Trader's Roundtable

[damian]

Hi all,

SirG and I (and others) started a discussion on another internet forum recently that I would like to continue in the best environment available, which in my opinion happens to be this new forum. I have brazenly decided to copy and paste between forums. I hope that in doing so I have not brought unwanted heat to this forum.

The final post from SirG in the above mentioned discussion is a good starting point to continue the discussion, it appears below and is vintage SirG :

********

Hi Damian-

You wrote:

“Regarding your comments on looking at how another successful trader may respond to the March draw down, I would love to do so but to be honest I do not know any other traders…….”

My belief is that you (and all of us) already know others. You already know the successful you, the not so successful you, the happy you and the unhappy you. I think we as a whole have a lot of baggage which limit our options and slows down our journey. The baggage has come from unkind words & actions from our enviroments & from family/friends/teachers/strangers. These sorts of things, among others, give us some sort of feedback which tells us who we are, how we are expected to act. The unkind actions & words do the devils work of nurturing our insecurities. All this has a direct impact on who we believe ourselves to be. We become who we believe we are, by behaving in such a way.

What I’m suggesting is as follows:
Where we all are today is the results of our past decisions.
Virtually all of us limit ourselves in some way.

I believe that if we have desires beyond where we currently are… that we aren’t where we want to be, we have somehow limited ourselves. Perhaps we don’t think we are capable or worthy of our desires. How many times (in our single days) did we see someone we were attracted to, but never introduced ourselves? Or didn’t behave in a respectable manner? The limiting that I speak of lies somewhere along those lines.

In your minds eye, think of Tudor Jones, Richard Dennis, Ed Seykota or one of the Turtles, whoever it is that you “believe” in. What I’m suggesting is that we allow our minds eye to focus on someone who we believe is capable and worthy of our desires. Our mind is then able to get beyond the limiting thought process that restricts “us” (because we are not deserving) and it will adapt to help our capable & worthy trader who is deserving and thus not a target of our limiting mindset. We can then learn and take counsel from our own advice.

It might sound a little hokey, but please consider it.

Let’s fabricate an example with varying degrees of depth. Let’s say your minds eye will focus on Tudor Jones. Please don’t just read the following words, but let your mind form the questions & answers.


Let’s say sit down at your desk, it’s a mess! Would Tudor Jones’s desk look like that?
It’s not just a passing thought… clean the desk so you can be more efficient.

You read an interesting article… no, better then an article, you see that some of the original Turtles release the turtle rules. You download them, read them and then stick them in a drawer. What would Tudor Jones do? Would his mind be searching for reasons to “insult” the giver? To insult the system? Would he search for ulterior motives? Or would he study it, read between the lines, take notes on all the elements of his system compared to the turtle system, ponder the importance, then begin to test out the different elements. Would he seriously consider the purchase of the VeriTrader Software to learn how these elements impact each other? Or again would he discount the software without knowing anything about it?

Your broker doesn’t service you well, would TJ tolerate that?

You have the opportunity to ask someone more “successful” then you some questions that you have pondered, would TJ make the contact?

There is NO opportunity to ask someone more “successful” then you some questions that you have pondered, would TJ CREATE the contact?

If you need to spend a month’s pay on some data to help further your testing, would TJ do that or would he think about spending it on a great vacation or on how nice it feels to have the money in the bank?

You just had a DD which was fast & furious, but it could be seen forming, even during the increase in equity, it could be seen forming. Does TJ live by the sword, only to die by the sword? Would he cap his daily/monthly loss at a certain %? Would he keep his open position risk in check? Would he reduce his positions in correlated markets? Would he incorporate different asset classes? Would he only buy strong markets while shorting the weak ones? Would he diversify by adding a blend of systems? Would he take 5% risk per trade?

Would TJ want to be the big fish in a small pond? Or would he want to be a small fish in the big pond which would give him the opportunity to grow?

Would TJ allow an inner circle that was not supportive to his dreams?

Would TJ work the extra hours, weekends included?

Would TJ feel sorry for himself? Or would he see things as an opportunity?

How would TJ make the transition to fulltime trader? Would he concern himself with payments per month? Would he “punish” himself with no payment during a losing month? Would he set aside funds that will cover a year or 2 of expenses? Would he increase his expenses or try to reduce them? Would he look for support from friends/family? Would he be more willing to sacrifice his lifestyle while he nurtured the transition? What is the worst that would happen if he had some setbacks? Would his life be over?


Most everything in life seems to be cause and effect. It strikes me as a maze where each turn is directed with a yes/no response. It’s incredible the weight which is behind each decision we make. Damian, you are no different then the rest of us, all the answers are within you! The above TJ exercise is (hopefully) a simple way to get your mind to think beyond its current constraints, while customizing a game plan just for you. Try to find ways to tap the resources of your mind. Life is short and the price is high not too!

Now, if you believe my earlier statement, “All this has a direct impact on who we believe ourselves to be. We become who we believe we are, by behaving in such a way.”
The nifty consequence of changing your mindset to someone who is deserving is that….. All this has a direct impact on who we believe ourselves to be. We become who we believe we are, by behaving in such a way.

Once you make your choice, life seems to have a way to be supportive to it. But understand, your choice could be to stagnant, to fall behind or to move ahead.

I hope it helps.

Sir G

[Howard Brazzil]

[Dave S.]

The above posts were excellent!

It seems another thing we all fail to be aware of at times, and to varying degrees, is the constant self-talk we all engage in. This is the little voice in our head that has a constant running commentary on everything we think, everything we're doing, and everything that's going on around us.

How often do we fall into negative self talk ("I can't do that!" "That's not possible/realistic/practical," etc)?

How often do we encourage our efforts ("I CAN do that!" "That's realistic for me," etc)?

What would (to use the above example) Tudor Jones be saying to himself?
Would he have spent time working on the type of self-dialogue that allows him to succeed in his goals?
Would he constantly be coaching and encouraging himself to achieve his goals?

Working on this idea of positive self-dialogue, I think, is a lot like training for an athletic competition. One keeps training, reviewing the training, enhancing the training, and slowly improving with constant practice, all the while visualizing the successful final outcome.

[John D.]

"As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he" New Testament

"A man's being attracts his life" Gurdjieff

"You are what you is" Frank Zappa

YOU ARE WHAT YOU REPEATEDLY DO.
-----------------------------------------
First You make your habits, and then they make you.
You become a slave to your constantly repeated acts.
What at first you choose, at last compels.

Your habits are either the best of servants or the worst of masters.
Your thoughts lead you on to a purpose,
your purposes go forth in action.

Your actions form your habits.
Your habits determine your character,
and your character fixes your destiny,

Once in motion, a pattern stays in motion.
---------------------------------------------
copyright 2002 Written by: MotivationMentor@aol.com

[damian]

I have always been a huge dreamer. I am sure I have written several stories in my head. Each time I am the main character.

I never really thought much of it, other than that I was perhaps a little self indulgent and I should spend less time dreaming and more time working.

Anyhow, over the years the stories I would write in my head tended to converge on the general themes of career, money, trading and having a fun life that was a little 'different' to most others.

As more time passed I found that in many senses, my stories were coming true. Not necessarily to the letter, but in general terms what I had been dreaming most intensely about started to take shape.

Without realising it I started to be more specific in my mental images to the stage where I had lived the life I wanted to live 1000 times over in my head. Little by little some of it has materialised.

It got to the stage where I would write these stories over and over in my brain so as to make them happen. when they did eventually happen many would comment on how happy I must have been. Of course I was happy, but it wasn't a surprise to me that I was in that current situation. So long as I knew the person would not think I was arrogant I would usually respond "yeah, no big deal, I was always going to do this". The truth was, in my head I had already lived several steps past the latest positive development in my life that had just taken place.

Obviously during my shortish life I have put in hard work and effort along the way amd made decisions that I thought would maximise the chances of my dreams coming true. It was not some mysterious power that just made the good stuff happen.

Having said this, my greatest partner in life so far has been the vision of me in the future, doing what I wanted. Damian (t+1), if you will. He has been a good partner to have.

I have often looked back and thought "hey Damian, you were just dreaming and not acting". It is a trap to let a dream satiate your desires. There are several aspect in my life that are simply not good enough and I was dreaming about fixing them in the past, but did not come to the party. I let Damian(t+1) down, I didn't live up to my end of the bargain.

I could have said all of the above in a few of my mottos:

"what one man can do, so can another... and better" + "see it then do it".

My story above also reminds me of a passage out of The Alchemist. I gave away my last copy to my younger brother, so forgive me if I get it a little wrong. It was something like "if you dream hard enough, the world will conspire to make your dreams happen". It reads far better than I can remember it, sorry.

[Jimmy S]

Hi, Damian,
This is Jimmy. You helped me when I purchased Behold! last year. Thanks for sharing your experience of goal setting and using visualization in your mind to reach your goal. Well done. Napoleon Hill said “What the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve!” “Keep your mind on the things you want and off things you do not want.”

[damian]

hi Jimmy S,

I didn't see your most in the flood of activity that has become this forum of late. Pretty cool, isn't it.

I remember helping you out with Behold! I hope everything turned out ok.

[About now would be the place to mention that as much I speak of Behold and evidently help other with info on the product, I am not at associated with Ntech etc. The fact is I just like helping out and being involved].

Regarding becoming what we believe: it is the only way to get to where you are going. However it must be accompanied by constructive action. This is were I sometimes fail. Too much think and not enough do. Other risks that I have found is that too much future think about where you want to go can distract you from where you are today.... and teh wheels can fall of the cart if you don't pay attention to the present (ie, ones current job for example). Today partially makes tomorrow.

cheers
damian

[Jimmy S]

Damian,

You were very helpful when I purchased Behold! I appreciate your help very much. I think it would be more appropriate to put our discussion about Behold under the topics of Behold.

To me being who we believe we can be is a journey of life and it is worth the effort.

Jimmy S

[William]

Learning Flawless Execution of a Trading System
by Mark Douglas

http://www.angusjackson.com/

Not sure if anyone has seen this article before but i thought it was a great read about system traders and some of the psychological obstacles that exist for system traders as well as strategies in overcoming some of the more common pitfalls.

Located in articles and publications section..

[Bernd]