A little bit about me - I went from my full-time, super secure corporate job to part-time work about four months ago in order to pursue my trading career. I have been trading for a little over four years and truly thought I was ready to make it happen. I had the plan that I would trade the one-minute chart from 8-12 EST and basically become a millionaire in about a year or two. I know that some people will read this and say 'well you should have been more prepared before you quit your full-time job' or 'I would never have done that' and I'm ready for those responses. You can have you opinion but I feel great about my decision and basically won't quit until I have 'figured this out.'
After being sorely disappointed during the last four months, I have learned a couple of things:
(1) I can pound out 30% returns in a week on a demo account (using proper money management), but once I go 'live' I seem to forget my trading. I know, I know, it's demo so who cares. The thing that hit me is that since I can take almost any realistic system and get killer returns, the problem is me and not my system (maybe this is a trading psychology thread...)
(2) I am a habitual 'system jumper.' For some reason, even if I get great returns on a demo account, I switch systems in an attempt to get even better returns. In reality, what happens is that I go system to system to the point where I don't actually have a 'go-to' system on a daily basis. It feels like it changes every week (because it does...)
(3) I can't control the market. I've almost come to the conclusion that money management is more important that the actual system. I can control my MM, but I can't control the market. I've played around with all sorts of MM techniques. From the simple 2% method to actually having no stop loss (which I actually had pretty decent results, but once you get on the wrong side of a trend...yikes).
After reaching the point of exhaustion trying to make forex work, I have decided to start a trading journal to (a) record every single trade I take (b) get the input of others and (c) give a history of what I was thinking at certain times. I hope that in a couple of years I look back on this post and realize how far I've come as I'm spending 5 minutes a day trading with great results.
The 'current' way that I trade has two parts to it: (1) I trade off pivot points on the one minute chart and (2) basic price action/touch trades on the four hour chart. I'll detail more in my posts as we go along.
I will be as transparent as I can in this thread so we can all grow as traders. I will post every single trade I take and will also post the returns (after that fact - but I have no problem showing my loses). Every single trade I post will be on a live account - I'm done with demo. After all that has been said so far, there's only one more thing to say:
It's Go Time
After being sorely disappointed during the last four months, I have learned a couple of things:
(1) I can pound out 30% returns in a week on a demo account (using proper money management), but once I go 'live' I seem to forget my trading. I know, I know, it's demo so who cares. The thing that hit me is that since I can take almost any realistic system and get killer returns, the problem is me and not my system (maybe this is a trading psychology thread...)
(2) I am a habitual 'system jumper.' For some reason, even if I get great returns on a demo account, I switch systems in an attempt to get even better returns. In reality, what happens is that I go system to system to the point where I don't actually have a 'go-to' system on a daily basis. It feels like it changes every week (because it does...)
(3) I can't control the market. I've almost come to the conclusion that money management is more important that the actual system. I can control my MM, but I can't control the market. I've played around with all sorts of MM techniques. From the simple 2% method to actually having no stop loss (which I actually had pretty decent results, but once you get on the wrong side of a trend...yikes).
After reaching the point of exhaustion trying to make forex work, I have decided to start a trading journal to (a) record every single trade I take (b) get the input of others and (c) give a history of what I was thinking at certain times. I hope that in a couple of years I look back on this post and realize how far I've come as I'm spending 5 minutes a day trading with great results.
The 'current' way that I trade has two parts to it: (1) I trade off pivot points on the one minute chart and (2) basic price action/touch trades on the four hour chart. I'll detail more in my posts as we go along.
I will be as transparent as I can in this thread so we can all grow as traders. I will post every single trade I take and will also post the returns (after that fact - but I have no problem showing my loses). Every single trade I post will be on a live account - I'm done with demo. After all that has been said so far, there's only one more thing to say:
It's Go Time
