This is very true. Unfortunately, in the past I didn’t even realise that I didn’t understand the market.
After I review my trades, my mistakes would become clear.
But now I’m trying to do like you were just saying. I’m trying to understand the market BEFORE I trade. It’s simple, but not easy.
My morning routine was better this morning. What I haven’t been doing lately was reviewing the majors.
I have a few majors that I’m trading, so, the last step in my morning routine is to check out the remaining majors (and USD/DKK). Just take a look and see if a set up is coming.
I haven’t been doing that this week, and I saw on USD/DKK I missed a PERFECT set up. I was mildly annoyed. But not angry or frustrated. For one thing, I’m content with my reaction.
There will be plenty more set ups; even just like that one.
I’ll keep in mind to check my trades, then take a quick peak at the remaining majors.
Oh man. All morning, I’ve been thinking about that DKK trade I missed.
I guess it did affect me. I’m not sad. Nothing like that. Just annoyed. I can actually laugh about it a little.
But, it has to be a lesson for me. Every mistake must be a stepping stone.
I gotta follow my morning routine until the end.
Earlier this week, I was trading small positions only. Less than 1%. Around 0.3%. So, I’m not missing out on much profit. But more important than the money, is the routine.
I’m learning that there are many opportunities in the market. But our imperfections cause us to miss them.
This morning, my routine was taking a little longer than I wanted. I had just a couple more trades to update, and I wanted to finish soon. I had to be intentional. So, instead of looking at my position and analyzing where I could open another position, etc…I simply looked at the chart and updated my notes. It took less than 1 minute to finish reviewing my remaining two or three trades.
I think what slows me down is anaylyzing new trades with a pair instead of focusing on updating only.
I noticed I haven’t checked my trades on my phone in quite a while. A few weeks, I think.
It was difficult to kick the habit at first. But, now I don’t think about it much.
I had a dream last night about forex. Haha
I was hanging out at someone’s house, and I was talking with someone who works in in forex for a broker. He suddenly said an investor just bought €6M.
In my dream, I was thinking it could affect the D1. In real life, €6M doesn’t shift the market, but in my dream it was financial news that could affect my trades. Perhaps my brain meant to say €6B. Anyway…
My first impulse was to check on my trades on my phone. But I told myself “no! Do not check on your trades on your phone! Leave it alone!”
Even in my dream I’m trying to kick the habit of checking on my trades frequently!
I’ve been doing alright with my routine, lately.
I’ve had much less losses lately. For the past week I’ve had just a few losses. But that doesn’t mean I’ve been winning either.
My SLs have been at recent highs/lows. So, my trades are staying open.
It’s a bit of relief because I’m not on the hunt for new trades, which I’m not so used to.
The upside to that is I’m losing money less quickly. This, for me, is definitely a step in the right direction.
So, instead of looking for more trades, I use that time to backtest.
My trading habits are changing. I don’t feel anxious about checking my trades. However, I still get alerts from my broker about which pair is up 0.5% or down .75%.
I’m trying to hold out for better entries. I’m taking some losses but fewer. That only means my trades are lasting longer. Not that I’m winning more. Haha. Not there yet.
This morning, I noticed a mistake I’ve been making over the past week.
I haven’t been following up on my watchlist.
And because of it, I missed a perfect entry. So, this morning, I went thru my watchlist. Of course, it’s too late now.
I have to put more effort in including that into my morning routine. Check my open positions and check my watchlist. Doesn’t seem difficult, at all.
I’ve had so many things on my mind. I allowed myself to get distracted.
There will be more opportunities.
One day last week I had worked late and had to work early.
It was the first day I didn’t check on my trades. I was quite happy with that. Normally, if I don’t have much time, I’ll check for maybe 15 minutes.
I didn’t even bother opening my laptop. I was happy about it because I resisted that impulse “how are my trades?! How are my trades?!”
Recently, I’ve been leaving for work at my desired time, 05:45. However, there were two days that I didn’t start getting ready when I was supposed to. I continued watching movies on my laptop.
I realised I was falling into old habits, and I closed it immediately.
It happaned twice that I caught myself.
Controlling these impulses ties in with my trading. If I can improve that, it can help me make less impulsive trades.
As for actual trading, I won’t really know if it’s going better until the end of the month.
If I can break even. That would be nice. If I can do that two months in a row, I’ll know it wasn’t luck.
I have to make a decision right now.
According to my strategy, I’m about to experience some market pullback.
Do I hold, or close and lock in my profits?
It’s a tough decision because I have decent profits, and I don’t want to see those numbers go down.
I have two accounts just for this purpose. One account to ride the whole swing (long-term) and one account to trade the bounces (short-term).
Unfortunately, I was quite uncoordinated with this. I’m trading totally seperate pairs in each account. This is rather chaotic and unorganized.
I’ll try to do better next round.
Why is it important for traders to maintain a journal and also keep track of it? What benefits does it have if traders maintain a journal during every trade?
If you can remember where you entered and your reason for entering every trade, then you don’t need a journal.
But it makes the process much easier if you write it as it happens.
When you close the trade you have all the information recorded and you don’t have to worry about trying to recall anything.
At the end of the month you can do a tally of all your errors and look to see which errors you repeated the most.
It was a game changer for me.
I’ve been needing some sleep, so I finally slept 8 hours last night. Which didn’t leave me any time for trading. I just took a quick look, nothing really productive.
I’m currently trading 12 pairs. Not all are swing trades. Some are channel trades.
But they’re longer trades that will probably last two weeks or more.
In my other account for short-term trades. I’m winning a little, but still losing.
I’d like to get better at that. Because, if I’m swing trading on one account, I can trade the S/R bounces in the other account. That’s my goal.
I’m still learning to catch good timing. It’s difficult.
I’m thinking about how much more time trading is taking up, now.
In the morning, I have less time for other things. Maybe I could check on my trades faster. That’s a possibility.
I suppose that there’s no need to spend time updating my long-term trades every day.
But the short-term trades require daily attention.
One aspect for me to improve is paying more attention, and placing my entry orders in advance so I don’t miss well-priced entries. This is key. A good entry means everything.
Last night, I placed four trades. Well, two of them were orders.
I didn’t check on my other trades. I just did my four trades, and I was done in 30 minutes.
It makes me wonder how fast I could I get thru my morning routine…
Why is it important for traders to maintain a journal and also keep track of it? What benefits does it have if traders maintain a journal during every trade?
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Having a trading journal can help you keep track of all your entries live in trading. It is highly useful for beginner traders to keep track of their mistakes and develop those skills.
I’m coming to the conclusion that I have to trade differently than the last month. June was a very busy month. I actually had a 30% increase in my account.
But my journaling was terrible. I have no statistics for the May or June.
I wanted to go back and track down all my losing trades and see what happened and correct my records. Nope. That’ll take two weeks. I’m just gonna be more careful for July.
Another thing…FOMO bit me a few times. I gotta be more selective about my trades.
I’m focusing on trading S/R bounces, channels, and breakouts from consolidation. I just have to wait for those patterns. If I can’t see the pattern, I should wait. If I’m not sure, I should limit my risk.
I’ve done an ok job reducing risk. Some trades I trade less than 0.5% risk.
I need some time to figure out my head…I’m glad it’s the weekend and the market’s closed.
Here’s AUD/USD D1 in a channel. I wanted to jump in bullish on this, but my strategy determines that the major trend is bearish. So, if I take a long trade, it could turn bearish soon, but I don’t know when. It could bounce the MA20 as resistance. It could bounce the other MAs. It could go all the way up to resistance.
I noticed that I’ve been getting bit by the FOMO bug lately. I should wait for proper set ups–not just jumping into a trade that has several possible outcomes.
It would be best to wait for set ups where I think it will either bounce or break thru.
So, instead of trying to trade long right now, I’m just gonna wait for it to either go bullish and trade the resistance bounce, or break thru support.
And if I do trade it, just for fun, it has to be 0.5% risk. I think that’s wise. Trading 1% risk on bad set ups is too risky. I’ve taken loss after loss with these kinds of flaky set ups.
This is me trying to learn which trades not to take. Of course, part of my brain is saying “well what if…? you don’t wanna miss out do you?” This is the FOMO voice that I have to ignore.
This morning, I was going thru my charts. It was quite random at first, so I decided to do things in some kind or order.
So, I just started with the EUR pairs, then GBP, and AUD. Since the month just ended, I check the M1.
If I’m really going to discriminate more which trades I take, I have to be more patient and wait for the right opportunities.
That means I reaaaally have to be patient.
I’m still looking for set ups, but if there will be less set ups, then I have to look thru more pairs. And I also have to watch them. That’s a lot of work. But, if I’m trying to maximize profits, this is the price I have to pay.
