Losing the will to live with this!

[glen10]

deggsy, i have only been full time at this for four months and i hear where your coming from. i played around with trading 18 months off and on before going full time and had the same issues, here is what i found worked for me.
1. start with small stakes and a bank that you can afford to lose and not get stressed out about if you do lose it. i know you dont like that idea but it was the only way for me.
2. i had to put myself in a position where i dont have to make money trading to pay my bills and living expenses. i dont know your circumstances but have money put by to pay all these things if going full time. i found not being in a rush to make money a major game changer for me, less stress.
3. i started with football trading at the weekends when i had a full time job, just making £50-£80 or so to cover my beer tokens! perhaps follow blueskys suggestion on that, you can be in and out of some football trades in minutes and is def less stressful than horses, also no need for software, can trade on the move with ipad or phone.
4. accept losses, i treat losses like a business expense, i.e keep the expenses as low as poss but they will always be there however good you are. control the losses and the wins take care of themselves, thats what i find any way, other more experienced on here may disagree!
5. self discipline is a must. this includes what everyone on here says, dont go in-play, never, never! (unless you intended to from the outset) you might get a win and think thats easy but trust me you will lose your money quicker than a blind man playing darts!

the list could prob go on and these are just things that worked for me, im way too inexperienced to tell you what to do but if there is one thing i can tell you its this, read and listen to the experienced people on here, they have earnt there stripes and this forum has been a big help to me, like me , you dont have to post much, read all the posts and absorb and learn all you can.
anyway, good luck with what ever you decide and relax!!!

[iambic_pentameter]

Deggsy

As always, some good advice in the forum.

It's a tough game to be involved in and made 100 times tougher by beating yourself up.

The fact you had 5 winning trades shows that something is going right.

In my early days, I'd notice that if I traded too much, then my performance (unsurprisingly) would go down.

A suggestion might be:

a) Identify any type of race you are strong at and focus on those - if there are only 5 a day, so be it.
b) For the other races, just watch them and talk through what is happening on the screen - don't feel you have to get involved
c) Once you have more 'mental stamina' add 1 race a day.

I'm just over a year into my journey and realistically, I know I need to go through at least another 2 market cycles before I can wear my competent badge.

I use the Headspace app for meditation and being mindful both when I'm trading and not trading has helped me a lot.

Best of luck

Iambic

[ruthlessimon]

Saw this amazing graph the other day of the progression of a trader (I'm gonna paraphrase a bit so bare with ):

That was great (although the graph shows the exponential growth beginning at the very end of year 3)
Where did you see it?

I think that was my fault drawing the axis a little bit wrong But the time aspect isn't really that important, & will vary massively from trader to trader depending on their circumstances. Some traders will quickly stop their mistakes, others might never see the mistakes etc. Some traders might never break out of the breakeven stage

[max_usted]

This is something I've seen which ties in with your bit simon...

Learning a new skill has four stages of competence:

Unconscious Incompetence – “I don’t even know what I don’t know“
Conscious Incompetence – “I know what I don’t know and I'm learning it”
Conscious Competence – “I know what to do, but it takes focus and energy“
Unconscious Competence – “I have embodied the skill and I can do it effortlessly“

For new traders, the key takeaways of the learning model are the following:

Awareness of the stage in which the trainee is it’s critical to the success of the learning process.
By example, assuming that the trainee is in Stage 3 when he is actually in Stage 2 can lead to a failure of the development plan.

Identification of the learning stages serves to better understand and address the obstacles that the novice trader encounters.

V. interesting posts Shaun/Simon. Not trying to hijack, but a quick question if I may. I started about a year ago and made a lot in my first month then lost (most of) it in the second. I've been trading with small stakes ever since (10 months now). I'm going to try larger stakes again this month.

I can make regular profits using the techniques I have (when using small stakes)... but in the last two/three months, I believe I have become able to see so much more profit/opportunity in the market (outside of my narrow orthodoxies).

However if I'm not concentrating fully, or if I'm too wet, I consistently fail to accept the risk in the trades I can see that I should be making. For instance, I had nine trades (outside of my usual techniques) lined up last night and pulled out of all of them! When I notice that the first one would have been successful, the thought of the subsequent failing is too painful, if you see what I mean.

Can you relate to this at all given your own previous experiences, and if so, (and given identifying learning stages is important), which stage do you think this is??

[ruthlessimon]

Did you find this on a financial trading web site? I saw either this or something very similar over 20 years ago on a financial trading seminar I was attending, so long ago now I can't be sure it was exactly the same graph.

Yes it was, a trader at a London prop firm, the name of the prop shop alludes me, but I thought graph & the way he explained it was genius & genuine. I spend a fair amount of my spare time delving through in interwebs, looking for bits of gold like that. I would be doing more on financials (I used to), but pre-race has kinda taken over my life!

[ShaunWhite]

This is something I've seen which ties in with your bit simon...

Learning a new skill has four stages of competence:

Unconscious Incompetence – “I don’t even know what I don’t know“
Conscious Incompetence – “I know what I don’t know and I'm learning it”
Conscious Competence – “I know what to do, but it takes focus and energy“
Unconscious Competence – “I have embodied the skill and I can do it effortlessly“

I think this was produced by an educational psychologist did you come across this when you did a teacher training course (PGCE)?

I've never done any sort of course for anything, I just did A-levels (badly), got a job and taught myself anything I've needed to know since. I think this stuff about the hierarchy of competence first came about in the 70s. I live by "I'll have a go at that, how hard can it be?"

[ruthlessimon]

V. interesting posts Shaun/Simon. Not trying to hijack, but a quick question if I may. I started about a year ago and made a lot in my first month then lost (most of) it in the second. I've been trading with small stakes ever since (10 months now). I'm going to try larger stakes again this month.

I can make regular profits using the techniques I have (when using small stakes)... but in the last two/three months, I believe I have become able to see so much more profit/opportunity in the market (outside of my narrow orthodoxies).

However if I'm not concentrating fully, or if I'm too wet, I consistently fail to accept the risk in the trades I can see that I should be making. For instance, I had nine trades (outside of my usual techniques) lined up last night and pulled out of all of them! When I notice that the first one would have been successful, the thought of the subsequent failing is too painful, if you see what I mean.

Can you relate to this at all given your own previous experiences, and if so, (and given identifying learning stages is important), which stage do you think this is??

"made a lot in my first month then lost (most of) it in the second" That in itself is a lightbulb moment. You realise you have no edge.

Straight away that takes you into stage 2 (i.e. small stakes/practise mode, aware that you know nothing, begin experimenting with ideas). Also it's important to understand 'idea creation' is very, very, very, very hard!!! I personally spend most of my day trying to come up with new ideas. Similar to talking to girls at bars. It takes a special kind of person to come back after having failure, after failure, after failure. I think this where the majority of traders give up

Also, speaking personally, when I fail to accept risk (& this applies to pulling orders) on a trade, that means I don't understand the trade concept well enough. It means I need to do a lot more work in understanding my process & edge (back into stage 2). People wrongly assume it's a psychology problem - it's an edge problem (usually). This again leads back to idea creation.

You'll know if you're in stage 4 (year 3), because you'll have moved onto a new sport!

[ruthlessimon]

To add to that, thought I'd give an example of how I go about 'idea creation' in stage 2.

The following races, I highlighted as being almost identical. Notice how my strike rate is almost 50/50, yet the pattern is 100%. Also notice the dates - clearly the pattern repeats, but we'll never know when it repeats (this is why experience & journaling is so important).

After watching each race back several times (literally took me 10hrs yesterday), I realised (lightbulb) I had a bias/preconceived notion about each of the markets which was completely wrong. But even having the lightbulb moment, I might still be wrong, & it's vital I accept that & move on. True knowledge comes from destroying 'conventional wisdom'. I go out of my way to destroy my ideas, not confirm them!

[Korattt]

Problem is Deggsy is that whenever you ask a question on here you never get a definitive answer & that you're expected to "work it out for yourself" whilst losing (like I have) whilst learning.

Some people on here will take to it like a duck to water, however people like me will try time & time & time again with some encouraging fleeting success that keeps you coming back only to get knocked down again.

What I'm trying to say is that I've tried this tried that, done a course blah blah & I'm still down around 5 figures in an effort to get anywhere near good, I do frequent the forum as I still look for clues as to how to get there, however I never hold my breath over it, fair play to those who can but I sympathise with those who can't.

[ruthlessimon]

Problem is Deggsy is that whenever you ask a question on here you never get a definitive answer & that you're expected to "work it out for yourself" whilst losing (like I have) whilst learning.

If you're lucky enough for someone to give you a pointer - that's a lovely bonus. But it must be treated as a bonus. A pointer can only be used to its full potential, if you already have strong foundations (i.e. great journal, base level of education from BA)

[Naffman]

Problem is Deggsy is that whenever you ask a question on here you never get a definitive answer & that you're expected to "work it out for yourself" whilst losing (like I have) whilst learning.

Some people on here will take to it like a duck to water, however people like me will try time & time & time again with some encouraging fleeting success that keeps you coming back only to get knocked down again.

What I'm trying to say is that I've tried this tried that, done a course blah blah & I'm still down around 5 figures in an effort to get anywhere near good, I do frequent the forum as I still look for clues as to how to get there, however I never hold my breath over it, fair play to those who can but I sympathise with those who can't.

I guarantee that if you found your edge you wouldn't tell anyone, you'd be lying if you said you would!

[Korattt]

that's just it Naffman, I've tried this & tried that & just cannot find an edge, tried scalping recently, total car crash

[ShaunWhite]

Problem is Deggsy is that whenever you ask a question on here you never get a definitive answer & that you're expected to "work it out for yourself"

I don't think there are any 'definitive' answers to all but the most basic questions, too many variables both internal and external. There isn't a grand conspiracy to hide the secrets, but thankfully there's a lot of people who'll give you a net even if they can't give you a fish.

If you think it's hard now, I first dabbled in 2002 when there was NO information and it cost me dearly. It's the opposite these days. There's a huge box full of jigsaw pieces, but from several pictures, you have to pick the ones that make the picture that suits you. That's more than enough waffle again from the poundshop Confucius.

[ruthlessimon]

Watched this recently, applies to trading. just replace "law" for "edge": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OL6-x0modwY

Gotta love Feynman

[ShaunWhite]

that's just it Naffman, I've tried this & tried that & just cannot find an edge, tried scalping recently, total car crash

I used to flit from one thing to another and none of it worked, evey failure was another nail in my confidence. Then I realised nothing was ever going to work doing that (10/10 fails).

So i've just stuck to one little simple way of doing things (surely I can do ONE thing if I practice enough!) and it's slowly getting better. When that's in the bag, I'll do one other little thing until that works, and repeat. I'm not smart enough to learn a dozen methods in a year, but I am bl**dy stubburn enough to learn one.