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Today was one of those days, lol. I didn't go Hulk, but I took some meaningful trades. Felt like I misread a trade once. Most of my trades didn't break out like I thought they would and stopped out for break even several times. Also, got impatient and cut a trade off before it broke out. Would've brought me back near break-even P/L. Positive realized, though. $BSX 4/24/2019 Felt like I may have misread $BSX the second time I went short. I thought the fade was coming since it closed under VWAP again while under the 9MA 5-minute and 9MA 1-minute. Looking back now, didn't make a new low, made a new high and it closed above the 20MA 5-minute as it did the previous 5-minute candle. Was more probable for a long. $T 4/24/2019 $OXY 4/24/2019 $EBAY 4/24/2019

April 23, 2019 - $KO (Partial x 2) It was good to have a trade go in my direction after my entry. 0 for 4 can take a toll on you. I saw $KO sell off at the open and I figured it was people taking profits, but because of the good earnings report I was looking for a bounce back. I saw the hammer doji on the 15 minute chart and along with the moving averages below the price action on the 1 min. I was looking for a little more of a pullback towards VWAP, but when the stock broke above the 2 previous 1 minute high candles, I decided to enter. I executed the entry and first two covers well. The third cover I was wanting to let it run to my profit target, so I was willing to hold it longer. Because the moving averages were well below the price action I was willing to hold it past the second 5 minute candle that failed to make a new high. Sample Set Results P G S P E S P P P S G 12 13 14 S P 17 18 19 20

Tuesday 4/23/2019 I had a well-being score of 5/10 this morning. Nerves were a little on the bad side, but that was due to the stressful day I had planned and not due to the trading. Took two live trades on AAPL and AMD. I really liked AAPL in the premarket, several 5min candles with higher highs. There was a “Vish” setup and a really good target at 204.93. I waited for the price to break the 201.55 level, then I went long. 5min chart when I took the trade: I was able to take one partial, but then price immediately reversed. I tried to S/O at B/E but the price blew right through it. I had so much slippage I gave all my profits back. I was then waiting for the 5min ORB on AAPL which was setting up. But then I saw AMD had a good “step” setup. I have been shying away from AMD for many weeks since it was no longer in play for my setups. Then last week when reviewing the charts it looked in play again. So I waited for the break of the 2min candle body, but the price had a pull back. So much it went from a “step” setup to a “simple” setup. “Simple” setups I should enter when it breaks or bounces off of VWAP. Which would have worked. But all I saw at the time is a daily level above it that the price has to break first. When it broke the TL it bounced off the HOTD and again retraced. Then bounced again off the HOTD for the 3rd time. When it finally broke the HOTD I went long. Since I don’t fully trust AMD yet I reduced my share size by a 1/3. The price made it to my first partial, then I almost got stopped out. Then I took a second partial early because I was losing faith in the trade. Then went all out on a new 1min low, which is good since the price dropped from there. 1min chart when I took the trade: What I did good today: I liked that I adapted the 2min ORB, for AMD entrance and exit on the fly. How did I challenge myself today? Traded AMD again. It had been awhile. What I did bad today: I had chart configuration issues again!! Somehow the platform reset the configuration, though last night when I reopened the platform it was fine. What can I do better tomorrow: Chart configuration still needs work.

Tuesday April 23rd, 2019 Sleep: 7 hours. Mood: good, ready to trade. First trade of the day was an ORBD in VZ. my plan was to get in at the previous, previous day low and risk it popping above the VWAP. I was too fearful to get in right at that level but ended up going short a little bit lower which would have been fine but i didn't change my Risk level so my first sell at the LOTD wasn't favorable. i took half off because it was hesitating and the rest at breakeven. GOOD: got some profit on the trade. RFI: stop is too far again. CONSISTENT: yes MOOD: good. Then i took the double bottom reversal in VZ but again i was too scared to get in at a good R/R and instead chased it and got a bad r/r and i ended up not taking any profits at the PPDL level and i held on way too long thinking "it will turn around" which it did and i got out at my stop loss. GOOD: good setup. RFI: FOMO entry lead to bad R/R which lead to a full stop out. MOOD: good, i still have a lot of psychological work to do CONSISTENT: i got out at my stop but i shouldn't have been so firm on my profit target. I should have stopped trading after this because it did rattle me a little bit. i ended up trying to take an ABCD in ROKU. My first instinct was to short it as a double top but i've been burned so many times i stuck to trading long. It is amateur trading to associate older trades with this trade because every trade is unique. i should have just waited to see which way it was going to break instead of guessing. i got out on a new 5min low against my position. glad i did because it ran to my stop. GOOD: got out on price action. RFI: associating older trades to this trade. guessing which direction instead of waiting for a signal. MOOD: fine, happy for the small loss. CONSISTENT: yes. Ok day of trading today. worse than yesterday but i wouldn't say i did a bad job. turns out after i finished my ROKU trade that i noticed i was in SIM all morning so none of these trades went to my real P&L. After i realized i was in SIM i took a couple more trades, all winners that put me well in the green for the day. that shows i still have a lot of psychological work to go but i am getting better, it's just a slow process. What I did good today: two of my three trades were in the right direction. What I did bad today: still too cautious on my stop loss. What can i do better tomorrow: either stick with your original entry plan or adjust your stop so that you can get a good R/R that is achievable.

4/23/2019 A bit frustrated because I gave all of my gains back for the day. Misread $CGC and paid dearly for it. I shouldn't have shorted there with it not really claiming the 9MA (purple line) 5-minute and with VWAP as support. Other trades I've taken there long for a bounce off the 1-minute moving averages. Even with my short strategy off the moving averages, that entry was super late. Other trades were great although $HAS chopped around. Should've stopped after making the two trades on $WHR/$KSS. Was well up for the day. Still a positive day, though. $KSS 4/23/2019 $WHR 4/23/2019 $HAS 4/23/2019 $CGC 4/23/2019 EDIT: Yeah, $HAS was trash. Made the move a few minutes later.

Hey, Greg: Read your journal from the beginning till now. I hope you are still trading and just decided to take a break from the journal. You and I seem to have similar issues on our trading entries and mentality. I do have a few words of advice that are helping me get over the issues we share. I initially struggled A LOT with trading in the first 5 minutes. Sometimes I would win, sometimes I would lose. But over time I realized that this was contributing to the get fast money FOMO mentality. I liked the idea of trading only 2-5 minutes and being one and done. I had to go through a detox phase to ween myself off that habit and mentality. To help, I would force myself to sit and watch the market move and go without me. It was painful.. and I relapsed once a few weeks ago for the first time in several months. Haven't done so again because that day I lost. (Luckily, not bad because I realized what I did). My point here is, you have to take similar steps in your own way to stop that habit. You gotta recognize that urge that you have and be okay with it being there, but not acting on it. It's gonna be hard, but when you recognize "the trigger" activating, you will catch yourself. Acknowledging your triggers and letting the pain burn as you watch the market move without you will help. I don't have the urge to trade the first 5 as often as I used to. 930 is 935 to me now. But that's just one part of it. What also helped me is attempting to battle FOMO in my daily life. You gotta practice the same things while you're not trading. <-- That is critical. For me, I let things happen as they do. It settles my mind and I move at my own speed. I don't rush, I don't fuss and I try not to dwell on downfalls in life. It's not a life coaching per say, lol but there are more things that hit our psychology and minds in a day than just trading. So, we definitely should pay more attention to external noise that alters our mental. Whenever you are trading and you feel that urge to double down on a trade, acknowledge THAT FEELING and let it simmer. Don't suppress the pain and push it away by doubling down because the trade isn't working. You gotta catch yourself when these triggers are activated. And this is not to say I am perfect because I am not. However, my trigger(s) are far less volatile and I think that is enough to say that it's a damn good push towards becoming a better trader. I'm not at the point of not trading anything in a day, but the trades I do take I have a reason on why I took them. In most cases, anyway, lol. As for some of your trades (in my non live/professional opinion), your bias shows towards the short side. Which is fine and you know that you are. It got more neutral as I went through your journal. Something I would recommend doing is studying the moving averages more and how they form in different situations. I found myself going short on up trends trying to catch the top of a reversal to a moving average and getting squeezed within a few moments later. I realized I wasn't aware enough of what the moving averages looked like when forming a reversal/long trade etc. So, when I went short, I wasn't seeing the more probable long trend continuing or forming. When I see a possible short trade forming now, I think about how this trade would look if it were a long or if it will pullback towards the next average. That helps me see the moving averages in a different perspective. I also think about what is more probable to happen. If I short here, based on the moving averages and the price action, is it more likely to go up or more likely to go down. It has helped me see long trades a lot more and know when to get out on either side. You can check out my trades to get an idea on how I trade. I had a big blow up and went back into the cave for awhile too.

Wednesday 4/24/2019 I had a well-being score of 4.5/10 this morning so I had to trade with half share size. Nerves were actually OK, but I had a bad day trading, broke some rules. Took two live trades both on AAPL. AAPL was OK in the premarket, started really strong and I went long just as the first 1min candle was finishing because it broke through 5 levels in 1 minute. According to my recent chart review, AAPL is starting to setup as 1min ORBs, so I was open to that setup again for AAPL. Price actually reached my 1st partial (the high of the premarket) but I got a bad fill. The stock reversed but I have a rule (with AAPL only) that don’t S/O at the B/E if there is a major TL just below it. For some reason I forgot this rule and S/O at B/E. If I followed my rule I would have gotten 60c out of APPL on that trade. This really hurt. The second trade with AAPL was it was setting up for a “step” setup. So I waited for the break of the premarket high and went long. Did not notice I broke the B-Band veto rule. The price was well above the Boulinger band when I took the trade, thus it was too extended. I did not break this rule on purpose, I honestly just didn’t notice or remember to look. As you may expect the price immediately reversed and I was stopped out. What I did good today: My methodology for determining well-being seems to work well. I apparently needed to be trading with half sizes today. How did I challenge myself today? Traded an 1min ORB. What I did bad today: Broke two rules today and one of them a major veto rule. Luckily it only cost me -0.4R today. An inexpensive lesson. What can I do better tomorrow: Adding rule review back to my daily preflight checklist. I removed it since I was doing quite well recently following my rules and it seemed silly reading these rules that I have well memorized. But you never know when you may have an off day and you need a reminder to your rules.

Wednesday April 24th, 2019 Sleep: 7.5 hours. Mood: good, trading in a doctors waiting office not really comfortable with trading here. First trade of the day was a long in T. It closed above VWAP so i tried to take it long right on the break higher but i got left holding the bag and stopped out. i'm not sure why i went long on right there, that's not my trading style specifically for the reason that i typically get stopped out. also i'm working on taking my full 100 shares but it was too much for the regular 1min moves in this stock. GOOD: not going to knock the trade idea, i think it made sense. RFI: too soon on the entry and too large a position size for the normal movements. MOOD: mad at myself for not positioning correctly CONSISTENT: yes. Took the same trade again. which i should not have with the same results. same issues. GOOD: got out at stop RFI: don't take the same trade again unless it goes in the direction of the original trade. MOOD: eh, not that bad CONSISTENT: yes. Last trade of the day was a long in SNAP. it sat at the PPDL level for almost 20 minutes so i got in long on a new 5min high. after i got in I realized i should have waited for a pullback so i could use the LOTD for my resistance level. this trade didn't work either and i got stopped out on the trade and max loss for the day. GOOD: better risk level than on T but still not good. RFI: got in the trade too soon. MOOD: ok. CONSISTENT: yes respected my stop. What i did good today: respected my stops and tried to get myself to take full position size. What i did bad today: chasing entries and not being patient for good setups. What can i do better tomorrow: need to correct the other way and get full share size but at a point where there is shown resistance.

Greg, I know exactly how you are going thru. I was in SIM for over a year before going live, yet I lost $8K in the first week. Went back to SIM after a month, came back lost $10K more. This is called "addicted to action". My suggestion to you is to read and put to practise Mark Douglas principle in "Trading in the zone"if you haven't read it yet. It is not completely a discipline problem because I considered myself to be very disciplined person. I played very advance electric guitar and bass. I trained many year in free style kick boxing. The kind that your couch pushed the sand bag at your face until your nose broken. You just wiped the blood and continued. I could lock myself up in a room for 4 hours straight to read technical books like Cisco or Juniper. Those books are like eating cardboard. Those skills take serious discipline. But you can see that I am not better than you when it comes to trading because of the instant gratification. However, I realized that trading is psychological in nature. How we trade is a reflection of who we are. If you're frustrated, the stock will creates event that caused you more frustrated. I am stable now for a few months. This morning I trades 2 stocks only and made $800. Most of the time, I trade just one stock and make average $500. Here my suggestions to you. 1. Don't come to the market to try to get something or to fight. Come to the market to look for opportunity. Tell yourself, I don't have to trade today if nothing good. 2. Plan your own trade by join Carlos in pre-market. FYI: Talking about lack of sleep. I left work and got home at 1am PST every day just to wake up at 5:15 to plan my trade and go back to sleep around 9:30am and again wake up at noon to go to work. So I am with you regarding lack of sleep. I've done this 1 1/2 year now. 3. Before market open, do deep breathing exercise by closing your eyes and visualize something fun and happy while taking multiple long deep breath. I ALWAYS nervous before market open. So this will help me relax and not too jumpy or anxious (FOMO). Remember, how we feel will attract the same result to us. 4. I choose "CONSISTENT" over making money. The moment I got my first win, even if it's $50, I shut DAS and my PC down and go to sleep. I don't care how many good stocks are in play. This will reinforce your inner strength because you do what you said you're going to do. It's not easy. But after 2 weeks, it becomes natural. We make habits then habits make us who we are. Be strict with your rule but flexible with you outcome. Everything else you seem to get them in control there. Hope these help. I will add more when I can recall what I did back then to stop this kind of compulsive aka addicted to action. I can tell you this, when your mind is calm and you don't try or struggle to win, the setup will come to you. For me the winning trades are obvious and easy. I see what I need to see and get in right on the money and ride it all the way. In the past I would flip my position 10 times on the same stock without even knowing that it's consilating or being choppy. I just know one thing "I got to win". That's how bad or stupid it was. Looking back I can only laugh at my dump behaviors. I wanted to win at all cost. The market thought otherwise. To me because I did so well in the SIM and when it comes to live trade it did not work, I could not let that happen. I am no where near perfect yet but I am on my way. I wish you the best !!! Johnny

Hey Rob, Carlos, Have you guys made any updates to the s/s you use for journaling? I find video re-capping trades is excellent for the thought process but you also need the hard stats from an s/s to find out what actually works in the long-term? Would love to have a BearBull custom template so we can compare our perf. Maybe something like a trader of the month award.