Is your life and trading out of control?
The following words are not my own, they are from an "Evolving Trader" - a trader-friend who has devoted herself to self mastery and becoming a successful full-time trader.
Her trading focus is on stocks and stock options. That works for her. My focus is different. Yours might be too, but I'm sure you will still find her words perceptive and encouraging - Numb Trader.
What I learned and changed this year
Thought this might be a good time to review the year and what happened in it. For the purpose of discussion and the chance to take a critical look at what we are doing I suggest the following questions :
1. What significant things/lessons did I learn this year?
2. What did I change this year?
Things I learned:
a. TIMING IS EVERYTHING - time is precious and using it well is the art of investing, trading and living AND practising patience is a trading virtue
b. SIMPLE IS BETTER
Things I changed:
a. 1. My primary focus is on my longer term portfolio, I sell and buy options around that portfolio to generate additional income. (I found I was chopping and changing too often and the overtrading was working against me so taking a longer term perspective got the overtrading thing out of the way.) I am still developing separate plans for medium to shorter term trading.
a. 2. I changed the timing of selling options to sell calls at or soon after peaks and puts at or soon after troughs in the stock cycle (or as best I can see them); sell puts for longer periods at lower strikes.
a. 3. I stopped trying to buy back instantly into a stock when the stock was lost through assignment - I wait for the right signal to re-enter at the right time.
a. 4. I started paying someone to do housework I loathe.
a. 5 I am practising forex trading on simulator accounts until I am ready to go live.
b. 1. I changed my software and quit using all those confusing indicators - now only use the phoenix indicators (BOF and EWS which work together for entry and exit signals) as well as 3 simple moving averages 20, 55 and 200 day for a longer term perspective.
b. 2. I set up goals for the year for all aspects of life and check thatdecisions I make (including investing and trading) are consistent with those goals.
There's plenty more but these were the critical ones for me that have reshaped what I do, why I do it and how and I do it.
Evolving Trader.
