I stole that expression from someone at Hampton, and I absolutely love it. You see, the thing is to always keep learning new stuff. If you trick your mind to believe that ‘you’re the shit’, then, the market will take care of you. Sooner than later.
I gained a lot of mental clarity by explaining my process over and over again. Little details that seemed insignificant turned out to be key. Some things that seemed very important have been partially removed/automated.
This email is if you’re stuck and you’re looking for some ideas to get unstuck. As a brave anon online persona, I will not take responsibility for any of what I’ll share below. After all, we’re all adults.
Lastly, you only need one of these ideas to have a ‘Aha’ moment that can change your career (doesn’t necessarily have to be for the best, anon, don’t get too excited).
It doesn’t matter if you’re just starting out or if you’ve been blowing evals for 5 years. Sure, it’s easy to start fresh with no bad habits, but don’t underestimate years of live price action.
The first thing to acknowledge is that trading is fucking hard. It’s a full time job. And there are more than one job to do: analyst, searcher, psychologist and sniper. You need to be elite at each of these, while having a full time job to pay for the bills. And a family. And hobbies. And everything that life can throw at you. To make it even harder, you can’t even talk about it to your relative, because who would understand you, right?
It’s obvious to me, but maybe not for you. It’s hard to perform well every day when there are so many potential distractions. So keep that in mind.
One of the greatest trick the market plays on us is that we have to be there all the time. Yea, it’s open. But we don’t have to watch every tick. I do, but that’s because I’m absolutely addicted 🤝
Executing trades should be what you do 1 or 2 hours a day max. Give it 200% during that time. No phone, no wife, no kids, nothing. You and the market. If you can’t do that at least 3 days a week, let it go. The more free time you have, the more you have to spend working on your strategy and execution.
Motivation sucks. No one is happy about writing the prep, analyzing its 50 scalps and going to bed at the same time. Yet, it helps.
Strategy-wise, I often advise people to start with a naked chart. Don’t hide behind fancy stuff. Feel the flow of the candles. Get into the low ticks-based candles. Dance with them. No need for DOM & other fancy stuff. Leave that to the ‘pro’. Social media did a great job at feeding people with things that most likely don’t work.
My scalping system is dynamic. Each rotation takes into account the most recent price action, based on simple mathematics. If the market is slow, my risk is tighter. If it’s fast, it’s wider. Then the number of lot is adjusted automatically. I don’t have to think. I follow whatever the indicator tells me, because I know that over hundreds of rotations it’ll make me capture the max EV.
Take last week for example, I had some tight TP and had a fantastic week. Then on Tuesday this week I had harder times and left a bit on the table. Overall, it evens out. It wouldn’t be realistic to catch each move, to its fullest.
For me, it all comes down to selecting some early rotations that I want to be part of, based on 3 simple criteria. Agression. Velocity. And I’ll keep the third one for me. But it’s simple, I promise.
One exercise I have in Hampton is for people to write down their process on a 1-page document. Everything. From market regime to execution but not forgetting mental game and risk management. It takes hours to do, but it’s worth it. Because you can’t hide behind words.
Don’t compare yourself. Love yourself & accept the mistakes from the past.
Strategy-wise (again), everything should be dynamic. It just makes thing easier on the long run, trust me (or don’t).
Find a few guys to share your trade review every single day. That’s where you’ll make the most progress. You might now see your obvious flaws, but someone will. Do it.
Understand what makes you snap. Work hard so that you don’t put yourself in these situation. Yesterday I got stopped 2 times in like 3 minutes. I got absolutely mad for no reasons. Coming out of my longest winning streak, yet I was triggered by 2 small losses. But they were so fast that it’s like the market was screaming at me ‘wow buddy, you suck so much’. Hurt my ego? Maybe. The point is, I realized that and quickly called it a day, journaled and came back stronger today.
Understand the situations where you underperformed and do whatever it takes to not be in these situations.
Self sabotaging. Ah. The classic. I have a (way too) long article coming up on Sunday on this. We all do it to a certain extent. Why? Vicious circle. Family. Friends. Death desire… it can’t hurt to think about it, and find… why.
Pure scalping is a loss art. I think I’ve only met 2 guys doing it successfully. It’s such a fast paced market, cycles are getting shorter, adaptation is key. Mental is at stake. Not for everyone. Hence why it’s the best.
Identify the trapped side and then take trades in smart locations. If the trapped side isn’t obvious, stay away. You need less accuracy (edge) if you can correctly identify who is trapped, even if it’s on a short period of time.
Understand how local tops and bottoms form. Time (speed). Shape. Time of day.
Start each day with a baseline, tweak it with MGI.
The more I trade, the less I need HTF levels. Just the ticks/Renko I have in front of my eyes. Good enough for me to execute without second thoughts.
Risk management. Don’t go above a 20 leverage if you’re growing the account. Right now 1 NQ is $360,000, so that would be a $18,000 account. It’s high, but it’s doable. I personally use < 5 now, but have used 50+ for too long.
I like the weekly loss limit more than the daily.
If I feel like not trading, I don’t. There are no rules.
Build some stats, simple stuffs. Actionable things. Python + gpt and you’re good in a blink.
Write your DRC every single day. Sick or not.
Markets are slow then fast. Then slow. We never know for how much time. Always be on the lookout, but don’t try to time these things. Go with what works at the moment, until it doesn’t. I sent the ATH regime alert at the beginning of January, and we’re still in it. These change of pace will play with your mind. Be strong, and ready.
Quit all social media and the ‘friendly games’. Have you made progress in the last 6 months? In which area specifically ? If you can’t answer and can’t back it up with an equity curve, you’re waisting your time and life.
Give yourself 2/3 months to actively get better. 200% disciplined to see if you can do this. Yes - your life change. No - move on.
No edits, wrote that in bed.
Cheers,
RC
I love you more than Algoflows. Best post imo. Great pointers. Also Algoflows is bald.
Not my alt dude I just caught a stray for no reason