The Bucking Bronco

Good Morning.

I guess I'll always be a soldier of fortune. "But I feel I'm growing older..."

Splendid cover! Awesome version. Great guitars and David is always a great singer.

Another nice cover of a Deep Purple classic.
Another message about Trading, of course.
One that fti uses very often in his thread...

Come on... are you in? Charts? Comments? Anyone?

If you know what's going on... you control your tactics!
Analyse the terrain and act.

460... The bulls reaction at this level will be fundamental. Now will see.

Fight the Force? Search the top? Not so easy... I told that. Bulls target is clear!

Scaling out my long. Trailing my stop.

Not always to ride a Trend is simple and smooth. In the last part is pure hell.
I prefer to square here.
492
I did my best.

''The truth knocks on the door and you say, 'Go away. I'm looking for the truth.' And so it goes away."
Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

For those who have learned to recognize the sight, sound, and feel of its knock,
trading becomes a game (Jesse Livermore used this term),
a journey,
a dance ,
and an astonishing personal odyssey of self-realization.

For those others who haven't,
trading becomes a menace,
a frustration, a painful activity of repeated negative associations and fear-driven experiences.

Missed the right entry and lost 8 points, chasing.

I am always thinking about my trading.
Sometimes I realize that I was arrogant and opinioneted and patronizing... in the way I was thinking at things.
It's interesting to understand that trading teaches us something about ourselves that we don't necessarily want to know. ROFL
Not to mention what we can explore about our personal fears and nightmares.
As a form of deep psychoanalysis - facing our inner self - trading could be constructive or really destructive.

But, at the end of the day, the information is always very instructive.

OK... 475-480 next strategic level. Enjoy your trading,

m1... first attempt to North +20

m1... Second attempt... stopped out +2

End of the day for me... time to go. CU

I have often used quotes, anecdotes, and analogies to put certain points of my reasoning in focus.
There is one quote I have found myself using very often with people,
when I am talking about this experience of study, education and formation to try to become a trader.
That quote is: “The journey is the reward.”

There are at least 3 reasons that justify this image.

- This journey is unexpected.
While you may think the destination is the prize, the reward is also in how you got there.
Discoveries of different genres and value and nature, good readings, encounters, all kind of emotions...

- This journey is memorable.
This journey provides you with precious moments that will endure and stand the test of time.
One will for sure remember this experience.

- If you think about it... This journey is the only thing guaranteed.
No matter how well you plan and execute, nothing is guaranteed. Success you working towards may never happen.
But the journey itself -and what you will get out of- it IS guaranteed.
Everyday you have a chance to get better.
To learn something new, to meet new people, to solve problems in different ways.
To experience yourself, your forces and ability.
As in the real trading on the battlefield, living in and appreciating the present can sometimes be the greatest reward of all.

Robert Koppell is the author of “The Tao of Trading”.

I disagree with what he wrote in that book
on the base of my personal experiences on the battlefield and my perception of Market reality.
He is famous. And I am Mr No One. So use your discretion.

He sustains that the fundament of successful trading is in “intuition”,
and I profoundly disagree with him.
To say the truth, I think that this statement is absolutely the most dangerous to be expressed in front of a crowd of beginners.

He couples intuition with simplicity in something that we could call “spontaneity”,
simplifying the reading of Tao Te Ching and, to me, using it for justifying his personal beliefs.

I had a mythical crash on TAF with one wannabe there, on this point alone. And it was a real nuclear war (with some witnesses).

The base, the fundament of successful trading is Knowledge.
Knowledge through the proper and correct Education. FULL STOP.
Who goes around talking of spontaneity and intuition in front an unprepared audience is just a criminal.

To play in the Zone (extraordinary concept of fusion of the subject with the action) comes from preparation at the TOP.
The personal realization in the fusion in/with the Tao is the apex of a deep formation and transformation of self.
There is nothing of spontaneous in them.
There is always a question of journey, technique and study... even in Van Gogh, as the letters to his brother testifies.

Maybe, but I say maybe... you could find some sort of spontaneity in Naive Painters and for sure in children! LOL
My sophisticated way of insulting.

One example.
Koppel quotes Charlie Parker.
"Music is your own experience, your thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn."
Wonderful.

My objection.
What the heck are you talking about?
You can't do it without knowing how to play that instrument.
And at the top, to be precise and honest.
You must learn to play it and then, only then you could be able to express yourself in music. Maybe! FULL STOP.
To learn to play the instrument at that level you need 10/12 years. SECOND FULL STOP.

Am I wrong?

I already posted this video.
This is John Petrucci improvising on a famous song.
He is "expressing himself" with spontaneity.

My foot. Hey! You spontaneous! Yes... You! I'm talking to you...
Pick up a guitar and do it!
Yes come on... let me hear with your damned simplicity.

Do you have an idea of what this man had to do to be there? No? Study. Try to understand.