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We can learn from these failures - because something inside us that we do not own up and hold ourselves to causes the destruction.
The markets alone are incapable of destroying us.
The markets have no insanity, fear, greed and rage. All these are facets of us that move up like pawns unless we are in control.
The market is the 800 pound gorilla which always wants to keep us dancing.
Many a times we fail to take this pursuit seriously. The arcade nature of this game makes it a fascinating video game - an expensive hobby. Why do it this way when so many resources exist on this very forum to know where to put the faith - believe in yourself and your system and not lapse control and suddenly go on tilt?
Mindfulness is simply a tool - but the premise is that trading is a serious business. Trading is boring and cut and dried. Trading happens to make money when you accept yourself for what you are, do not fall prey to the arcade illusion, heal the temporary wounds that losses inflict and continue fighting the battle with iron discipline.
It isn't for the faint of the heart - I actually laugh out loud when I think how I landed here - the lure of the easy money.
This has been the hardest easy money I ever made in my whole life.
We may get tired and want to stop, we may get bored to death by all that hard work - but isn't that a small price to pay for coming out victorious - with a wad of currency notes that you actually earned?
Unless we are aware of the present moment we simply keep replaying the past - clinging!
We know we need to let go of so many things - we have allowed our identities, our - we still hang on to ropes which we know will drag us into a never ending hole but we are unable to let go - we have let habits become monsters that drive us at their free will.
How do we stay focused?
How do we stay calm?
How do we stay open to the possibilities and the states that the market is whispering to those who will listen?
The market may be secretive and need work for the intuition to grasp what is happening but why are there so many entangled knots to be unraveled in this simplistic endeavour of buying low selling high (and allowing ourselves to being wrong graciously?).
Why do we let this simple game fool us so many times without any real valid reason?
What are all these fears and ghosts that keep walking behind us like shadows?
We need to answer these questions first to improve as traders.
On the trading journey I find that progress is not linear.
I am cruising down the freeway making huge profits when suddenly I hit a speed bump.
A event triggers off a chain of reactions - lot of old stuff comes back from the closet where I thought I had shut it out long ago and for good!
When will I have Cut losses short tattooed on my palm? When will I guarantee that I will not go on tilt?
It is when I realize that I am sometimes still looking for easy ways!
But there are NO easy ways!
If it is one thing that trading makes you realize that it become less difficult as we go along but it never allows you to lower your guard or lie down and be lazy and yet make money! The powers that be make you realize that agonizing over what cannot be the reality is simply living again in a fantasy world!
Trading is a job!
When the sudden slip occurs it usually means you need to go deeper to find answers - deal with it and move on is instead of forever getting stuck to that speed bump!
One of the cutest facts and realizations in life is that there really is no "end" - everything is just going further.
The ego gets out of control more times that we like to admit.
We are lured into thinking that our way of looking at the market is the only right way.
The trap is so subtle that there is no time to escape - often the trap occurs as a long drawnout battle!
We hold on to a losing position saying that the market is showing signs of turning back!
We admonish ourselves for doubting ourselves! We recollect the last time we exited and the market went 50 points our way!!!
However when we realize through meditation that:
- What we call ego is in fact another side of insecurity!
- We are not knowers! We cannot predict the future!
- We are afraid of our own nakedness - we have ego risk!
If we have an opinion isn't it just an opinion? Why do we want to become that opinion!
e freely offer advice on forums like @Big Mike about what to do right and where the market may go but in our own private chamber of the mind we need to admit the 'point of being wrong' - because when the tide goes out it becomes obvious who is swimming naked!
If I let the last hour's trade be the last hour's trade and this hours trade be this hours trade then we have tasted success.
Practicing daily discipline is like travelling a smooth road.
Getting into the market with an emotional stance with no plan and no routine is like lurching over the muddy trail.
Both get you at the same location - the later path makes you weary and the former takes you there gently and in a serene state.
Why do we allow the past to stay alive - why do so many fears haunt us?
We really know what is to be done. But when we look though the smoked glass of so many yesterdays then the moment is biund to appear hazy.
A loss is no big deal.
And we are capable of making money still!
Why then do we live with such terrible intensity and allow our worst moments to dictate our actions?
Such behavior is tragic beyond words!
Yet we do this everyday in the markets!
Why does self-criticism have the steering wheel of our lives in our hands?
Why do we live with a feeling of lack? Lack of time, lack of money!
Why do we swallow our integrity by suddenly taking a decision opposite to what we had planned to stand by?
Why don't we go down bravely with each loss like the captain of the Titanic? And firstly we never let the loss grow as big as the Titanic in the first place!
Why do we jump about from system to system, method to method, tweaking fiddling playin around with faith and finally our sanity which is what makes us profitable in the first place?
We pretend to be victims when we fail to be disciplined.
Without discipline it is but a matter of time before that gigantic loss takes us forever out of the markets.
Without discipline death will overtake us before profits do.
I have been troubled with hesitation - faltering for that fraction of a moment before a trade is about to take off!
then chasing the market!
Then feeling "Now the risk is too high"!
Then resenting over paying "too high a price" when I could have gotten in easily at the start of the ride with a small risk and big reward - a nice R:R!
However this kind of unchecked pain needs to be conquered. Meditation showed me how,
This pain fixates me onto the exact point, the epicenter of where the pain was felt.
Then this negative process imprisons us forever in an infinite loop!
The pain becomes larger from this emotional fixation!
The hesitation becomes a habit!
The way to conquer this is to take responsibility for courage.
"This stops right now!" once uttered you become free to execute and then take responsibility of the action rather than fixating upon the result of the action!
You become free from pain!
A plan does all this - following the plan sets you free!
Whenever I lack courage to face up to my trade, open, ope myself up to the possibility of taking planned loss I always remind my self "Fear is an impostor"
At some point trading well is nothing more than consistently plodding ahead with a open mind which is willing to make decisions based on a reality that keeps continually changing and eveolving!
Long term profits are simply a reward of the hard work we do by making those decisions in the face of uncertainty multiple times a day.
Everyday we discover a new road on the trading highway - the path leads to newer truths.
The plodding becomes weary - boredom is part of the trading journey!
But when confronting boredom and feeling like running away from it all I think - it could have been much worse! All I have to do is stay steady and sit here and the profitable trade will come!
