First off, I want to apologize for the lack of postings. I allowed myself to become distracted with other issues, and this affected my blogging, as well as my trading. Trading well requires constant effort and self-work, and I allowed myself to lose my edge.
That said, I want to go through some of the goals that I have for 2008- these are related to Tharp's 10 tasks of trading, and are not tied to any profit goals. It is my belief that if I focus on the process of trading, and manage my trades according to my rules and strategies, then the profits will come.
The key areas of focus for 2008 are to take the trades that my screening software identifies, and manage them well (not taking profits too early). These tasks (as developed by Van Tharp from his modeling of top traders)-
Taking action, and monitoring the trade.
There are 10 tasks in total, and these are detailed in his "Peak Performance Course for Traders" program.
The other main goals are continuation goals- meaning that I am doing a pretty good job on those now, but I really need to make sure to maintain that effort. In addition to these, I want to work on continual improvement with regards to my trading, nutrition and exercise program, and spiritual development.
One thing that I have noted this past year, is that the Nasdaq seems to set up more reliable patterns than the other indices. I use the Nas 100 (NDX) to see how the large cap techs are doing, but the Nas sets up better support and resistance, fib retracements, etc., so I use it as my main market indicator.
Other than that, I will try to post weekly, share my learnings, successes and failures. Have a happy and healthy 2008, and good hunting!
