Eaglets Flight Training School

GBPUSD TS hit +83 pips
GBPJPY TS hit +161 pips

Found this useful site where I have copy/pasted from:

What is a Trading Plan?
Unfortunately for a lot of people who start trading, many will find success difficult to achieve. One wonders what the minority are doing right that give them the advantage over the vast majority who leave the market with less money than what they had when they started trading. Sadly, a lot of those who fail walk away with very little of what they had originally.
So what is it that separates the successful from those who fail? If you ask anybody who has studied trading for any period of time, they will answer ‘psychology’. They will add that ‘your psychology’ is what will make or break you as a trader. Essentially, your mental ability to manage losses and profits, the good times and the bad, your capacity for risk management, and the self-discipline necessary to avoid becoming too greedy are all subsumed beneath the heading of ‘trading psychology’, along with many other similar skills and abilities. If we are naturally inclined to break all of the time-tested trading rules, how can we overcome those natural tendencies and therefore control our mindset?

One of the biggest reasons that our mindset is such a determinant of our trading success is that our emotions influence our actions. Irrational emotions have little place in our trading; however, removing our emotions from our decision making is easier said than done. It is our emotions that cause us to break the trading rules that have been proven to work over hundreds of years.

Must Suit You
First and foremost for a good trading plan is having a plan that perfectly suits you and is right for you. The best traders have discovered an approach that they are very comfortable with and confident in … however most importantly it suited them. None of them have found any magical solution nor have they found that perfect trading approach that gets it right every time.

Then of course, how can you possibly develop an approach that is right for you if you really don’t know yourself? I believe that the first part of assembling your trading plan should be to conduct a self-assessment.

A good trading plan suits who you are, and many other factors including even the seemingly unimportant things like how much time you have to commit to your trading, your level of computer proficiency, your environment and your tolerance to risk. The last one is important.

Most people have a different tolerance to risk and managing risk is a vital part of trading well consistently. So if we all have a different tolerance to risk, clearly we won’t all have the same level of comfort and confidence in the same trading plan. Therefore, we all have to discover that approach that suits us as an individual person.

Important Factors
Some of the more important factors include your personality traits like patience, confidence, decisiveness, emotional stability, mental agility, and probably most importantly, your attitude.

Another key ingredient to the trading plan is the ease in which you can execute it … over the years, I have had the pleasure of speaking to thousands of traders from many countries and during this time, I have learnt many things. Based on these conversations and my own observations, I am convinced that generally people fail at trading for two main reasons.

First, the majority of actions required for success are counter intuitive and if people are not aware of this, they often consistently make poor trading decisions. Second, and backing up my point here about ease of execution, when people realise that trading is not as easy as they thought it would be, they tend to overcomplicate their trading plans which often causes further problems. Software now available with a myriad of technical indicators probably doesn’t help this situation.

Keep It Simple
Whenever I speak to people, I mention that a trading plan needs to be simple as it makes it easier for us to follow it. Furthermore, simple approaches have proven over time to work.
When you think about it, the time tested trading rules like cutting your losses, letting your profits run, follow the trend and keep trade sizes small (just to name a few) are based on very simple concepts.

For example, after you enter a trade, if the price moves down to your pre-defined initial stop loss point, then close the trade and cut the loss. It sounds simple because it is. The others are just as simple. Don’t overcomplicate your trading plan – it doesn’t need to be.



Finally, some advice for putting one together … obviously having a trading plan facilitates your decision making by helping reduce the influence of your emotions from the equation and, therefore, will hopefully make you trade more efficiently. The best way to ensure you get the most from your trading plan is to write everything down. I believe your trading plan should take into account three broad areas (nothing new here), as follows:

1. your trading mindset (or psychology)
2. your money management (position size, pyramid strategies, and so on)
3. your trading method (requirements for trade initiation, filtering processes, daily routine, and so on)

http://www.trading-plan.com/images/pie_chart.gif
One thing I have experienced over the years is many people who accept that a trading plan is an essential requirement to trading well, yet they don’t know where to start to put one together. I accept that it can be overwhelming at first to tackle this issue.

3 Key Decisions
So let me simplify this for you. There are three key decisions you need to make when trading and if we think in these terms and your trading plan answers each question, then you may have the makings of a simple yet robust trading plan. Despite what I listed previously as the three broad areas in your plan, your trading boils down to the following:

1. Under what circumstances will you enter a trade?
2. How much money will you commit to the trade?
3. Under what circumstances will you close the trade?

Never picture your trading plan as a detailed document containing pages and pages of information because then it will overwhelm you and may deter you from compiling one in the first place. Think in the simple terms above and once you have answered the above questions, then you can add some detail to it as time goes by.

A trading plan is simple, easy to execute, and most importantly suits you and your personality.

Free trading plan template>>>>Link coming soon.

EDIT: Not sure whether I can post the direct link of this site. While the Trading plan template is free, it is a commercial site.
PLEASE Google "TRADING PLANS" . It is the first one which comes up.
Great information and trading videos on a large number of trading topics. Very good education !

Your requirements are all on the first page of this thread. The elusive EA is non-existent so I am unable to provide the parameters you require. In this thread we operate through manual labour. Do not let the absence of a robot dishearten you as you will soon find that it is all for the better. It is very easy actually once you have found the tools. Happy trading.

N.B. We only have an EA for Update Stops. Is that what you are referring to? My Take Profit steps keep changing every few days depending on what I feel is possible to get depending on the immediate past price behaviour. You can see the steps from my results figures.

Sounds far too complicated

... but if you do a PF, I'm in (please)

Hi Glen, great post as usual. Without doubt I'm in the 90%...always swapping systems, trying new indys etc.

If I only do one worthwhile thing from now on, it will be to stick to this system...and really give it a go, to see if I can master it. I take great heart from Trader 7, who seems to have mastered it in a fairly short timescale. It would really be pointless of me to do anything else.

Your new charts look good..I'm only guessing but I wouldn't be surprised if you are ''only'' using the basic info, but presenting it in a different fashion, maybe with a twist or two. You are also right that someone like me that flits about, would still have trouble using it.

Good luck with your private site.......I'm not giving up the possibility of getting an invitation sometime in the future, after I've applied myself to this system..so don't forget to look in from time to time to check up on how we are doing!

Cheers

Freddi

Psychology is kind of my 'bag of rocks', given that I have worked in the counselling field for many years, and am now formalising my quals as a professional. Yep. Its what has kept me away from the market for the past couple of months (and why I have not been posting any trades), but, its been worth it, because I have been aceing my courses. (I never thought of myself as all that academically minded, but things have gone really well so far!) Now I have a couple of week's break before my summer courses start. Thankfully, they wont be a full workload.

Why tell you this? Because I too am a new trader (2.5 years). I have had the 'mind of a moth' when it comes to indis and setups and such - always chasing the next brightest flame...

After quite a few years in the workforce, I have returned to formal study, and the only reason I have been able to do so well has been the fact that I have been able to impliment 'The Trader's Mindset' that Glen, lrathi and others speak of.

Consciousness is a powerful beast. When we choose to focus that power, like a laser beam, on a single topic, we get far more done than if we cast our view out wide. For me, that has meant that I have had to put a hold on trading, and to focus as fully as I can on study. But I know that the trades will still be there for when I am able to sit in 'the pit' (my trading room) again, and focus my attention fully there. I sort of only get one crack at Uni though...

'The Trader's Mindset', I have discovered, has nothing to do with trading at all. Its about focus. Its all about taking a powerful concept like consciousness and focusing it down to a single point...

There is an old story about a young novice who comes to learn singlemindedness from a Shaolin Monk. The master greets the youngster, and his first task is to carry a cup of water, filled to the brim, around the grounds without spilling a drop. The novice fails, time and time again, and continually returns to the master with less in his cup than he set out with. The old man had had enough, and in a menacing tone, he told the boy to fill the cup up one more time. Then, he instructed two of the guards to draw thier swords and follow the young boy around. He said, "This time, if you spill one drop, they will kill you!" He didn't spill a drop on that final time around!

Singlemindedness also brings balance. I know when I put a good solid block of time into an assignment or general study, at the end of it, I 'turn off'. There is seperation between 'this task' and 'that task'. I expect that seasoned trader's like Glen get 'bored' with trading simple setups, day in day out, because it has become so automatic. I also expect that when he is lounging around the pool (if he has one) or chatting with his friends/kids/grandkids/whatever, he is not obsessed with his trading. But when he is in 'his pit', he is all there. 100 percent.

I am reminded of the Minister who, when writing his sermon, was thinking about making love to his wife, and when making love to his wife, he was thinking about writing his sermon...

I am not posting this stuff because I am a seasoned trader and I speak from years of experience. Just the other day (in the thick of exams and assignments due) I wrote to lrathi in despiration, saying that the charts just didn't make sense to me any more. I realise now (now that this block of study is over) that I was simply overwhelming myself. Scattered consciousness. I am posting this because I am at the beginning of singlemindedness. Keeping Glen's post in mind is like having those two guards follow you around...

Glen's post brings home to me a truth that I have been able to bring to bear in my 'other than trading life'. A truth that has been fruitful. I know I am preaching to the chior here, but I am beginning to see the truth of that much bandied around concept of 'Trader Psychology'. Its heartening to read a post like Glen's and to realise that all that separates virtually anyone from being in the 90% or the 10% is the trader themselves...

I read a tagline from someone in another thread that said something like "If you always go long, you won't be wrong all of the time". Regardless of profitability, its true.

This thread came about due to a desire for its participants to have an open forum about Glen's trading ideas. Private thread or not, that remains true. It will remain a place where discussion is welcome as well as successful and non successful trades can be posted. I can see Glen's point though... we have walked around and around the grounds, spilling our cups of water over and over again, and this and Indrek's thread have both been about giving us the space and time to chuck this indi in or that filter... All the while, Glen shakes his head because to him it IS simple. It IS automatic. He has traded it so long, it is no longer an idea needed to be tested or refined, but rather a very simple set of rules with a high probability of success.

He realizes that the process of gathering of a sense of certainty around a trading plan lies within the individual, not within the trading plan.

I believe that the most sublime and helpful thing that Glen has contributed to the forum has NOT been his trading ideas. Most of us have a reasonable level of intelligence... we could all come up with setups if we tried. The most important thing he has written is in his last post. Its the one thing that if assimilated, would take any trade setup and make it profitable.

I have gone on long enough.

In closing, if you can develop, or even just catch a glimpse of 'The Trader's Mindset', it will pay its smallest dividend in terms of money in the bank. It's real benefit is in other areas of our lives. Being fully present as our children grow up. Looking deeply into our partner's eyes and knowing that we are there, with them, 100%. And, when life takes that final breath from our lungs, and we release our hold on family, friends, trading terminals and livelong lovers, we can smile, knowing that we were THERE for it all. In that present moment.

And that, my friends, is worth more than all the pips and pairs in the world...

PPP.

Thanks PPP..far more eloquently put than my meagre efforts.

Funny thing is that all through my life I've had an amazing ability to focus on the task (or sometimes tasks) in hand, and could and did coach/mentor others to do likewise. Mostly with good results.

I was lucky enough to be able to take early retirement in my mid 50's some 6 years ago (believe me guys IT IS THE BEST!)..now doing many of the things that we all want to be able to do, when we have more time for ourselves...and some new things that I had not even thought of!! I suppose that if I'm looking for an excuse for not focussing like a laser, its because I have spent so many years doing so, and in some ways it is a relief not to have to!!

But Glen (and you, Lrathi and a few others) have made me realise that I have needed to make my mind up whether I'm going to carry on faffing about for the hell of it or to treat trading seriously. I've chosen the latter.

So starting tomorrow I'll give it a go...not forgetting that its NFP day!

Cheers,

Freddi

PS Good luck with your studies and exams!

Great story.....as I read it, I thought to myself....he should have drank the cup of water, then he would have been able to carry it around and not spill any......a simple solution.

Maybe trading is that simple.
Learn the system. Trade the system. Otherwise Glen will send a few Shoelin monks to our place to knock us on the head.

Good trading to all.

PGPB (Shoelin monk in trading/training)

Thank you Glen,

It looks as if it is just a matter of waiting for the three colored indicators to align themselves in the correct order, above or below the solid line.

Looks simple enough.

The main problem I find is the reason people do not stick to a system. It is that they have not backtested it to convice themselves that it is profitable if they stick with it. They just figure they will win some and lose some and "hope" they win more than they lose. Hope will not be necessary if you "Prove" to yourself that the system is profitable. Test it, Test it, Test it!!!.

Wow! A person so young! you share wisdom at a higher level.

Your post on mindset,singlemindedness,focus .....

TRADING is a personal journey in many ways!

This experience in your personal life......

When we can use this in trading and all aspects in our life..... this is a great secret well known for centuries..... the PRACTISE of living in the "NOW" is the real challenge.

For those who know and for those you do not know......

For those that have heard of/not heard of ......THE POWER OF NOW and THE NEW EARTH has once again taken the world by storm. ECKHART TOLLE has brought these concepts ALIVE this century!

OPHRAH a few years ago had brought ECKHART TOLLE to her studio and linked millions of people in a WORLD EVENT through skype and the internet LIVE! (ARCHIEVED on her website) to these very powerful concepts for the advancement of humanity.

This is a trading thread.... but without mindset and living in the NOW...

This link is appropriate to trading and much ,much more.....


#

I was not going to post any more statements....


It was a good trading day for this strategy...makets were trending.....

I was focused on trading.....

PROFIT 20.5%

Same account post#84....

Doubled ++ in about 2 weeks (9 actual days of trading)

[quote=freddi;3209472]T

Funny thing is that all through my life I've had an amazing ability to focus on the task (or sometimes tasks) in hand, and could and did coach/mentor others to do likewise. Mostly with good results.

I was lucky enough to be able to take early retirement in my mid 50's some 6 years ago (believe me guys IT IS THE BEST!)..now doing many of the things that we all want to be able to do, when we have more time for ourselves...and some new things that I had not even thought of!! I suppose that if I'm looking for an excuse for not focussing like a laser, its because I have spent so many years doing so, and in some ways it is a relief not to have to!!

But Glen (and you, Lrathi and a few others) have made me realise that I have needed to make my mind up whether I'm going to carry on faffing about for the hell of it or to treat trading seriously. I've chosen the latter.
quote]

Freddi,

Thanks for sharing a bit about yourself and your trading journey.

We are the same age group, retired early for different reasons, cannot say i can sit back and enjoy my early retirement like yourself.....

I still consider myself blessed and grateful for the many blessings I receive daily.

This system is great,profitable..... etc.

The challenge is yourself (Like it was for myself too!)

Hi lrathi. Congratulations. At this rate the sky is the limit.

Irathi,

Great to see these results. It really shows that you stay focused.
Success to you.

Bruce

The penny has finally dropped!

If you can jump this hurdle, believe me, you already have an edge compared to the 90% that will be doomed to a frustrating life of wandering around forums and threads looking for the next " flavor-of-the day/month ".

You will NOT find the answer you are looking for because you are looking in the wrong place!

The majority of traders trade to avoid losses and don`t trade to win. This becomes a mindset as well as their trading strategy( if you can call it that)
At the end of the trade they are happy that they did not lose rather then be satisfied that they executed the trade according to their trading plan/strategy, regardless of the outcome. If they lose, the next step is to spend the next 2 days on an autopsy and often shop around for another system because the previous one clearly did not work.

If you own a coffee shop and you sold 20 doughnuts yesterday,today only 3 because it rained and everybody stayed indoors, do you sell the business??
I don`t think so, you do your income statement at month end and figure whether you have a profitable business??

When it comes to trading, every trade becomes a matter of life and death. The result or outcome of the trade is the next major life shaping event

It makes no difference if the expectancy is a win ratio of 80% , the results are not viewed as 16 wins out of 20 trades but if the trade is a loser the perception is that it is 100% losing strategy because 1 trade 1 loss equals 100% failure rate.

To get a proper perspective on trading and the outcome of your trading efforts requires a specific mindset. You can learn this or " cultivate " this mindset. It starts with proper planning, discipline and most important the desire to make it work or to give it your best shot.

Looking at the results of another trader and copying trades or a trading system will NOT turn you into a successful trader!

How many of you have a trading plan or use the simple checklist posted in the manual?
Do you take a screenshot of every trade and compare it to your trading plan or checklist to make sure you trade with an edge?
How many trades did you make on the spur of the moment because PA started to move?
Can you show 20 trades that you executed trading this system or any system for that matter?
If you traded GBPUSD during October according to the simple rules and checklist, how many pips were possible?

Trading is personal journey, the final destination is not always clear but if I have a choice, I would opt for the highway and not a 4 X 4 route.

That CLANG! CLANG! sound you hear is the PENNY DROPPING (I need more than 1 penny to drop!)

Thanks Glen.

Freddi

Hi mary4x,

I was not successful with a PM reply to you. Could you look into that and let me know when the problem is rectified? Have a nice day.

[mary4x has chosen not to receive private messages or may not be allowed to receive private messages. Therefore you may not send your message to him/her.]

Freddi,

It certainly sounds a lot better to me than $$$ being flushed down the loo

True!

Market has to be right +mindset. This happens often but not everyday.

I need to demo more to make it a habit. Shows it is possible for 5% of traders.

It does feel good.

Thanks BRuce!

How is your trading journey?

Using MTF TRIX?

Regards