Trading In The Zone - Align mental environent

Question 1

Getting to carefree fearless state of mind will take a bit of work, but not that much, some getting burned is needed

Answer 1

The solution is however much simpler than we think - it’s like fixing one line in thousands of lines of code, once done it’s easy looking back (just needed to be found)

Question 2

Awareness of a correction needed doesn’t mean a belief is corrected

Answer 2

Example - man afraid of snakes, he is taught certain snakes are not dangerous, can he now touch these snakes? No, he is still afraid, logic and belief/attitude must be in line and his phobia will trump his logic

His mental environment is not fixed by his awareness of facts

Many similar contradictions exist in trading - where holding contradicting beliefs and attitudes can cancel out positive intents. Many of these contradictions are not obvious

Question 3

First main point of book - take threat of pain or happiness out of market information

Answer 3

Professionals are in flow - and it seems so simple, but someone else seemingly doing the same thing would fail due to subconscious

Question 4

Perception vs learning

Answer 4

Candle charts used to look like Japanese, but now I can read them, this is a move from perception to learning -

Uncovering just some of the unlimited opportunities presented by the chart is the next point of learning

Our mental energy will produce this

Question 5

Charts used to be indecipherable to me

Answer 5

“People see what they want to see”

Better put

“People see what they’ve learned to see, everything else is invisible until they learn to counteract the energy blocking awareness of what is waiting to be discovered”

Question 6

A good test to see if you are still fear or phobia prone?

Answer 6

Does whether or not you’ve had a winning or a losing streak effect the probability of whether your next trade will be a success? (imagine the system is fine and proven, so assuming the system isn’t the issue and discipline is fine)

If yes - these fears are irrational - each trade has nothing to do with the last

If this irrationally based fear is still there the market has a big edge

These fears are unfounded -

Each trade is statistically independent from other trades

Question 7

rationalising fears about the market basically legitimise ideas in an unsuccessful traders mind

Make no mistake…

Answer 7

This is the same as rationalising phobias like a fear of spiders, dogs and so on

These phobias hide under more intellectual layers so they don’t seem like phobias, but they are, and they derail the trader

Question 8

Great example

1. Boy at early age attached by angry dog
2. Happy dog approaches boy, happy energy, boys negative mental energy makes experience painful and terrifying
3. Boy has projected internal pain and fear into outside world, and would state as fact the source of pain and terror came from environment - the happy dog, which most would understand to be inaccurate (his internal negative energy is source of fear)

Answer 8

To learn and have correct perceptions traders must be free from fear to avoid projections, projections harness internal phobias that skew our views of market information - the most damaging point is this trader will rationalise the market was the source of any pain or concern, ignoring the internal source of this which skews their ability to objectively read market information

Losing traders project internal fears and biases onto the market, the same as the boy projects onto the dog

MOST BASIC OBJECTIVE OF TRADER
- Perceive opportunists available (not perceive threats of pain)

Question 9

If feeling fear ask…

Answer 9

Is info threatening, or is mind projecting its own state of fear

Example -
1. Trader lost last 3 trades, signal says buy
2. Starts to second guess self, entry moves, trader starts checking other signals to confirm if he should enter, he doesn’t usually check these
3. Trade entry now way off what he wanted
4. Irrational fear projected into market made trader unable to process information

• Opposite - trader won last 3 trades, see entry, puts on way bigger position size that usual, here it’s a similar projection, projecting mental attitude and environment onto the market

Question 10

Trader group - perception of risk very influenced by whether won or lost last trades

Pro group - recents wins or losses have no impact on their perception of risk

Huge psychological gap between these two

Answer 10

Every trader had to train mins to focus on “now moment opportunity flow” 

It’s not a gift -