September 24 Overlay, Trades, and Commentary

Today was very frustrating for me.

I had everything I needed on the prep and goals posting I did this morning. It was like a blueprint on how to win today. These are very powerful to me.

I would be doing much better if I just listened to my initial read and stuck to my goals. Of course, the difficulty in trading is that sometimes these things break down.

What separates a winning trader from a loosing trader is how you deal with things when they break down.

I was going to to just post that my trading was total garbage today (it was) but I decided to to add a bit that I think might be helpful.

I would first like to say that there are details on my trading in the Midday Post that I did earlier today. I was down 5.75 points which is slightly less than my average loss on 1 trade.

I had a plan this morning as well as 7 goals to keep in mind. Writing these down every morning has been helping.

The goals are not technical plans. The technical side is important because we are technical traders but I rarely lose due to inaccurate premise or read.

When I lose it is due to a breakdown in what I am going to call my "core trading values."

These include: courage, confidence, belief, no defense, no hesitation, intensity, aggression, and gamble (yes I said gamble).

I will due a separate post on these sometime soon. I am still working on the concept.

It is my belief that you can not trade consistently, regardless of your strategy, without these attributes holding firm.

While this may not seem to help many of you who are struggling to understand how the markets move, please believe that building these values into whatever you are doing will save you time and money.

I cost me 1.5 years to not understand this. Can you put a price on that?

I think you can take these values and apply them to a losing strategy and make money. I also think that 9.5 out of 10 traders who do not understand these values can not make money over time with a 75% win 1.5/1 win ratio system.

These not only need to be remembered, they need to be FELT.

If any one fades out (and it can happen without warning), you can make the wrong move that is not part of your plan before you even know you are doing it.

That is why I have been writing them every morning and I will continue to do so.

I violated goals #1, #3, #5, and #6 exactly 14 minutes after the open today. It costs me $1200.00 up front and another $275.00 later.

I did not lose the $1200.00 but is was there for the taking according to my plan.

The difficult part now is avoiding the TILT tomorrow. I need to come in and really perform well, otherwise, I historically have drawn down after a miss like this. Very tough.

I should also note that there was another trader visiting the office today. I am not sure how many of you follow professional poker, but I had a Phil Hellmuth like rant for most of the morning after my rule breaking defensive break even.

I trade with intensity and am very hard on myself.

I'm sure it was entertaining.