How to become much more intelligent and lose fear in trading

[tar]

Granted the quickest I've observed is eight months, after which the guy retired. But then he did it on his own (which may be the reason why he was able to grasp the basics so quickly). Children can do it much faster, but then their egos aren't invested in the process. Ego appears to be the chief hurdle, though ignorance is a close second. But then there's really no excuse for either, particularly ignorance, given the good templates for developing a trading plan -- a thoroughly-tested and consistently-profitable trading plan -- that are available, here and elsewhere.

In the meantime, beginners will devote themselves to candlestick patterns and indicator settings and Forex 'R Us (lunch included). Year after year after year.

Db

Based on your reasoning and hence the quickest was 8 months - but then retired - , then choosing an arbitrary deadline of 6 months doesn't make sense , you should have chosen the average time that takes a beginner to become a good trader which is according to your findings is higher than 8 months .

 

[timsk]

Where i said that ?

Where you said what ?

 

[dbphoenix]

Based on your reasoning and hence the quickest was 8 months - but then retired - , then choosing an arbitrary deadline of 6 months doesn't make sense , you should have chosen the average time that takes a beginner to become a good trader which is according to your findings is higher than 8 months .

What I said was that "if one can't figure out what makes price go up and down in six months he likely never will", which is generally the case. In any event, 8 months beats 9 years.

Db

Originally Posted by DbPhoenix:

Whether *** can accomplish his objective or not isn't particularly important. What is more important is that he's set a time limit for himself, which beats those who are at this for 3 or 5 or 10 years and still can't do better than breakeven. After six months, Doc will know whether he has the necessary discipline or not.

Exactly ... if I can't make a go at it in six months, why would I think things would be any different in six years?

Given the responses here, I have to wonder how many traders posting to trading forums really trade for a living. I would have thought that the response from a forum of profitable market operators would be more positive and less skeptical.

Consider the difference here compared to the the tone of Wyckoff's Studies in Tape Reading. While Wyckoff obviously knew that most members of the public who speculate do so poorly, he also makes it clear that if someone were to take the time to understand the how and why of price movement, and then to speculate according to the way the market in fact works, that it should neither be difficult nor take an interminably long time to achieve profitability.*

Going to the first pages of Studies in Tape Reading, Wyckoff mentions a friend of his who had started trading over the same ticker with a trader named Joe Manning. In the beginning, they were both trading in 10 share lots. Years later, Joe Manning was trading hundreds of thousands of dollars, while Wyckoff's friend was still trading in 10 share lots.

In six months, I'll either be on my way to being a Joe Manning, or I'll be like Wyckoff's unnamed friend. If the former, then full steam ahead; and if the latter, I'll move on to something else.

 

[mpups]

Whether you should give up after X amount of time if you haven't figured out "what makes price go up and down" is an interesting question and could be a whole new thread

 

[Fugazsy]

Two good reads:

The Power of Now

Zen in the Markets

Edward Toppel, author of the latter, and an on and off floor trader for ages, has since died.

RIP.

You would like this:

http://www.amazon.com/Wherever-You-Go-There-Are/dp/1401307787

 

[counter_violent]

BSD

Unfortunately Counter Violent is WRONG

You need to understand something....CV is never wrong

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In Fact totally incorrect statement - a bit like the press just printing rubbish about somebody

So far there has been over 60 + - yes 60 statements / accounts shown off various broker sites - some demo of students - some other real live accounts of 2 other students in this last year.

I will do copies if you cannot find them - and the thing is - they are all untouched - ie not paint shopped like so many others have used


More misdirection......

nobody, myself included, is interested in any of these statements from "your students" , we are only interested in your statements to back up your supposed "live calls" and to date there has been zilch, nada, zip !

With regards to LIve calls in advance - well love to hear you and C_V's definitions again - and then I will just show you a few

I have ignored his comment and will ignore any more


No, you haven't ignored it, which is the reason you responded here.

Its as NVP as already mentioned - this is "F baiting" - its so obvious to all members that you are trying to get me banned again - so thetefore i will stay on my own journal and comment there


More misdirection......

It is not F baiting.....statement will suffice that backs up your pip claims on the thread.......it's quite simple to do, I've posted lots of statements over the years.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Also please will you apologise to the OP of the thread for taking it totally of topic with your blatant lies and misleading comments about myself and other members who follow my method

No more engaging from me

Have a great day - and say what you want here

Regards

F

 

[NVP]

continues to be a great lutz thread and the handbags are really out now ......superb example,to our newbies of the old folks at trade2win having nothing better to do with our lives ....

Have good weekends guys .....

 

[BSD]

You would like this:

http://www.amazon.com/Wherever-You-Go-There-Are/dp/1401307787

Thanks, will have a look.

 

[BSD]

Yup.

And oh yeah, don't forget, he is the guy who has got it cracked to trade off of time based tick charts !!!



Hey.

I offered to fly over and stay at a hotel and watch him trade live for one week.

Of course I never got an answer, simply because there would have been nothing to see.

 

[Splitlink]

Yup.

And oh yeah, don't forget, he is the guy who has got it cracked to trade off of time based tick charts !!!



Hey.

I offered to fly over and stay at a hotel and watch him trade live for one week.

Of course I never got an answer, simply because there would have been nothing to see.

Get bigger underpants, mate, your BSD is almost showing.

 

[BSD]

Haha

 

[BSD]

"Why Success Always Starts With Failure

SPOT A FAILURE, AND FIX IT, EARLY

“Few of our own failures are fatal,” economist and Financial Times columnist Tim Harford writes in his new book, Adapt: Why Success Always Starts With Failure. This may be true, but we certainly don’t act like it. When our mistakes stare us in the face, we often find it so upsetting that we miss out on the primary benefit of failing (yes, benefit): the chance to get over our egos and come back with a stronger, smarter approach.

According to Adapt, “success comes through rapidly fixing our mistakes rather than getting things right first time.” To prove his point, Harford cites compelling examples innovation by trial-and-error from visionaries as varied as choreographer Twyla Tharp and US Forces Commander David Petraeus.

I interviewed Harford over email to dig deeper into the counter-intuitive lessons of Adapt. What follows is a series of key takeaways on the psychology of failure and adaptation, combining insights from our conversation and the book itself.

The Wrong Way To React To Failure
When it comes to failing, our egos are our own worst enemies. As soon as things start going wrong, our defense mechanisms kick in, tempting us to do what we can to save face. Yet, these very normal reactions — denial, chasing your losses, and hedonic editing — wreak havoc on our ability to adapt.

Denial.
“It seems to be the hardest thing in the world to admit we’ve made a mistake and try to put it right. It requires you to challenge a status quo of your own making.”

Chasing your losses.
We’re so anxious not to “draw a line under a decision we regret” that we end up causing still more damage while trying to erase it. For example, poker players who’ve just lost some money are primed to make riskier bets than they’d normally take, in a hasty attempt to win the lost money back and “erase” the mistake.

Hedonic editing.
When we engage in “hedonic editing,” we try to convince ourselves that the mistake doesn’t matter, bundling our losses with our gains or finding some way to reinterpret our failures as successes.

We’re so anxious not to “draw a line under a decision we regret” that we end up causing still more damage while trying to erase it.
The Recipe for Successful Adaptation
At the crux of Adapt lies this conviction: In a complex world, we must use an adaptive, experimental approach to succeed. Harford argues, “the more complex and elusive our problems are, the more effective trial and error becomes.” We can’t begin to predict whether our “great idea” will actually sink or swim once it’s out there.Harford outlines three principles for failing productively: You have to cast a wide net, “practice failing” in a safe space, and be primed to let go of your idea if you’ve missed the mark.

Try new things.
“Expose yourself to lots of different ideas and try lots of different approaches, on the grounds that failure is common.”

Experiment where failure is survivable.
“Look for experimental approaches where there’s lots to learn – projects with small downsides but bigger upsides. Too often we take on projects where the cost of failure is prohibitive, and just hope for the best.”

Recognize when you haven’t succeeded.
“The third principle is the easiest to state and the hardest to stick to: know when you’ve failed.”

The more complex and elusive our problems are, the more effective trial and error becomes.
How To Recognize Failure
This is the hard part. We’ve been trained that “persistence pays off,” so it feels wrong to cut our losses and label an idea a failure. But if you’re truly self-aware and listening closely after a “release” of your idea, you can’t go wrong. Being able to recognize a failure just means that you’ll be able to re-cast it into something more likely to succeed.

Gather feedback.
“Above all, feedback is essential for determining which experiments have succeeded and which have failed. Get advice, not just from one person, but from several.” Some professions have build-in feedback: reviews if you’re in the arts, sales and analytics if you release a web product, comments if you’re a blogger. If the feedback is harsh, be objective, “take the venom out,” and dig out the real advice.

Remove emotions from the equation.
“It’s important to be dispassionate: forget whether you’re ahead or behind, and try to look at the likely costs and benefits of continuing from when you are.”

Don’t get too attached to your plan.
“There’s nothing wrong with a plan, but remember Von Moltke’s famous dictum that no plan survives first contact with the enemy. The danger is a plan that seduces us into thinking failure is impossible and adaptation is unnecessary – a kind of ‘Titanic’ plan, unsinkable (until it hits the iceberg).”

Being able to recognize a failure just means that you’ll be able to re-cast it into something more likely to succeed.

Creating Safe Spaces to Fail
Twyla Tharp says, “The best failures are the private ones you commit in the confines of your own room, with no strangers watching.” She rises as 5:30 AM and videotapes herself freestyling for 3 hours each morning, happy if she extracts just 30 seconds of usable material from the whole tape. This is a great example of a “safe space to fail.” But many of us don’t have this luxury of time or freedom. So how do we create this space?

Practice disciplined pluralism.
Markets work by this process, encouraging the exploration of many new ideas as well as the ruthless weeding out of the ones that fall short. “Pluralism works because life is not worth living without new experiences.” Try a lot of things, and commit only to what’s working.

Finding “a safe space to fail is a state of mind.”
Assuming that you don’t operate a nuclear power plant for a living, you can probably infuse a bit more freedom and flexibility into your workday. Give yourself permission to test out a few off-the-wall ideas mixed in with the by-the-book ideas.

Imitate the college experience.
“College is an amazing safe space to fail. We are experimenting with new friends, a new city, new hobbies and new ideas – and we’ll often mess up academically and socially as a result. But we know that as long as we don’t screw up too dramatically, we’ll finish college, graduate, and move on – that mix of risk and safety is intoxicating. Yet somehow as we grow older we lose it.”"

—

http://99u.com/articles/7072/why-success-always-starts-with-failure

 

[Charlton]

Failure and success are opposite facets of a coin - heads and tails - but of the same coin that is life.

One cannot exist without the other. They are inextricably linked.

To live is to experience both success and failure.

To learn requires experience of both success and failure.

The evolutionary process is a process of successful and failed outcome.

So we have nothing to fear from failure. We only cease to fail in this life when we die.

What we can control is our reaction to failure, our mindset to failure and how we can absorb failure into our learning process to increase the chance of success.

On a practical front we need to create structure - structure which leads to effective and objective analysis of the market, structure which leads to effective and logical action based upon that analysis, structure which takes full account of risk and its reduction to protect our capital and finally evolutionary structure which enables us to remain adaptive and reactive.

The realisation of the structure in physical form Is the trading plan.

It is proof of our ability to , as the OP puts it, to become more intelligent and lose fear in trading.

 

[Fugazsy]

New Yorker cartoon: Two Zen monks in robes and shaved heads, one young, one old, sitting side by side crossed-legged on the floor. The younger one is looking somewhat quizzically at the older one, who is turned toward him and saying: "Nothing happens next. This is it."