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> during intraday trading I find myself with so much time on my
> hands that I inevitably try to apply myself by questioning every
> move my system makes.
Boy, does THAT sound familiar. :-)
> Questions:
> 1. How have others dealt with this?
Personally, I lost so much money second-guessing my system that I
nearly had to quit trading. I finally swallowed my pride, admitted
the system was a helluva lot better signal-caller than I was (even
though a lot of its entries and exits really stunk!), and started
following the silly thing. Suddenly my account equity experienced a
dramatic upturn. :-)
Suggestion: if you can't resist the temptation to meddle with your
signals during market hours, DON'T WATCH THE MARKET. Iconize your TS
and just let it pop up when it has a signal. Spend your time
refining your system and developing new ones, or reading the endless
mounds of email from trading lists, or playing solitaire, or ANYTHING
to keep your attention off every tick. Watch some OTHER market if
you want to practice your discretionary trading skills, but DON'T
trade it unless you're darn sure your trading ability warrants it.
> 2. Is it easier to switch time frames from intra-day to end of day?
> Maybe switching to EOD will limit the time span I focus on the market,
> which perhaps could minimize the temptation to meddle with the system.
I'm still doing intraday trading, so I'm not a good one to comment
here. Seems to me that EOD trading is a lot better answer if it
meets your personal and financial needs; you don't have to glue
yourself to the monitor all day, etc, and it's a lot easier to ignore
the market during the day. But I believe you can make a lot better
return with good intraday trades, so that's where I'm focusing my
efforts now.
> 3. How have others dealt with this demon?
It was a learning experience. "Yea, though I walk through the valley
of the Lack of Discipline..." :-)
Seriously, the answer is Discipline, Discipline, Discipline.
You just have to get to the point where you decide how you're going
to trade. Assuming your "non-system" trading is going as bad as mine
was, you have several choices:
* Keep doing what you're doing, and go bust.
* Ignore the system and switch to a discretionary style.
But you'd better figure out how to do that a WHOLE lot better
than you've been doing so far, or you'll go broke here too.
* Decide you're more interested in making good money as a trader
than in gratifying your ego, and START FOLLOWING YOUR SYSTEM.
That's all there is to it. If you want to be a systematic trader,
then FOLLOW THE @#$@# SYSTEM. It's up to you to decide you're going
to do that, and to exercise the discipline to do so. Maybe you'll
require a financial 2x4 upside the head like I did, or maybe you'll
learn quicker than I did. But until you make that decision, or until
you suddenly become a great discretionary trader, your account
balance will suffer. *You* have to decide when you want to start
winning.
Gary
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