I used to think success in anything about came down to one’s sense of persistence and determination.
But over the years I have come to understand that those are hard to maintain if a person doesn’t have a good attitude.
Here’s what I do to keep my focus on having a good attitude.
It’s not always easy, but I try to keep my consciousness on my attitude and go from there.
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I advocate that you should consider building a trading system as part of your trading evolution.
You can build your sense of discipline over time and your trading system can help with that process.
You’ll need the simulator and the data feed if you go that way.
A good simulator will run you between $2-4k and the data can be a few hundred per month, depending on how many markets you want to backtest. It’s end of day data.
We teach people how to do it by hand so you can eventually determine how you want to invest your time.
Connect with me here if you’d like to learn more about it.
I didn’t have a choice but to do it by hand as there weren’t any simulators around at the time.
I used Lotus 123 to build my models and run the macros.
A trading system will generate all your entry and exit orders, as well as your position sizing.
Yet you’ll still have to put the trades on.
That’s where the discipline comes in.
If you’re in fear about what’s going on in the world, you may have significant reluctance to enter that order.
We talked about the variance between you and your rules in an episode last week.
In the end, I recommend you build a system.
You’ll learn a lot about yourself and you can grow into your rules.
You can email me if you have any questions and I’ll point you in the right direction.
Click here to get your free copy of The Inner Voice of Trading audiobook.
My advice is to systematize as much of your trading as possible.
For one, there is less chance for computational errors.
Two, systems will help you eliminate and disqualify names from your list.
A good system is a complete risk management tool that includes entries, exits, and risk management.
I regularly see and hear about traders trying to find opportunity on a chart when there’s nothing there.
Then they start overthinking things and can find themselves in trades that they have no business being in.
I know traders who read charts. I know a lot who run systems. I know a lot who read and incorporate fundamentals too.
The goal is to find what’s best for you.
I would start with one and evolve from there.
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When you let your system do the work, you are in effect putting yourself in the right place at the right time in a very efficient way.
The moment that happens, the expectation is that the other market participants will have to pay you to be in the trade that you’re already in.
They put the wind in your sails so to speak.
When you behave this way, you’re thinking about the expected value of a trade.
You don’t need to sit at your machine and try to steer the trade in a hypervigilant way and over-manage things.
You can have both peace and profits at the same time if you want.
It’s there for you.
You just have to decide how you want your day to unfold.
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Most chart indicators or overlays use the price as an input.
That makes them a lagging indicator which might be better for confirming trades after you already have them on, not for generating orders.
And if you’re not in the trade already by the time the indicator confirms, it’s too late.
You can’t chase.
I referred to most of the indicators out there as emotional band-aids in my book.
You can see things more clearly if you de-clutter your charts, let go, and surrender.
When you do that, an amazing thing happens.
You learn to stop trying to trade an “accuracy” model and you become comfortable with a model of “expected values.”
There is nothing better to answer the question “Is this the right place to get long?” than the price itself.
Click here to get your free copy of The Inner Voice of Trading audiobook.