Doc, my passion gives me much stress...

[thetradingdoctor 10]

HI Dogpile,

 

 

Thank you for sharing your situation with us. This is a great learning situation.

You mention that you have had stress for the past 10 years with your financial job and now with your trading. Please tell me about the way in which this stress manifests? In other words, please be specific about how it is affecting you mentally, emotionally, physically and even spiritually?

 

Thanks for being courageous enough to step up and ask for help, Dogpile!

 

Doctor Janice

[Dogpile 10]

<<mentally, emotionally, physically and even spiritually?>>

 

I received a few private messages so I know at least a few others can relate to the topic I presented... I figure if I open up a little, maybe it can help somebody else also.

 

mentally -- I know I have obsessive behavior. I always have. In school I tended to crank at one subject and totally blow off the others. in sports growing up, I shot a basketball hundreds of times a day almost never taking a day off. I learned to play poker years ago and read 15 books on it and typed up notes into computer files on many of them. I have little kids (2 & 4) now and have become somewhat anti-social as my kids are a huge focus for me. my parents think it is unhealthy to treat our kids as the 'center of our universe' but I happen to disagree.

 

I believe this obsessive behavior personality is what makes me effective at the things that I focus on but the extremely narrow focus comes with the price of stress when I enter a period of 'below-trend' results -- when I try so hard and don't do well -- this can be quite painful. Also, many times at the end of a trading day, I am so mentally exhausted that I can hardly communicate with my wife.

 

that said, I do work out multiple times a week and this is very therapeutic for me. nevertheless, I find myself very stressed out a lot. Its like my head is just muck and I get severe headaches. I do drink quite a bit of caffeine so that probably doesn't help -- but I feel I need a jolt in the morning or else I will probably not have the focus and energy to work hard.

 

physically -- I could stand to lose a few pounds but I do get good exercise. I was very athletic through college and have never had any physical problems.

 

emotionally -- well, don't really want to go there publicly. will save that for a shrink someday.

 

spiritually -- hmm, not sure how to structure an answer to that. tell me what kinds of spiritual feelings are typical of professional traders?

 

thanks for any help.

 

One note, I do have a bitter taste in my mouth (and probably always will) about getting laid off years ago. It was quite a b.s. situation in retrospect -- I worked my ass off, performed very well and got laid off anyway because of the 2002 market meltdown and the short-sightedness of some of the senior managers. 2003 would have been an incredible year where all my hard work would have paid off but I got chopped off at the knees in February of that year (the market bottomed right then). I may have deeper emotions that haven't been totally explored on this subject. I made a lot of money at my old job which allowed me time to learn how to trade for a living so that isn't all bad. But the entire situation is one big source of jaded resentment towards the idiots that were my bosses. I took a year off as my 1st kid was born right around then. I had zero interest in getting another job. This is when I took up poker and obsessed about that.

 

ok I got some of that out -- hey this is helping already.

[thetradingdoctor 10]

Thank you Dogpile,

 

I am a real shrink by the way! However, I know what you mean about keeping stuff for private discussion.

 

Cooter asked me to elaborate on why people have a subconscious desire to lose. There are a number of reasons, but one of them is contained in Dogpile's most recent post.

 

Dogpile. Think about this quietly and radically honestly and let me know? The people who let you go---the bosses and the senior managers---

 

(1) What did you really think/feel about them as human beings?

(2) What did you really think about them as financial people ( ? traders/investors?

(3) What did you really think/feel about how they conducted their business?

(4) What did you really think/feel about how they treated you?

(5) What did you really think/feel about the amount of money they were making?

(6) What did your parents, wife and family think/feel about those bosses and managers?

 

 

 

Thanks for your answer, and please everyone bear with me as we go through this?

 

Thanks!

 

Doctor Janice

[Dogpile 10]

wow, this is getting heavy... but I am certainly game.

 

(1) What did you really think/feel about them as human beings?

 

no-backbone wimps hiding in a big corporate ladder that had reverse darwinian process -- the best people left and the people that stayed the longest eventually elevated themselves through attrition.

 

I really didn't know them on a personal level -- they were based in a different location and flew in for meetings.

 

 

(2) What did you really think about them as financial people ( ? traders/investors?

 

they had failed themselves so not much... they had made multiple boneheaded moves over the time I was there.

 

(3) What did you really think/feel about how they conducted their business?

 

What can I say other than I didn't respect them. They fired a group of 'value managers' at the low of the growth/value cycle (2000). Ironically, a key reason the value group underperformed their Russell Value Index was because Worldcom had become a huge weighting in the index they competed against and they refused to buy it and thus they underperformed in the short-run. classic.

 

(4) What did you really think/feel about how they treated you?

 

These all have the same answers. History has proven me and my group correct and them wrong. I had a contract in writing that was reneged upon and I had to fight a huge corporations team of lawyers. Honestly, the company went through some mergers and those were very difficult times for the industry as a whole. There were subsequent lawsuits which I am legally bound from going into. Clearly, I feel they treated me and some other hardworking people unfairly. There was no logical financial reason behind it, there were a lot of politics. I won't go into the details but let's just say that once a manager attempts a power play that backfires in front of the 'higher-ups', it sometimes gets easier to just terminate people rather than own up and admit to some professional misjudgment.

 

(5) What did you really think/feel about the amount of money they were making?

 

I have no idea how much money they made so I have no opinion. I don't care about that really. I made a lot so I never cared how much they made.

 

(6) What did your parents, wife and family think/feel about those bosses and managers?

 

None of these people knew the bosses/managers. Parents were not so supportive when I told them the story actually -- that did really piss me off. Taught me a valuable lesson with how to support my children when the chips are down. Wife thought it was total BS. Remember, we had a child due in one month.

 

gotta go for now... look forward to where this is going. this might be extra therapeutic to get other peoples opinions of something that has been buried for a while.

[Guest cooter]

Parents were not so supportive when I told them the story actually -- that did really piss me off.

 

Ouch.

 

At least you have a family of your own now that has got your back, so to speak.

 

Just be sure not to repeat the cycle with your own kids.

 

Oh - by the way - are you parents supportive of your current trading activities?

[Dogpile 10]

<<Oh - by the way - are you parents supportive of your current trading activities?>>

 

hmm, it wasn't clear for a while but I think they have become supportive at this point. In general, they have been supportive parents. re. letting me down, I think they just didn't understand or maybe didn't believe me when I told them what had happened and how it went down. it didn't really make much sense so it must have seemed that I was leaving something out. but in fact, it really didn't make any business sense -- a nasty downturn in the industry brings out the 'end of the world' callers. doom & gloom was rampant at the time. a new guy was brought in to run our unit and his policy was that everyone should do business based on the belief that the economy wasn't going to come back anytime soon. the goal was to cut costs fast cause business was all going to go to get much worse and there was no upside case -- just the certainty of a non-stop downside for the forseeable future.

 

2002 was an absolutely brutal year to be in the financial services industry. the aftermath of 9/11 had some people thinking that the bottom must be in as it's hard to believe it can get any worse than that. but the vertical short squeeze at the end of 2001 set the market up for a non-stop downside churn in 2002. it hardly even upticked and we were actually fundamentally recovering from the 2001 recession -- the market didn't care and stocks just went down and down. then Enron and Worldcom scandals broke and that caused more gloom and doom.

 

everyone was under a lot of pressue and you could feel it. the right thing to do during this time is to have people take pay-cuts and rationalize your business. the wrong thing to do is to assume that it will never get better again. well, our managers didn't do the right thing. what are ya gonna do? our business was in fine shape. yes, it was down -- but it was down off of super-inflated levels. so the right thing to do is re-set the compensation to the new level of business (lower costs). my employment contract was designed with this in mind and my bonus was reduced automatically as it was calculated based on my units revenues generated for the firm. but anyone can make up a forecast and say, 'you know what --- your business is going to go to shit this year and you and your associates aren't worth keeping on because there is no hope.' it wasn't based on reality, it was based on a bad forecast. no discussion with our customers. no discussion with us. just a pink slip and a refusal to honor a written and signed contract. 'we will see you in court'....

[MidKnight 12]

I'm being as candid as I can possibly be about this Dogpile. You have fallen into the reverse logic trap. Because scaling-in and averaging-down have one thing in common, doesn't make them identical.

You have already mentioned one point where they are different. Scaling-in is planned, Averaging down is not. Before you scale in you know exactly where you will do it and whether the new entry is in your favor. Averaging down overloads the boat because the boat was full on the first entry. Scaling-in adds to a mostly empty boat.

 

I am in full agreement with what you are saying here Jerry. I came to the same realization in my own trading not more than a couple months ago. Now the problem is how do I get bigger on those trades when I only get my first entry before the market takes off. Unsure about that one so far...enjoying the discussion, sorry if this detracts from the original posters topic.

 

Best regards,

MK

[jperl 11]

I am in full agreement with what you are saying here Jerry. I came to the same realization in my own trading not more than a couple months ago. Now the problem is how do I get bigger on those trades when I only get my first entry before the market takes off. Unsure about that one so far...enjoying the discussion, sorry if this detracts from the original posters topic.

 

Glad to hear you know how to scale in MidKnight. We will have to discuss this further in another thread for those who need to be enlightened. I'll consider posting some videos on the subject.

[PYenner 10]

Dogpile

 

Your life and your observations have some uncanny similaities to my own.

It has been brilliant to hear you speak the same truths that I learned.

 

My parents are supportive yet they totally failed to comprehend that the world had changed in a way that meant my career field could never deliver the Cinderella outcome that they or I might wish. They still express their incomprehension in oafish questions that sting. I take the hurt and try to give a simple clear cut answer that they might understand but without expectation that they will understand. I live with it and work towards happy outcomes, which is about all that matters to them. Their goodwill is with me but their comprehension of the realities remains close to zero. I am grateful for the former and accept the latter as a reality that is unlikely to change.

 

Regards middle and upper management characteristics, I agree with you, for myself I now lack the tolerance to live with that type and self-employment is close to essential for me. There are exceptional companies and individuals within them, I had the good fortune to have worked for one such at the beginning of my career but perhaps it also made me less tolerant of the suited apes that abound in bigger business.

 

I have a suspicion that you will quickly come to loathe working with apes again. You may need to be working with constructive people or on your own.

How do you read the company that has a career to offer you, apes or humans?

 

With kids and a mortgage you are up against "hard stops", heavy pressure to perform. Good on you and no wonder that you stress out when the markets are wasting time. Can I suggest to you that you are already performing to an exceptional level and that your frustration with the market peaks when it underperforms and lets you down, denies you progress? I also have a slave driver within me that has the same reaction, I am ready, the market is not, futility, all dressed up and nowhere to go. When the market goofs off we also need to goof off too, but it is not easy when you are driven for the best of reasons.

 

Dogpile, I don't have simplistic solutions to offer you.

I do respect your achievement and the character that motivates it.

You are not giving yourself full credit for either but that is part of the motivation that keeps you going.

 

I have part time work, the income takes the pressure off trading but the times can compete. A career is full time, it is an either/or choice. You have trading to come back to, you may not have a career to come back to.

 

I love/loathe the markets.

With apes in suits there is no love, just a struggle to suppress loathing, I would be struggling to last 2 years without telling them where to go.

 

You can probably expect no comprehension and no meaningful guidance from those around you, only you have the depth of understanding to make the choice. Your choices will shape the superficial judgements that others make of you but that is a smaller consequence to me.

 

I would much rather see you becoming an outstanding success at trading, than another captive monkey in a suit. Neither is an easy path, neither comes with guarantees. Best wishes.

[hechua 10]

Hi Dogpile,

 

I can empathize your situation which I am in now. I have a non-working wife and two children to feed. Besides, I have a bunch of bills to pay every month - housing mortgage, car loan, insurance policies, utility, children education, etc, etc.

 

I have been trading professionally for the last three years without any other source of income after quitting from a relatively good job that paid more than 5 figures a month. But for the last three years, my trading incomes have not been very reliable. In fact, I have been losing more than gaining and I am digging into my saving every month to survive financially.

 

The thought of giving up trading and finding another job to feed my family has been haunting me especially after a few days consecutive losses. But my self-believe and faith that I will able to make it in trading overwhelms my thought of giving up trading altogether.

 

I know that If can follow my trading strategy day in and day out religiously, I will be able to succeed in my trading. After 3 years of trading, I still can't perfect it but I know I am getting nearer every day and hope that with my self-believe and faith, consistent success in trading is just around the corner for me.

 

Dogpile, I certainly hope consistent trading success will also come to you soon

[WHY? 16]

Pull the plug out. Live your passion... 100%. You will never be satisfied unless you do. Forget the job. If you blow out you can always go to work. But you won't blow it. Your passion will find a way for you to make it work. Living secure but having unfullfilled dreams is not good IMO. I'll take the zesto in life. If I bomb out, I'll be back. I'll claw my way back if I have to. Live on the edge. Take the chance. Don't look back. Full steam ahead. But first ask the wife!

[Reaver 10]

Pull the plug out. Live your passion... 100%. You will never be satisfied unless you do. Forget the job. If you blow out you can always go to work. But you won't blow it. Your passion will find a way for you to make it work. Living secure but having unfullfilled dreams is not good IMO. I'll take the zesto in life. If I bomb out, I'll be back. I'll claw my way back if I have to. Live on the edge. Take the chance. Don't look back. Full steam ahead. But first ask the wife!

 

As much as your posts in the politics section made me want to fistfight you :boxing:...I'd have to say that's one of the most motivating statements I've read.

[walterw 10]

Hi Dogpile,

 

I can empathize your situation which I am in now. I have a non-working wife and two children to feed. Besides, I have a bunch of bills to pay every month - housing mortgage, car loan, insurance policies, utility, children education, etc, etc.

 

I have been trading professionally for the last three years without any other source of income after quitting from a relatively good job that paid more than 5 figures a month. But for the last three years, my trading incomes have not been very reliable. In fact, I have been losing more than gaining and I am digging into my saving every month to survive financially.

 

The thought of giving up trading and finding another job to feed my family has been haunting me especially after a few days consecutive losses. But my self-believe and faith that I will able to make it in trading overwhelms my thought of giving up trading altogether.

 

I know that If can follow my trading strategy day in and day out religiously, I will be able to succeed in my trading. After 3 years of trading, I still can't perfect it but I know I am getting nearer every day and hope that with my self-believe and faith, consistent success in trading is just around the corner for me.

 

Dogpile, I certainly hope consistent trading success will also come to you soon

 

 

Hi Hechua... quite a situation this one that you are telling here...

 

let me add my two cents if it can be of any help...

 

one key on my experience that really keeps me relaxed, is aiming very small targets per week... (low weekly preassure) this targets have to be good enough to maintain my income and growth alltogether... so your trading aproach doesnt feel any high preasure and at the same time resolves financial and growth issues...

 

Whatever I can be of help, I am at your entire disposal... cheers Walter.

 

 

PD: I am also FULLTIME trader...

[WHY? 16]

As much as your posts in the politics section made me want to fistfight you :boxing:...I'd have to say that's one of the most motivating statements I've read.

Well thank you, Reaver. Somehere along the line we had to have something in common!

[Reaver 10]

Well thank you, Reaver. Somehere along the line we had to have something in common!

 

:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D

[walterw 10]

:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D

 

 

Hey Nate, Now you are GURU man ¡¡

[Reaver 10]

Hey Nate, Now you are GURU man ¡¡

 

hahaha I didn't even notice that! haha