods - as a ?difference? from everything else. It rather makes itself known to me by being ever so slightly different to everywhere else. It might only be a few blades of grass, I don?t know, I?m not a born tracker, but a few blades of grass here, absence of other things, such as twigs there - all indicate as the picture builds - a path through the woods.

This is passive concentration. Hanging on to what it is you want to find or find out, as time unfolds even though your mind will be jerked this way and that by internal thought processes and external events - which trigger internal thought processes. Not necessarily keeping it in the forefront of your mind - in fact, absolutely not keeping it in the forefront of your mind - it needs to be out back. Awareness occurs - perception piles in to let you know what it thinks you want to think of that pure awareness that impinged on your senses before you intellectualized it. It?s a Long Thought that gets interrupted countless times and only seems to get taken off the track numerous times - then to come back to that which is your central point of interest. You need to bring it gently back. You obviously also need to remember or remind yourself you had something to think about in the first place. Life will take you into the fast lane without your permission and you need to deal with everything that comes your way. It?s not easy to keep any thought central to your being, all the time, until it resolves. But to ?have? that central point of interest to be brought back to - that is key. It?s key to passive concentration and will prove to be key to active concentration. If you have no single point of thought, goal or target or point of enquiry, you are just a subject of time and allow if to move you along and consider whatever it hands you as a series of unrelated events ?of time?. A difficult post. Don?t worry.





Trading Wont Make Your Life OK

I?ve explained previously how the journey to becoming a master trader will likely be long, hard and difficult. So you?ll need to get your life in order ?before? you even think about attempting it. Same as before you undertake any lengthy journey - you get your affairs in order and you prepare for the trip. Trading wont make your life OK. Doesn?t work that way round. Even masterful trading wont make your life OK in and of itself. But I do know for a fact that if you have mastered trading, or anything else for that matter - you will have already taken control of your life - and mastered that. No other way. They kind of go together. It?s akin to the advice (and I?m possibly paraphrasing here because I can?t remember with total clarity and can?t find the original quote anywhere) - "If you wish to paint the perfect picture, first, you must make yourself perfect. Then paint". I know of no master traders or any other types of true master in any field who have anything other than an ordered and controlled existence outside their main field of excellence. Their life is a function of their art - and their art of their life. You need to live right first. There?s a lot of scared money out there being traded by folk who should really know better. Don?t you be one of them. I titled this thread "Unfashionable Advice" because that?s exactly what I?m giving you all most of the time. It ain?t sweet, it ain?t easy and it definitely ain?t glamorous. You still get to do the chores. Still need to get your finances balanced. The house and car and yard still require maintenance to be done. Everything you have and are and own and do is a reflection of the person you are. Inside and outside. If you?re house needs a lick of paint - get to it. If the car could use a clean up, inside and out - get to it. Keep it clean. Keep it sharp. Goes for everything. If you?re troubled by finances you?ll need to get on an even keel. You really can?t have anything else on your mind when you get deeply into this stuff - or you simply wont. You need to develop personal mastery before you go out there and master anything else. There needs to exist about you a sense of Quality that others can feel - in who you are and what you do and they way you do it. And this isn?t style or veneer - that?ll soon wane or peel away - it has to be the real thing. And above all, if you need an income - get a job or just do something, anything to bring in the minimum to cover you while you?re learning your skills. Trading isn?t going to do that for you just yet. If you?re a rank beginner or a hot shot on that final losing streak, you shouldn?t be using money right now anyhow. Time enough for you to fill your saddle bags further down the way. There?ll still be plenty left for you - whenever you get there. I mention money and income and finances a great deal because seems to me most new to trading traders are getting into trading to ?sort their finances out? or ?get a good income?. This is unlikely to happen. The final and most important item on the list of things to keep in order - your body-mind. They?re a single entity far as I can tell. Put good stuff into yourself - that?s good food, water and education. Clean environment, good friends and exercise. Effort only requires discipline until you reach the next level. That then becomes your baseline. There?s no going back. And you?ll never want to. Keep your thoughts positive at all times. And keep everything (body and mind) tuned up to high-performance level at all times. You never know when you?re going to need that extra torque. I?m not suggesting you turn into a vegan who works out in the gym 10 hours a day and spends the rest of the time in quiet contemplation. Just get sensible with what?s going on in your body and your mind. The Quality thing start right inside you and works it way out into what you do and how you do it. It manifests itself in your entire life spectrum - and beyond. Attitude. Comportment.

Anyone still reading this post? Not very heartening so far, was it? There may be a few who haven?t given up and have decided to do exactly what I?m suggesting. A few of these few will go even further and actually do it. But there may be one or two who have carried on reading this with no intention of bothering with all that old baloney because it isn?t to do with real trading. There are people who know they have a lot of real life stuff to fix, but as that has no bearing on real trading they can ignore it. Trust me, some folk just want to stay broke. For those I may have depressed ever so slightly I have a question. Have you ever really been at the end of your rope? I mean really depressed. You come up a notch from the self-pity stage and the just looking at your boots stage and you?re at the point where you decide it?s you against the rest of the world - and a hard edge develops - you?ve had enough. You don?t want to chit-chat. You don?t want to waste time. Yet you?re not yet quite sure what you need to be doing. A cross-roads. Pent up and coiled up with all the tensions of a pent up coiled up thing with tension in it. It comes across. You walk into a bar, gas station or a store in this mood. You?re not mad at anyone. Just ready and waiting and deep inside yourself. Alone but not lonely. Like I say, a right hard edge does develop. And just by the way you walk, stand, talk, don?t talk, look - people ?notice? you. You?re not deliberately projecting anything, but your presence is so out of the ordinary, folks ?notice?. It?s a very different comportment. Your intent is way inward not outward, but that doesn?t stop it. What is the energy that?s hitting those folk? I?ve already mentioned it. Presence. In this case it?s a pretty negative energy that?s being projected and you have no control over that. But the same mechanism that produced that energy can be tailored to a more useful purpose in relation to operations of influence and interaction in an area in which we may, as traders, be more interested. More later (or maybe another post depending on stamina - mine, not yours). It?s important only in that this force of presence works over a distance - and surprisingly, over time too. And this energy is ?detected? not just by other people. There is a very fine web of energies which tie ?us? and ?it all? together. Actually is doesn?t do that at all - we ?are? the web of energies as is everything else. All connected. Whether you believe me or not it?s true and by the time I?m done, if you?re still with me, I wont need to prove it to you anymore. These energies are arbitrarily split into this type of energy and that type of energy, just to make it useful for our everyday physical needs. Different scientific disciplines will cut the cake whichever way suits whatever it is it?s trying to prove. Light, heat, X-rays, sound, pressure, touch, thought. They are merely convenient models of the reality of what really ?is?. It?s a model that has us accepting without thought there is a separate ?us? and ?it all?. And take light itself - we even have two useful models for how light ?works? - wave and particle, quite incompatible with each other. But they are useful depending on what it is you want to ?do? with light. Want diffraction - use wave. Want photovoltaic - use particle. Use whatever is useful - even if it doesn?t make sense to you right now. The undifferentiated continuum of all energy. We need to tie that in with Intent. I?ve already mentioned unselfconsciousness so we should be ready to go real soon. Remind me if I forget. It?s real important.

Based on my experience with new traders, most look ?at? their screens rather than ?into? the market. They fail to look deeply enough. It?s too dimensional. Subsequently they end up trading what?s on their screen - their own reflection - of the market, rather than the undifferentiated reality of the underlying market itself. How can be set about attempting to fix this?

When your attention is drawn to a bird noisily taking off from the pond you were so quietly sitting beside, it was your awareness of that bird that established your attention on it. Your attention to it did not exist prior to having your awareness of it. Couldn?t have. You can?t put your attention on something of which you are not aware. Can you? If you care just for a moment to take a position that it?s possible to swap that normal cause and effect around, your could consider the possibility that your attention can be ?tuned? to await the awareness event of the bird noisily taking of from the pond. It doesn?t get any simpler than that. Your attention precedes your awareness. Your attention is what brings awareness to your consciousness. You need to prime your attention in readiness. We normally do it the other way around. We are aware of something and then ?give it our attention?. But this is just a figure of speech - this form of attention is the awareness event that lets our conscious thinking ?us? take notice of an event that has occurred and has been brought to us by our unconscious. You need to be ready to accept what occurs. Ready to experience it. Not be surprised by it. Most do it the other way round. You can tune your attention to anything you wish. And any number of things or events. Just takes practice and intent. And of course, unselfconsciousness. You don?t care if the attention that leads to the awareness event ever occurs. It may. It may not. You really don?t care. As we?ve already discussed, the location of Attention or rather which location it isn?t in (can?t be the conscious mind otherwise it wouldn?t be on a position to feed what?s interesting to our conscious mind) isn?t the issue. What we want to know is how do we get to it to let it know what we what to be nudged ?awake? by? Well, how do you think you do it already? You need to figure this one out for yourself as the figuring is the process and not just the means to the solution. I will help you by PM but only yes/no type stuff. You need to think it thru. I?ll give you one small hint before moving on: work backwards from what you are doing right now, sitting at your screen, reading this post - and work back to what it was that brought you to this post, on this thread, on this bulletin board at this very point in time. Attention is a filter (or trigger) between unconscious awareness of ?all that is? and the awareness event which is what we get to think about consciously. If you thought you just caught me using the term unconscious awareness, you did. And no, not this post. What causes you to notice the things you notice? You set your own attention filter. How do you do that?

While you?re giving all that your attention, in your experience, which is more likely to occur: a reversal or a continuation? What does the price have to do first to warrant being called a trend or a consolidation? What does it have to look like or be doing. Easy enough. What then has to happen for it to be considered to no longer be classed as it just was? How far back, in terms of number of bars, do you need to go to know it?s changed its nature, or not? If the same price mechanism works in all markets across all timeframes, and this is just for argument?s sake of course, what would you have had to have done to know with reasonable probability the price was going to have done what it did in say just half the number of timeframes you previously needed?

It occurs to me that I can usefully demonstrate something which I want to develop next post with one simple exercise. If you have more than one entry setup. Pick one. Doesn?t matter which. But one which you have traded for a period of time either on paper or with real money. What?s your win rate? As a percentage. If you?ve kept a log of all these trades (and if you haven?t, that?s OK, but for the purposes of this question, start logging them now if you want to play along and come back in a couple hundred timeframes to look at this again). You also need to compile a list of your numbers of consecutive losses against total number of trades up to the point that particular string of consecutive losses occurred. There is a list example thumbnail below. In my example I?m saying after 15 trades I had 2 consecutive losing trades occur (trades 14 & 15). After 35 trades I had a run of 3 consecutive losing trades occur (trades 33, 34 & 35). And after 101 trades I had 2 consecutive losing trades occur (trades 100 & 101). OK? Someone might ask, so I?ll specifically mention, a single losing trade does not constitute a consecutive losing trade. Seriously, some folk (statisticians mainly) will insist on including single loss trades as valid if they think they know where I?m going with this one. It?s highly unlikely they do, as I have only the faintest of notions myself. So it?s cumulative trades to date with a list entry trigger each time you have more than one loser in a row.

Do you think the more trades you make with any given system which has a known and fixed win rate and more specifically with your chosen system for this exercise will:-

(a) have no impact on the frequency of consecutive losses of similar number
(b) increase your chance of having multiple consecutive losses of similar number
(c) decrease your chance of have multiple consecutive losses of similar number
(d) increase the probability of you having even longer runs of consecutive losers
(e) decrease the probability of you having even longer runs of consecutive losers.

Don?t limit yourself necessarily to choosing just one option, but unless you have some interesting variant on my way of thinking (if so, I want to hear from you), you?ll probably not choose more than one option from (a) thru (c) and no more than one from (d) or (e). Might be fun to share your thinking with others on the boards if you wish, but equally valid as a personal thought exercise. If you do decide to post - think it thru first. Remember what you want to have happen in the other person?s head. Don?t PM me with any of your work on this, unless it?s got nothing to do with the apparent object of the exercise. You don?t need to discuss with me the various merits/demerits of the 5 options or your rationale. That?s for you and others to tackle. That?s the purpose.

(see thumbnail below)

Trading before mastery is different to trading after mastery. You still chop wood and carry water, so the physicality of ?what? you do is exactly the same-ish, but the experience is quite different. You can I am sure draw your own parallels with that statement in your own experiences elsewhere in your life where you have already attained a degree of mastery in some endeavor or skill. Until you develop that quiet, motionless, quite thought-less center of operations, you need to trade very cannily. For as soon as you get an inkling of emotions riding over the conscious horizon you need to snap to attention. Emotions will kill your trading and your bottom line. You are striving to trade without ANY emotion. How can you train yourself to tackle just this one area of trading as you develop your mastery? OK, try this. You?re trading SR levels in a bull move and each previous potential resistance level is being ignored and plowed thru as the price action powers on up - and you?re in a Long position. You?ve been Long since the exact starting point of the rise. You?re on a roll. The world is good and you?re the boss. (What was that sound?). The momentum begins to slow coming up to the next key level, and a tension begins to manifest itself in you in the way only you know, and you now hear more clearly that sound - it?s the distant thud of hooves. These are the runaway emotions of your own greed and fear. So the world was good and you were the boss were you? They?re riding out to meet you, the market and that line of potential resistance (potential resistance??? You kidding me man! There?s nothing potential about that line. It?s real! That darned line is actually growing thicker and darker and more foreboding and impenetrable by the second - that?s clear to anyone, surely? Just looking at it is making it more so by the second) and those emotions are looking mean and they?re getting real close now - what do you do? You close your position. You then watch the price development with totally unemotional detachment and objectivity. You can now do this once again, because there?s no cash riding on it - no ego - no emotion - and you?ve already booked some profit. When the price confirms the level was just a rest and the resistance is now support - you can choose to go in Long again if you?ve a mind. It costs you spread plus support confirmation at most. If the level holds as resistance, you?re not Long and you might consider a Short - or not. Either way you?ve shown yourself to be a smart operator and can feel good, but only as long as you realize feeling good, or anything else about that trade, is holding you back from never having to experience emotion in trading ever again. What would you rather have - feel good/feel bad - makes losses. Or feel nothing - make profits? It?s a trick question. My counsel to you if you are ever in that situation and take my advice, after you exit - go do something else. Not as punishment, but as a recognition of your growing control over your own emotions. That?s a lot more important in your journey than attempting to grab the next ride up or down. How many times are you expecting pull that one in succession anyway? Treat yourself to a cup of coffee and watch the sun shining thru the trees, or the rain dripping from the roof. Take a walk out back. Whatever. Treat yourself. You deserve it. As an aside, when it?s gray and cold, why does it always look better with rain as well?
Concentration is what you are really looking for. It was just a little way back that I first mentioned Active Concentration as an important, actually vital, aspect of character development for anyone wishing to progress in the discipline of trading and raise their proficiency to a level of true mastery. Consistent success. I am convinced that anyone who wishes to make the effort and put in the work, do the hard yards - use whatever metaphor takes your particular fancy - can become masterful in any chosen endeavor. We?re specifically interested in trading, but the skill development process is precisely the same for all disciplines of which I have any experience and knowledge. There are no minimum entry requirements other than your total and absolute willingness to work hard at it, to stay with it and to develop the correct mindset and attitude. This mindset is quite independent of trading which is why much of my writing will tend not to attract those who wish to find a quick fix to their trading problems or to find the one and only indicator they?ll ever need for all instruments in all markets across all timeframes and in all market conditions. If any of you on that particular path do find what you?re looking for - please do let me know. Anyway, back to concentration. There have been a few posts since in which I have veered away from this more esoteric area of trading personality development in order to ground what I am saying in a more basic mechanical level of trading functionality. I?ve done this as an attempt at finding common ground from which those that are interested can move forward with me. I appreciate some will not like taking what only appears to them to be a backward step. That?s fine. They either do or they don?t and they either will or they won?t. I have no control over any of this. I?m just giving you what I?ve got in the best way I can in the hope it helps. I don?t know if I?m doing it correctly - the right way. I don?t even know if there is a right way. I am making this up as I go along. I have never attempted to help other traders in this way, in this medium before. Some will welcome my lengthy posts as a welcome diversion from a trading career that has perhaps turned out for them to be less than the meteoric rise to riches they initially envisioned. And those who have tried and not met their, I suspect overly optimistic goals, are due a restful break too. But only from trading. The hard work is just about to begin.

It?s still a little early I feel to get into Active Concentration, but I do want to give you a starter into this very deep and difficult to explain concept by briefly bringing up the term ?Passive Concentration? for your review. By the way none of these terms exist, as far as I know, anywhere except in my head. There?s no course or programme (more of this later) to teach these as the ?standard? lessons of trading. There are none. If you think of a better word or phrase than me that meets your idea of what I?m talking about and makes more sense for you personally - by all means, use it. I don?t believe there is a one size fits all in this or any other worthwhile endeavor. Use what works for you. Mantra. I also mentioned more recently the phrase "Plan for what you want to happen". Awareness. Perception. These two are key. Intuition. Surprisingly. Only surprising in that it most likely will not be in any way or context you have ever imagined it might apply to trading. I could have covered intuition in the "Don?t Delude Yourself" post, but that would have been way too obvious - you would have been ready for me - seen me coming - and it would not therefore have worked. I wont be able to cover any of these topics in this post as there isn?t enough time (yes, I?ve just come back up here after writing the final part of this post and it?s already too long even by my standards). I?ll save these topics for future posts. I promise I will cover off all of these as we move into and thru Active Concentration.

Talking again of concentration, I have to mention an encounter I had with a professional musician. I know relatively few professional musicians. Those I do know, interest me greatly and all for the very same reason. While they inhabit the same planet as me, arduous activities with their instruments over long hours along with frustration, exhaustion and desperation which tend to weed out the hopeful from the amateur and finally from the professional - make their take on life quite different to mine. But only in relation to our respective primary fields of endeavor. This comes across in the way they comport themselves. If you?ve ever met a professional, you?ll have known it and recognized ?it? immediately. Even if you are not in any way involved or interested in their genre, or even aware of what that might be, you will have clearly and quite easily observed a certain presence. Something a little ?different? about them and their manner. That?s the interesting thing - totally different fields of operation yet there is a central and identical core of behavior and attitude and bearing, a recognition of which each has in the other which is as instant as it is ineffable. You know what I mean. We got talking about my attempts and frustrations at my current inability to do what I am doing on these boards in attempting to help those at the beginning of their trading career with the taking on board of what they needed to do to become professional in method, if not in name, in trading the financial markets. The fascination with systems themselves rather than the primary importance of development of the person, the Self in which the sought for excellence can reside. Flowery stuff. This chap, a violinist and conductor of apparent renown laughed at my intellectual impasse. Not in deprecation of my feeling of lack, but in pure and absolute recognition of my plight. He commented that it would be equivalent, he said, to amateur musicians discussing among themselves, with great passion and verve, the various merits of which type of string to use and where to buy it and how best to tune it without any basic realization they first needed to learn the nature of the instrument and how to play it and to acquire the knowledge of how to play it and to practice playing it. With amateur musicians though, there is an inherent understanding that to learn from those who were already professionals was the only way to progress to becoming professional themselves. He added that a musician only becomes truly notable in their execution of a piece and recognized for their ability once they have learned who they are and what it is in them that comes thru them and into their music. I don?t think he was trying to be deeply allegorical - just honest.

He did suggest by way of helpfulness that I suggest to you all at some juncture the use of baroque music with a steady 60 bpm at barely audible levels to assist with the rapid induction into the state of the master trader. I?ve never tried this, but you never can tell with these things. Maybe somebody needs to do an ?Accelerated Learning CD for Master Traders?? Not necessarily my thing. Now jazz is. It has a pleasantly discordant interrupt mechanism on normal thought processes. It?s free and still legal (for the moment) I?m not suggesting you get into jazz or play it at just audible levels while you?re trading, or feign an interest in it, but in passing, it does tend to cause a conscious bypass within me of those areas of my being that would otherwise be strung out from time to time. And never be fooled into thinking any trader is totally unemotional the whole time. No matter how experienced they are and how good they are, there will be times when the flush of a superbly managed trade, well played, where the target is hit spot on and just as you close, the price immediately reverses direction. Perfection. Sometimes, when this happens, the pleasure of your success and clear evidence of your sheer brilliance will filter up to conscious levels and cause a smile of pure satisfaction to appear. Equally, the grim reaper of traders? dark souls with manifest groan of momentous stupidity that bad timing along with risk mismanagement and complacent arrogance that come shortly after the question we sometimes ask ourselves "Why on earth did I do that?" will occasionally come sit beside you at your screens. It happens to the best. The master trader will "treat those two impostors just the same" and simply carry on as if neither happened. Never, ever beat up on yourself. Because then you?ll have to hide round the corner waiting to get even with yourself at some point. It never ends. Don?t do it. That?s how it all started in Sicily.

I?ve got a little exercise you can play with. You can play this one whenever you want. As often as you want. Until you don?t need to any longer. I haven?t ever done it myself. I?ve just devised it yesterday as a useful way for you to experience what a master trader ?mostly? experiences with all his/her trades. I?m going to suggest you don?t use real money - but I?m not your mama. It?s called the "Long/Short Exercise". Pick an instrument. Any instrument at random. Absolutely one you have not recently traded and of which you are quite unaware of recent price action or news. Zero expectations, knowledge of or feelings towards this instrument. Before you choose it and look at a 5min chart of the instrument (no indicators on your chart for this one please, just price - no volume) - before you look - choose either Long or Short. That?s important. When you?ve chosen entry direction, look at the instrument on the 5min chart. Immediately take the trade in your randomly selected direction. No cheating. Do not be swayed by current price action. Stick to your choice. Integrity. Honesty. If you feel unhappy with your chosen direction given current price action, take it as a positive indication of your better than average skills at reading market action, but do not switch. Note the price you got filled at. 60 minutes later - exit the trade. There are no stops and no targets. You either scratched, made a profit or made a loss. None of these outcomes were as a direct result of your trading - you did it because I told you to do it. Right? So, how do you feel about that trade? Neutral? Good. That?s the way you need to feel about ALL of your trades. The ones you put on yourself too. You wont always get it, but that?s what you?re aiming for. Why am I giving you all this personal insight into what a pro trader feels like or does when we know all the action is in discussing systems? Because the last thing you need to be thinking about is systems. What you might want to consider doing, as I?ve said in other posts, is to start thinking, acting and behaving like a pro trader - first. Do this exercise as often as you need to learn to disassociate from all your trades.

Before I get back onto talking about passive concentration, I pondered long and hard the comments of another poster on this thread regarding concentration. I thought about why it was I wasn?t taking a different approach in my posts to accommodate those whose concentration or attention spans were limited. And I am borrowing wholesale from the PM I wrote the poster on this. The thing is, the very essence of what I am trying to work toward is the development of the skill of focused concentration. Those who 'lack concentration' are the ones I'm talking to. My posts end up looking like they have been deliberately crafted to befuddle and confuse. They seem off-puttingly long posts by standards of these boards. It's just the way they come out - eventually. I think I can best get those who are not trading with active concentration to work comfortably toward attaining the mindset and the mental attitude which will help them develop more fully their trading skills within that mode. If he, or you, or anyone else is finding it difficult to concentrate on my posts, that's probably exactly what I was aiming for - I?m not sure. It?s possibly a good thing. I thank rudeboy for that feedback. But if you can?t see the connection between that young monk, sitting at the chessboard, hour after hour, waiting for the old master to make the only possible move open to him (from the young monk?s perspective) and the ability to commit in an flash to action or inaction, without conscious thought, then you?re probably on the right track. Benevolent, benign responsibility. As a mode of living, and trading and even as a mode of discourse. Inseparable. I?m sure there is a fancy word for this oneness of being as it applies to everything one does, but as my skills in this area (of trying to describe the indescribable) are virtually and obviously lacking, I?ll leave that to others.

For those who have already mastered the art of active concentration, a post like these of mine pass in a flash and is fully comprehended - almost as if they knew what I was going to say in the sentence after the one being read now. I know it, because I can see it in others. They are most likely also aware of the various devices I am using to push the point home, repeatedly in every and each post. Perhaps they could let me know because I am at a complete loss as to what I?m doing when I?m writing. The irony is, those who already have those skills will unlikely be reading this thread. And those that would possibly benefit from them most are unlikely to have the mental stamina to begin with to even start the process. It's difficult. And I?ve already in all honesty with you explained I haven?t done this before and don?t know any other way to do it than simply following my instincts.

Another poster came up with some excellent points too. Also borrowing from my PM to him, I?m not convinced his short précis of a post was any better/worse compared with my extremely awkward verbosity as it didn?t really help anyone with what it is I?m trying to get across get any further forward to where he/she needs/wants to be (consistently successful), or find out trading isn't for them, any quicker or any more easily or with less financial loss in my view. But points well put and clearly with positive intent. At least you didn?t have to wade thru oceans of words to get on to the next post. But I do want to develop pitscum?s thoughts a little further, a little more deeply.

With the other professions/jobs he exampled, there's a clear career development path, training, education. Signposts all the way. Opportunity to assess ability/suitability all the way. Not so with trading as an independent. You have no graduated career development path. There are no officially regulated training programmes for you to choose from. For instance, you might choose to learn to fly (pilot). You?d start off with flying lessons provided by a qualified flight training instructor and you?d put in the hours. Your ability would be assessed by your mentor and you?d get immediate and fairly obvious feedback on your abilities. You?d also experience the reality of flying and decide for yourself if you really wanted to carry on doing it. You?d take written tests and hands-on tests leading to your first solo. Further training and guidance is undertaken until you achieve a standard level of competence which is deemed adequate to ensure your safety, the safety of others and you are granted the privilege to fly a plane - in restricted conditions. VFR. You can then choose to progress with further training in simulated environments or by using special in-flight devices to attain the next significant level of aptitude - IFR. You can now fly in more difficult conditions where you can?t necessarily see what?s right in front of you. You need to rely more on more on your instruments and your instrument reading skills. Of course, from there you can choose any number of further flying career development paths; courier, navy; army, commercial and progress to multi-engine, rotary, jet and so forth. But each step of the journey you are subjected to further intensive training, guidance, mentoring, review, examination and in addition to all of this, you will be re-tested, depending on age, experience and flying milieu, on a regular basis. You are required to continue to develop your skills. It doesn?t stop when you attain your required level of mastery. You are still required to put in the hours to keep current, to keep your ?touch? to keep your eye in and to maintain standards. Just like a professional musician or a master trader.

Does any of this happen within the trading development of an independent trader in the financial markets? That is where the poster, helpful as his post was and with the obvious good intent of cutting to the chase to save everyone?s time from the horror of reading any more of my expansive verbiage, was a little too quick to post. He did not think thru what it was he was attempting to say. Having an intuition to be a grocer, dentist, geologist, pilot, and you simply go do it - there is no parallel with trading unfortunately. Just because you like to do those other things, you can?t ?just? do it (well, OK maybe the grocer you could. But even then you still need basic business training if you wanted to succeed). In all of them you are required to embark on training, education, practice, examination, review and certification. But any fool can decide they want to ?buy and sell? on the markets and go right ahead and do that. No controls. No balances. No checks. I wonder if that?s because all the other professions have impact (quite literally in the pilot?s case) or require the buy-in of customers/clients/others? Trading does not. You?re on your own. Useful thoughts and my thanks to the poster who triggered them.

Anyway, concentration. You?re walking in the woods. I tend to get lost in the woods often. Deliberately. When you?re off the well walked tracks and into the uncharted areas of any wood, things take on a different appearance. What you?re looking for are different types of tracks. Animal tracks. Not scat or paw-prints. Just the gentle indentations on the forest floor which indicate small animals have gone this way - a number of times before. You don?t necessarily know in which direction of course. But sometimes. Even those signs are clear. Anyway, they go this way and that often enough times to leave a visible track. But it?s only really visible when you?re not specifically looking for it - or at it. It appears, to me at any rate, as I?m looking over the entire landscape - which will be variable in depth and breadth as time passes and limited by my environment depending on how deep I am in the woods - as a ?difference? from everything else. It rather makes itself known to me by being ever so slightly different to everywhere else. It might only be a few blades of grass, I don?t know, I?m not a born tracker, but a few blades of grass here, absence of other things, such as twigs there - all indicate as the picture builds - a path through the woods.

This is passive concentration. Hanging on to what it is you want to find or find out, as time unfolds even though your mind will be jerked this way and that by internal thought processes and external events - which trigger internal thought processes. Not necessarily keeping it in the forefront of your mind - in fact, absolutely not keeping it in the forefront of your mind - it needs to be out back. Awareness occurs - perception piles in to let you know what it thinks you want to think of that pure awareness that impinged on your senses before you intellectualized it. It?s a Long Thought that gets interrupted countless times and only seems to get taken off the track numerous times - then to come back to that which is your central point of interest. You need to bring it gently back. You obviously also need to remember or remind yourself you had something to think about in the first place. Life will take you into the fast lane without your permission and you need to deal with everything that comes your way. It?s not easy to keep any thought central to your being, all the time, until it resolves. But to ?have? that central point of interest to be brought back to - that is key. It?s key to passive concentration and will prove to be key to active concentration. If you have no single point of thought, goal or target or point of enquiry, you are just a subject of time and allow if to move you along and consider whatever it hands you as a series of unrelated events ?of time?. A difficult post. Don?t worry.





Trading Wont Make Your Life OK

I?ve explained previously how the journey to becoming a master trader will likely be long, hard and difficult. So you?ll need to get your life in order ?before? you even think about attempting it. Same as before you undertake any lengthy journey - you get your affairs in order and you prepare for the trip. Trading wont make your life OK. Doesn?t work that way round. Even masterful trading wont make your life OK in and of itself. But I do know for a fact that if you have mastered trading, or anything else for that matter - you will have already taken control of your life - and mastered that. No other way. They kind of go together. It?s akin to the advice (and I?m possibly paraphrasing here because I can?t remember with total clarity and can?t find the original quote anywhere) - "If you wish to paint the perfect picture, first, you must make yourself perfect. Then paint". I know of no master traders or any other types of true master in any field who have anything other than an ordered and controlled existence outside their main field of excellence. Their life is a function of their art - and their art of their life. You need to live right first. There?s a lot of scared money out there being traded by folk who should really know better. Don?t you be one of them. I titled this thread "Unfashionable Advice" because that?s exactly what I?m giving you all most of the time. It ain?t sweet, it ain?t easy and it definitely ain?t glamorous. You still get to do the chores. Still need to get your finances balanced. The house and car and yard still require maintenance to be done. Everything you have and are and own and do is a reflection of the person you are. Inside and outside. If you?re house needs a lick of paint - get to it. If the car could use a clean up, inside and out - get to it. Keep it clean. Keep it sharp. Goes for everything. If you?re troubled by finances you?ll need to get on an even keel. You really can?t have anything else on your mind when you get deeply into this stuff - or you simply wont. You need to develop personal mastery before you go out there and master anything else. There needs to exist about you a sense of Quality that others can feel - in who you are and what you do and they way you do it. And this isn?t style or veneer - that?ll soon wane or peel away - it has to be the real thing. And above all, if you need an income - get a job or just do something, anything to bring in the minimum to cover you while you?re learning your skills. Trading isn?t going to do that for you just yet. If you?re a rank beginner or a hot shot on that final losing streak, you shouldn?t be using money right now anyhow. Time enough for you to fill your saddle bags further down the way. There?ll still be plenty left for you - whenever you get there. I mention money and income and finances a great deal because seems to me most new to trading traders are getting into trading to ?sort their finances out? or ?get a good income?. This is unlikely to happen. The final and most important item on the list of things to keep in order - your body-mind. They?re a single entity far as I can tell. Put good stuff into yourself - that?s good food, water and education. Clean environment, good friends and exercise. Effort only requires discipline until you reach the next level. That then becomes your baseline. There?s no going back. And you?ll never want to. Keep your thoughts positive at all times. And keep everything (body and mind) tuned up to high-performance level at all times. You never know when you?re going to need that extra torque. I?m not suggesting you turn into a vegan who works out in the gym 10 hours a day and spends the rest of the time in quiet contemplation. Just get sensible with what?s going on in your body and your mind. The Quality thing start right inside you and works it way out into what you do and how you do it. It manifests itself in your entire life spectrum - and beyond. Attitude. Comportment.

Anyone still reading this post? Not very heartening so far, was it? There may be a few who haven?t given up and have decided to do exactly what I?m suggesting. A few of these few will go even further and actually do it. But there may be one or two who have carried on reading this with no intention of bothering with all that old baloney because it isn?t to do with real trading. There are people who know they have a lot of real life stuff to fix, but as that has no bearing on real trading they can ignore it. Trust me, some folk just want to stay broke. For those I may have depressed ever so slightly I have a question. Have you ever really been at the end of your rope? I mean really depressed. You come up a notch from the self-pity stage and the just looking at your boots stage and you?re at the point where you decide it?s you against the rest of the world - and a hard edge develops - you?ve had enough. You don?t want to chit-chat. You don?t want to waste time. Yet you?re not yet quite sure what you need to be doing. A cross-roads. Pent up and coiled up with all the tensions of a pent up coiled up thing with tension in it. It comes across. You walk into a bar, gas station or a store in this mood. You?re not mad at anyone. Just ready and waiting and deep inside yourself. Alone but not lonely. Like I say, a right hard edge does develop. And just by the way you walk, stand, talk, don?t talk, look - people ?notice? you. You?re not deliberately projecting anything, but your presence is so out of the ordinary, folks ?notice?. It?s a very different comportment. Your intent is way inward not outward, but that doesn?t stop it. What is the energy that?s hitting those folk? I?ve already mentioned it. Presence. In this case it?s a pretty negative energy that?s being projected and you have no control over that. But the same mechanism that produced that energy can be tailored to a more useful purpose in relation to operations of influence and interaction in an area in which we may, as traders, be more interested. More later (or maybe another post depending on stamina - mine, not yours). It?s important only in that this force of presence works over a distance - and surprisingly, over time too. And this energy is ?detected? not just by other people. There is a very fine web of energies which tie ?us? and ?it all? together. Actually is doesn?t do that at all - we ?are? the web of energies as is everything else. All connected. Whether you believe me or not it?s true and by the time I?m done, if you?re still with me, I wont need to prove it to you anymore. These energies are arbitrarily split into this type of energy and that type of energy, just to make it useful for our everyday physical needs. Different scientific disciplines will cut the cake whichever way suits whatever it is it?s trying to prove. Light, heat, X-rays, sound, pressure, touch, thought. They are merely convenient models of the reality of what really ?is?. It?s a model that has us accepting without thought there is a separate ?us? and ?it all?. And take light itself - we even have two useful models for how light ?works? - wave and particle, quite incompatible with each other. But they are useful depending on what it is you want to ?do? with light. Want diffraction - use wave. Want photovoltaic - use particle. Use whatever is useful - even if it doesn?t make sense to you right now. The undifferentiated continuum of all energy. We need to tie that in with Intent. I?ve already mentioned unselfconsciousness so we should be ready to go real soon. Remind me if I forget. It?s real important.

Based on my experience with new traders, most look ?at? their screens rather than ?into? the market. They fail to look deeply enough. It?s too dimensional. Subsequently they end up trading what?s on their screen - their own reflection - of the market, rather than the undifferentiated reality of the underlying market itself. How can be set about attempting to fix this?

When your attention is drawn to a bird noisily taking off from the pond you were so quietly sitting beside, it was your awareness of that bird that established your attention on it. Your attention to it did not exist prior to having your awareness of it. Couldn?t have. You can?t put your attention on something of which you are not aware. Can you? If you care just for a moment to take a position that it?s possible to swap that normal cause and effect around, your could consider the possibility that your attention can be ?tuned? to await the awareness event of the bird noisily taking of from the pond. It doesn?t get any simpler than that. Your attention precedes your awareness. Your attention is what brings awareness to your consciousness. You need to prime your attention in readiness. We normally do it the other way around. We are aware of something and then ?give it our attention?. But this is just a figure of speech - this form of attention is the awareness event that lets our conscious thinking ?us? take notice of an event that has occurred and has been brought to us by our unconscious. You need to be ready to accept what occurs. Ready to experience it. Not be surprised by it. Most do it the other way round. You can tune your attention to anything you wish. And any number of things or events. Just takes practice and intent. And of course, unselfconsciousness. You don?t care if the attention that leads to the awareness event ever occurs. It may. It may not. You really don?t care. As we?ve already discussed, the location of Attention or rather which location it isn?t in (can?t be the conscious mind otherwise it wouldn?t be on a position to feed what?s interesting to our conscious mind) isn?t the issue. What we want to know is how do we get to it to let it know what we what to be nudged ?awake? by? Well, how do you think you do it already? You need to figure this one out for yourself as the figuring is the process and not just the means to the solution. I will help you by PM but only yes/no type stuff. You need to think it thru. I?ll give you one small hint before moving on: work backwards from what you are doing right now, sitting at your screen, reading this post - and work back to what it was that brought you to this post, on this thread, on this bulletin board at this very point in time. Attention is a filter (or trigger) between unconscious awareness of ?all that is? and the awareness event which is what we get to think about consciously. If you thought you just caught me using the term unconscious awareness, you did. And no, not this post. What causes you to notice the things you notice? You set your own attention filter. How do you do that?

While you?re giving all that your attention, in your experience, which is more likely to occur: a reversal or a continuation? What does the price have to do first to warrant being called a trend or a consolidation? What does it have to look like or be doing. Easy enough. What then has to happen for it to be considered to no longer be classed as it just was? How far back, in terms of number of bars, do you need to go to know it?s changed its nature, or not? If the same price mechanism works in all markets across all timeframes, and this is just for argument?s sake of course, what would you have had to have done to know with reasonable probability the price was going to have done what it did in say just half the number of timeframes you previously needed?

It occurs to me that I can usefully demonstrate something which I want to develop next post with one simple exercise. If you have more than one entry setup. Pick one. Doesn?t matter which. But one which you have traded for a period of time either on paper or with real money. What?s your win rate? As a percentage. If you?ve kept a log of all these trades (and if you haven?t, that?s OK, but for the purposes of this question, start logging them now if you want to play along and come back in a couple hundred timeframes to look at this again). You also need to compile a list of your numbers of consecutive losses against total number of trades up to the point that particular string of consecutive losses occurred. There is a list example thumbnail below. In my example I?m saying after 15 trades I had 2 consecutive losing trades occur (trades 14 & 15). After 35 trades I had a run of 3 consecutive losing trades occur (trades 33, 34 & 35). And after 101 trades I had 2 consecutive losing trades occur (trades 100 & 101). OK? Someone might ask, so I?ll specifically mention, a single losing trade does not constitute a consecutive losing trade. Seriously, some folk (statisticians mainly) will insist on including single loss trades as valid if they think they know where I?m going with this one. It?s highly unlikely they do, as I have only the faintest of notions myself. So it?s cumulative trades to date with a list entry trigger each time you have more than one loser in a row.

Do you think the more trades you make with any given system which has a known and fixed win rate and more specifically with your chosen system for this exercise will:-

(a) have no impact on the frequency of consecutive losses of similar number
(b) increase your chance of having multiple consecutive losses of similar number
(c) decrease your chance of have multiple consecutive losses of similar number
(d) increase the probability of you having even longer runs of consecutive losers
(e) decrease the probability of you having even longer runs of consecutive losers.

Don?t limit yourself necessarily to choosing just one option, but unless you have some interesting variant on my way of thinking (if so, I want to hear from you), you?ll probably not choose more than one option from (a) thru (c) and no more than one from (d) or (e). Might be fun to share your thinking with others on the boards if you wish, but equally valid as a personal thought exercise. If you do decide to post - think it thru first. Remember what you want to have happen in the other person?s head. Don?t PM me with any of your work on this, unless it?s got nothing to do with the apparent object of the exercise. You don?t need to discuss with me the various merits/demerits of the 5 options or your rationale. That?s for you and others to tackle. That?s the purpose.

(see thumbnail below)

Trading before mastery is different to trading after mastery. You still chop wood and carry water, so the physicality of ?what? you do is exactly the same-ish, but the experience is quite different. You can I am sure draw your own parallels with that statement in your own experiences elsewhere in your life where you have already attained a degree of mastery in some endeavor or skill. Until you develop that quiet, motionless, quite thought-less center of operations, you need to trade very cannily. For as soon as you get an inkling of emotions riding over the conscious horizon you need to snap to attention. Emotions will kill your trading and your bottom line. You are striving to trade without ANY emotion. How can you train yourself to tackle just this one area of trading as you develop your mastery? OK, try this. You?re trading SR levels in a bull move and each previous potential resistance level is being ignored and plowed thru as the price action powers on up - and you?re in a Long position. You?ve been Long since the exact starting point of the rise. You?re on a roll. The world is good and you?re the boss. (What was that sound?). The momentum begins to slow coming up to the next key level, and a tension begins to manifest itself in you in the way only you know, and you now hear more clearly that sound - it?s the distant thud of hooves. These are the runaway emotions of your own greed and fear. So the world was good and you were the boss were you? They?re riding out to meet you, the market and that line of potential resistance (potential resistance??? You kidding me man! There?s nothing potential about that line. It?s real! That darned line is actually growing thicker and darker and more foreboding and impenetrable by the second - that?s clear to anyone, surely? Just looking at it is making it more so by the second) and those emotions are looking mean and they?re getting real close now - what do you do? You close your position. You then watch the price development with totally unemotional detachment and objectivity. You can now do this once again, because there?s no cash riding on it - no ego - no emotion - and you?ve already booked some profit. When the price confirms the level was just a rest and the resistance is now support - you can choose to go in Long again if you?ve a mind. It costs you spread plus support confirmation at most. If the level holds as resistance, you?re not Long and you might consider a Short - or not. Either way you?ve shown yourself to be a smart operator and can feel good, but only as long as you realize feeling good, or anything else about that trade, is holding you back from never having to experience emotion in trading ever again. What would you rather have - feel good/feel bad - makes losses. Or feel nothing - make profits? It?s a trick question. My counsel to you if you are ever in that situation and take my advice, after you exit - go do something else. Not as punishment, but as a recognition of your growing control over your own emotions. That?s a lot more important in your journey than attempting to grab the next ride up or down. How many times are you expecting pull that one in succession anyway? Treat yourself to a cup of coffee and watch the sun shining thru the trees, or the rain dripping from the roof. Take a walk out back. Whatever. Treat yourself. You deserve it. As an aside, when it?s gray and cold, why does it always look better with rain as well?

Det är alltid intressant att läsa om framgångsrika traders, fortsätt gärna och lägg ut...så länge det inte är copyright-skyddat material.

#2

Nej då, Rent och lagligt, de mesta är mail.

Mvh Simon25