September 2nd

Today marks the start of my 4th year giving Pop Capital a go. I'm not happy it's taking me so long, but I'm also well aware that if it was easy then everyone would be doing it. I continue to be my worst enemy.

I can write 'wait until obvious' over and over and over again, but it really requires extreme patience.

Today I was considering entering around 1:50, then annoyed I didn't enter at 2:03, finally entered at 2:32 and still managed to exit with 25% on ITM cons. I just need to not want to trade. Not want to put my capital at risk. Feel shame for entering without justifiable criteria.

It slowly going through the price action. What is the bias. Why wouldn't that direction continue? Why would it? Is there a clear setup that signals reversal? If not, assume continuation. Are we making a swing high or swing low? Are we near a previous one? How is price reacting to those levels? If there's clear confluence then enter.

Enter with appropriate size. It's the only way to stay in the game and stack gains.

I got arrogant and focused more on the outcome than my process.

My process is slow, thoughtful, justifiable entry's with clear and defensible plans.

Today's extra patient trade.

Clear down trend on the hourly.

Bearish ribbon on the 10m.

But we had aggressively eaten up into the ribbon and the immediate direction was up.

I deferred to the HTF bias of down and so waited for a potential resistance point.

Price reached up to the previous swing high / supply zone.

3m momentum shrank and stayed tight for 4 candles right at the scalp 618. This is where I initially wanted to enter. (Entry at $5)

Then the 10m confirmed with a bearish engulfing candle.

I didn't enter because I was worried about a morning star reversal off the 3m13e. However that was not confirmed because we immediately lost the 3m13e with a bearish engulfing. (entry at 7.4)

I should have however deferred to the 10m setup. We clearly rejected previous supply with a bearish engulfing. Any bounces off the 3m ribbon were likely to be pullbacks before a deeper move.

I did enter once we broke the 3m21e, retested and rejected it. Dipped to 7.3 on the test and entered at 8.8 after the rejection. Contracts peaked at 12 (+33%) and I exited most at 10.5.

I held a runner than ultimately got knifed but I was playing for the fully 3m vommy down to scalp close given the 10m ribbon bearishness.

In hindsight we had put in a reversal. The hourly signaled mean reversion and the 10m started forming an ivom. But, price never goes in a straight line. We have to ride the waves. If we're headed up, the entry is near a swing low. Which is typically signaled by tightening momentum on the 3m chart. Or if we're headed down it's best to enter closer to the swing high.

It's about waiting until absolutely obvious or 'missing' the opposing trade. Stay with the original thesis. Wait so long.