End of Day Journal (9-2-10)

Summary:

Finished the day at -$140 (paper trading 200 shares of TNA):

Quite a turn around from yesterday. Two things - I think my edge may need a little more definition and the decisions today were not those of a consistent trader.

For example - the first trade of the day I did against my better judgment - I 'knew' that going long was the wrong thing to do given the context, but I felt that a 'strict' interpretation of the edge demanded it, so I went for it. I need to modify the plan to accommodate that type of a scenario. I am not sure what it will look like, but it will have something to do with the 15/5 minute context.

Then this afternoon found me afraid of losing out, prompting two shorts on rather vague (at best) signals.

8 consecutive stops today. Somewhere around number 5 or 6 I was emotionally distraught. I cracked open Douglas' book to page 200 and reminded myself several times that the goal here is consistency. This helped, but not quite enough - I gave myself permission to make some out-of plan trades. By way of comparison, I did an EOD vs. live comparison.

I will try to post an updated plan tonight, after I get some more time to think about it. I want to maintain that careful balance between simplicity and objectivity. Perhaps an even more important agenda is to learn to recognize the emotional/mental breakdown and to stop trading if I need to.

Anyhoo - trade well.

Details:

The first chart is the live version:

Again - the first trade of the day went against all instincts but I thought I had to stick to the plan. The 12:00 was a stop (on the trailing stop) and a reverse. The 1:25 was something to think about - it came off of a stop on the 1:15 short, and the 1:15 doji (15 min) had just been formed. The 5's were saying short, but the 15's were saying 'Consider a long'. Looking at it now, it is clear that the 15's were correct, and by the plan they should of held sway. But by then I was emotionally exhausted and not thinking very clearly. The next two trades are dubious and may safely be assigned to the emotional 'afraid to miss out' category.

For comparison, here are the EOD plan trades:

Interestingly enough, I drew different S/R; though I think both cases recognize the same trade signals.