I just finished today's trading activities, and its performance was not good at all in terms of profit. Rather, I lost more money that I thought I would. Besides, if I look back, I was thinking of stopping trade after making enough profit. But the reason I decided not to do so had once again some very special meaning to it.
I guess today was the day to feel and realize the power of rapport. When I was having an NLP session with my sister-in-law this morning, I noticed for the first time in my whole life that she had been mirroring my swaying back and front to maintain high performance. That was impressive enough for me to satisfy my quality of work as a coach. When I took John's 6-day workshop this May, I had no client. Nor did I ever want to help/coach others professionally. My sole purpose was to see one of the founders of NLP. Besides, I was very much impressed by his work and its ethical implication of New Code NLP. The more I learn it, the more I adopt myself into the way of living based on New Code NLP. I fell in love with this set of ideas, and that was my destiny.
Going back to my trade story today, by the time I was ready to close my pc, I happened to take a look at my old picture taken with my husband almost 13 years ago in Boston. Looking at his gentle face and our happy smile, I bursted into tears like a flashback. And soon I realized that the meaning of my bad performance today was a metaphor for me once again. When I was looking at my trade log, I couldn't stop feeling exhausted because of the number of trades I attempted without much success. Today's performance was bad because it wasn't efficient.
First, I saw the meaning of my May trade performance, "the importance of mastering appropriate states for each context necessary" as recommended personally and publicly to me by Carmen. Given my personality, if May's performance turned out to be superb, I would tend to forget to work on my state issue. No matter how much I make myself believe that trade is a pure "PROCESS" game, and as long as I think that way, the big success will come into my life, I still want to check up my profit sheet to make sure if I make money or not. Why do I care about the consequence before focusing on its process? This is a incongruency which I need to avoid no matter what.
When I was thinking about my behavior, I wanted to cry, or maybe I did so because I somehow wanted to get rid of my negative energy flowing inside my body. There was nothing besides crying I could think of. When I was crying, I suddenly came to realize that what my husband really wanted was just a sincere support when he was in need. He didn't want any money or food. He didn't need any compliment or a free house. What he thought he deserved to have as a husband was just a support from his wife.
And having experienced the power of rapport this morning, I also could understand how rapport can let me become very supportive naturally. I guess one of my biggest obstacles in life was not to want to create rapport even with my closest person such as husband. Maybe I was living in my own world where distrust to people was the fundamental philosophy. Or maybe my frustration and dilemma between trusting somebody special and not trusting him had a very deep meaning to my existence. As said in NLP, everything has a positive intention. If that is true, then my distrust at the deepest level is a way to protect me from getting hurt. Even though its possible consequence might not have sounded right in some occasions, I was stubborn enough to avoid any other ideas besides that.
Since I came to realize what my husband really wanted when he had decided to start his business, I felt like I could step a little further into achieving my personal goal to create a much better relationship with him. It was not that I loved him but I didn't know how to love him. Rather, I didn't even understand what love was, and thus I had never loved anyone besides myself. I was glad that finally I could came to understand my issue rooted back in my childhood. Of course, I didn't have to find out the cause of my issues or to connect any past event to my current sates. But this process of realization came very naturally to me, and so I've decided to write about it.
I guess "Rapport and Support" are my exciting challenge this year besides my sate issue:) Oh well, it's better to realize I have more issues so that I can improve myself more and more...
2009/05/30
2009/05/29
Breath of the Market
I strongly believe that there exists a thing called "breath of the market." As many people know, there are mainly three kinds of market trends: UP, DOWN, and SIDEWAY. And for each, there are also 2 types: VOLATILE and QUIET. Van Tharp, a trader's coach, categorizes the market into these 6 classes, and he updates market trend every month.
I, as a day trader, also need to be very sensitive to any slight change in market's direction. It is like I also breathe at the same speed and intensity with the market. This is very important especially for discrepancy trader. To me, market is alive. It moves like us, sometimes very expressively and other times very subtly. So I need to be able to calibrate the state of the market. Also I need to accept its state of ambiguity. I don't know if this means the same as NLP's "Tolerance of Ambiguity."
I, as a day trader, also need to be very sensitive to any slight change in market's direction. It is like I also breathe at the same speed and intensity with the market. This is very important especially for discrepancy trader. To me, market is alive. It moves like us, sometimes very expressively and other times very subtly. So I need to be able to calibrate the state of the market. Also I need to accept its state of ambiguity. I don't know if this means the same as NLP's "Tolerance of Ambiguity."
Taking Revenge? On What???
Some traders can get very angry when they choose a wrong currency pair for the position. When I trade nowadays, I usually trade 3 major pairs: EUR/USD, USD/JPY, and GBP/USD. And suppose I think it is more probable for GBP/USD to move strongly in its currently formed uptrend. And so I took on a Long position waiting only to see it not moving at all but instead the other two pairs going through a rather rapid move. Yes, this means I just ended up leaving lots of money on the table in the market. I didn't have the slightest idea to think that it was MAYBE also possible for the two to go in my favor.
My first reaction: Oh, shoot... Why didn't I see the move in advance? Then I USED TO feel bad about myself who acted like a moron. And next I USED TO get very angry about myself. Why I who should have known the probability of the maket going that way didn't even think about taking the postion no matter how small the postion might be. Basically, it is all about REGRET, REGRET, and REGRET. And once I finish feeling pity on poor me, I had to find something else to absorb all my anger that had been just triggered by my wrong decision in trade.
And that must be "REVENGE."
If I think about my emotional ups and downs while watching the very volative move in the market in real, the most strong emotion, or I shall call it "state" used in NLP, it must be this one.
Maybe this is about victimization. Always blaming somebody or something and never take any responsibility whatsoever.
But on what did I want to take revenge? On the market? On whatever I think was the cause of my loss or failure???
If I didn't know NLP, this viscious cycle of my not so useful idea will lead only to more losses in the market. Why? Because the moment I feel I was "wrong" and I made a "mistake," I will never reach the ideal state of a successful trader.
In the world of learning, there is no mistake but feedback. Whatever I decided when taking my position, there is a correspondent consequence. That is it, and it is as simple as that.
Now I don't even think to take any revenge on the market when I lose because I know that is unproductive. Besides, there is nothing I can achieve by taking revenge. It is like living in the past. The truth is, the past is the past. And instead of saying "forget it," I prefer to say, "just reframe it!" as it is always the case in NLP. And this has some implication mentioned by John, "problem is never a problem but state is the problem."
Sometimes, my "mistakes" imply that there are still some very important lessons I needed to learn. If so, I should appreciate my "mistakes"a lot more. As long as I can sincerely say so, there is always some feasible improvement in my trade performance. So there is no need to feel anything! And in other occasions, my desicions are not even mistakes in terms of probability. When I chose to take on the position, I consciously and unconsciously see the winning probability of that position was higher than the others. And since there is nothing in the world that is known 100% right, just because my outcome was not the favorable one, we cannot help the outcome. So for either case, there is no point feeling disturbed by my "mistakes" since they are not really mistakes.
When I really understood this useful belief on mistakes, I realized that I had become a better trader!
My first reaction: Oh, shoot... Why didn't I see the move in advance? Then I USED TO feel bad about myself who acted like a moron. And next I USED TO get very angry about myself. Why I who should have known the probability of the maket going that way didn't even think about taking the postion no matter how small the postion might be. Basically, it is all about REGRET, REGRET, and REGRET. And once I finish feeling pity on poor me, I had to find something else to absorb all my anger that had been just triggered by my wrong decision in trade.
And that must be "REVENGE."
If I think about my emotional ups and downs while watching the very volative move in the market in real, the most strong emotion, or I shall call it "state" used in NLP, it must be this one.
Maybe this is about victimization. Always blaming somebody or something and never take any responsibility whatsoever.
But on what did I want to take revenge? On the market? On whatever I think was the cause of my loss or failure???
If I didn't know NLP, this viscious cycle of my not so useful idea will lead only to more losses in the market. Why? Because the moment I feel I was "wrong" and I made a "mistake," I will never reach the ideal state of a successful trader.
In the world of learning, there is no mistake but feedback. Whatever I decided when taking my position, there is a correspondent consequence. That is it, and it is as simple as that.
Now I don't even think to take any revenge on the market when I lose because I know that is unproductive. Besides, there is nothing I can achieve by taking revenge. It is like living in the past. The truth is, the past is the past. And instead of saying "forget it," I prefer to say, "just reframe it!" as it is always the case in NLP. And this has some implication mentioned by John, "problem is never a problem but state is the problem."
Sometimes, my "mistakes" imply that there are still some very important lessons I needed to learn. If so, I should appreciate my "mistakes"a lot more. As long as I can sincerely say so, there is always some feasible improvement in my trade performance. So there is no need to feel anything! And in other occasions, my desicions are not even mistakes in terms of probability. When I chose to take on the position, I consciously and unconsciously see the winning probability of that position was higher than the others. And since there is nothing in the world that is known 100% right, just because my outcome was not the favorable one, we cannot help the outcome. So for either case, there is no point feeling disturbed by my "mistakes" since they are not really mistakes.
When I really understood this useful belief on mistakes, I realized that I had become a better trader!
2009/05/28
The Importance of the Clean 3rd Position
One of the most important things I learnt at John Grinder and Carmen Bostic's 6-day workshop is the power of the clean 3rd position.
This is really about the feedback system in the process of NLP. If I can maintain my high performance during my trade, of course it is the best. But as John used to emphasize the importance of "practice, practice, practice," one of the supplementary ways to accompany with high performance is to put yourself into the "clean third position." Basically, this state is an objective state in which you can observe your own behavior and state in terms of VAK (visual, auditory, and kienethetic). So you ask yourself what you see and hear by looking at yourself in the first position. Here, the first position is where you are experiencing everything in terms of VAK as if you were really there. This process of putting yourself into the first postion is called "association". The process to be in the third position, on the other hand, is called "dissociation."
Sometimes when I trade in a very disturbed state, I purpose stand up from the chair and stand a couple of feet away from it to see myself from the clean third position. Interesting enough, I almost always cross my arms when I observe myself. This change in my physiology is already a sign of my being in a different position. I can notice many things just by looking at myself by imagining the way I trade. So I can come with many new ideas and advice to make my state better.
If this process becomes more automatic in my unconscious level without really stepping away from my first position, I can reach high performance much, much faster...
This is really about the feedback system in the process of NLP. If I can maintain my high performance during my trade, of course it is the best. But as John used to emphasize the importance of "practice, practice, practice," one of the supplementary ways to accompany with high performance is to put yourself into the "clean third position." Basically, this state is an objective state in which you can observe your own behavior and state in terms of VAK (visual, auditory, and kienethetic). So you ask yourself what you see and hear by looking at yourself in the first position. Here, the first position is where you are experiencing everything in terms of VAK as if you were really there. This process of putting yourself into the first postion is called "association". The process to be in the third position, on the other hand, is called "dissociation."
Sometimes when I trade in a very disturbed state, I purpose stand up from the chair and stand a couple of feet away from it to see myself from the clean third position. Interesting enough, I almost always cross my arms when I observe myself. This change in my physiology is already a sign of my being in a different position. I can notice many things just by looking at myself by imagining the way I trade. So I can come with many new ideas and advice to make my state better.
If this process becomes more automatic in my unconscious level without really stepping away from my first position, I can reach high performance much, much faster...
A Letter to My Friend In Chaos...
おはよう。
Jちゃんの中で、今、一番本気になってるのは何？それがトレードでないんなら、そして、私はそう思うんだけど、トレードには時間を割かないのも手だよ。
私はとにかくトレードのパフォーマンスあげるために毎日を生きてるんだ。朝も夜もそれだけ。そしてそこで学んだことは、子育てや他でも生かしてるし。
はなから副業とは思わず、それが本業と決めてやり続けたの。いかにその時、微々たるお金しか稼げてなくても。 そう思うのが正しいかどうかは別として、私はそう思ったから。
それに不動産は自分のエッジではまだないから、そっちはRにまかせてる方が今は効率がいい。ビジネスパートナーとしても信頼してるし。
私の真意を分かって欲しいんだけど、もしJちゃんがトレードだけを本気で学ぶつもりなら、私はいろいろ伝えることはあると思う。でも、タイガーウッズがゴルフも野球もテニスもやって、そのどれもでスーパースターになれるかな？趣味なら別だよ。
少なくとも私はそう思う。今のJちゃんの無意識が行きたがってる道で目標が達成するといいね。
*** added comment ***
There are a couple of interesting things I noticed after writing this blog. I used to believe that there is nothing conincidental in this world; whatever has happened was meant to happen for us. And this further implication, according to John Grinder, is "everything happening is a metaphor to you." Now I strongly believe so...
When I was trading tonight, I noticed something very interesting about the e-mail I sent to my friend who wants to master 3 totally unrelated businesses/careers AT THE SAME TIME! So I used an analogy of Tiger Woods trying to master golf, baseball, and tennis as a super star. Of course I was sarcastic in that I do not believe even he cannot do so in one shot. Besides, his special talent acquired with his unimaginable effort has no guarantee for him to become one of the world's best baseball player. As once Michael Jordan tried in baseball, maybe Tiger would also fail as a baseball player. So I told her if you want to be good at the three things as a hobby, then maybe the situation would be different... Yes, I was very sarcastic in that she had insisted on her strongest passion for each... To me, that was a fake. You cannot just commit to mastering three totally different things in one shot. Maybe this is my limitaion in thought; but it is ok since it has served me well to achieve my own dreams.
But the funny thing was that these "THREE ITEMS" were the metaphor for my three different currency pairs! I realized that when today's my performance turned out to be something no so desirable. It was like the law of attraction. I had no intention to choose the number 3, but my unconscious knew at that time already what kind of meaning my analogy would have for me... Since I am very good at interpretating the meaning of each event surrounding me, I would definately change my behavior of looking at three different currencies at the same time. I am not saying I will never act as I do; rather, that kind of behavior is not suitable and appropriate for me in my current context as a trader. So I can only take my new understaning as something very helpful to me instead of something that can limit my possibility.
==== added comment: June 18, 2008 ====
From an e-zine 【ボカンと売れる】 １円玉と５円玉の違いが分かる人いますか？ by 竹内謙礼
今日は珍しく、「副業」についてのお話です。
== 「在宅」の仕事に憧れる気持ちも分かるけど ==
さて、最近、不景気のせいか、
「副業」や「在宅ワーク」を始める人が非常に増えています。
私もネット関連の副業本や起業本を何冊が出していることもあり、
その手の相談を積極的に受けているコンサルタントの一人ではあります。
ですけども。
ここで、ズバリ言ってしまいますが、
副業や在宅ワークの８割ぐらいは、
「詐欺」だと思って、頭っから疑ってかかる必要はあると思います。
ええ、実は最近、副業や在宅ワークの人を狙った、
悪徳詐欺事件が多発しているんですね。
詐欺の仕掛けはとっても単純です。
在宅ワーク、副業をやりたい人は、
どうしても「簡単にお金儲けができる話はないか？」という基準で、
サイドビジネスを探している傾向にあります。
そうなると、「簡単に儲かる」という話に騙されやすく、
「難しい話」「大変な話」には、耳を傾けなくなります。
そこに悪徳業者は付け込むんですね。
「30万円支払ったら、売上アップまで全部面倒みますよ」
「100万円支払ったら、必ず売れるホームページを作りますよ」
「50万円を払ったら、売れる商品を優先的に回しますよ」
こんな感じで、
「お金さえ払えば、ラクして在宅ワークをさせてあげますよ」
って、誘い込むんですね。
「えー、そんなウマイ話に引っかかるわけないでしょ」
みなさん、そう思いますよね？
でも、騙されるお客さんの心理って、まったく逆なんです。
「お金を払うから、きっとちゃんとやってくれるはずだ」
「お金を払うから、面倒なことは全部やってくれるはずだ」
「お金を払うから、プロがやってくれるはずだ」
そう言って、なんの疑いもなしに、大金をバーンって払っちゃうんです。
だけど、結末はご想像の通りです。
お金が振り込まれたとたんに連絡が取れない。
最初の約束と違って、何もやってくれない。
返金もしてくれない。※業務契約なのでクーリングオフが効かないのも詐欺会社側が強い理由。
特に副業、在宅ワークで被害が多いのが、
「お金を稼がせてあげる技術を身につけさせますよ」って誘っておいて、
その技術を得るのにものすごいお金を投資して、
結局、技術は身につけたけど、
仕事をもらうための営業ができないってパターンです。
在宅、副業ビジネスに限らず言えることなんですが、
やっぱり「集客」っていうのが、どんな商売でも一番難しいんです。
いいですか？
ズバリ言ってしまいますが、「副業」と「在宅ワーク」で、
「簡単なビジネス」なんて絶対にありません！
ええ、断言してもいいぐらいです！
むしろ、本業よりも大変になることを覚悟したほうがいいですよ。
だって、片手間で稼げる仕事なんて、世の中、そんなにあるわけないですよから。
もし、会社に行かないで稼げる仕事が世の中にたくさんあるんだったら、
もう何年も前から「会社に通う人」なんて、いなくなっていますよ（笑）
そう簡単には自宅で稼げる仕事なんてないから、
会社や仕事場に通っている人が世の中には圧倒的に多いんです。
仮に副業や在宅ワークで成功している人がいるとしたら、
おそらく、稼げるレベルにたどり着くまで、
信じられないぐらいの血のにじむ努力はしてきたんだと思います。
っていうか、実際に副業で成功している人は根性がある人が多いですよね。
絶対に「ラクして稼ぐ方法」なんて考えていない。
だから、ちょっとキツイことを言わせてもらいますが、
「副業や在宅ワークで、ラクして稼ごう」と考えた段階で、
すでに副業や在宅ワークには、“向いていない人”なのかもしれません。
でも、そんな副業や在宅ワークのスモールビジネスの会員さんも、
ちゃんと応援させてもらっていますよ！
NLP Unconscious Assimilation Modeling
I wonder if I can apply the NLP unconscious assimilation modeling to my trading practice. I don't know if the market can be considered the collective unconscious or not. If so, I can maybe assimilate some chart patterns in some contexts, even though I have no idea what the appropriate contexts can be... Let me find out more about this.
My Passion for Trade
The main reason I decided to take NLP practitioner course was simply to improve my trading performance. Nothing more, and nothing less.
Little did I know that the implication of taking the course was a lot more than my initial expectation. Back in last October when I just started the course, my main focus was to learn some skills to cope with some difficulties at the time of trading. By then did I already notice that I had some emotional issues to tackle with. For example, I really wanted to prove to the market that I was right; when I lost a trade, I felt I was a failure. Somehow I thought that to become a successful trader would make me feel more confident about myself. But the reality was telling me something totally different. Yes, if I am not confident about myself when I am trading, I will never be confident even if I become successful. Basically, I have to be already who I want myself to be before starting anything else.
It is about my own impression. If I am not happy without money, it will never bring me happiness no matter how much I believe the otherwise. It is funny, but it is so true. It is like if I cannot love, respect, and accept my husband as who he is, there is no way I will be able to do that just because I had more money than today.
The funny thing is that, the more I learnt and experienced the power of NLP, the more I started to find out my identity and the meaning behind almost everything. What has happened in my life no matter how harsh it may seem has a positive intention in every context for me. I appreciated it finally, and I ended up opening my own Pandora's box...
Little did I know that the implication of taking the course was a lot more than my initial expectation. Back in last October when I just started the course, my main focus was to learn some skills to cope with some difficulties at the time of trading. By then did I already notice that I had some emotional issues to tackle with. For example, I really wanted to prove to the market that I was right; when I lost a trade, I felt I was a failure. Somehow I thought that to become a successful trader would make me feel more confident about myself. But the reality was telling me something totally different. Yes, if I am not confident about myself when I am trading, I will never be confident even if I become successful. Basically, I have to be already who I want myself to be before starting anything else.
It is about my own impression. If I am not happy without money, it will never bring me happiness no matter how much I believe the otherwise. It is funny, but it is so true. It is like if I cannot love, respect, and accept my husband as who he is, there is no way I will be able to do that just because I had more money than today.
The funny thing is that, the more I learnt and experienced the power of NLP, the more I started to find out my identity and the meaning behind almost everything. What has happened in my life no matter how harsh it may seem has a positive intention in every context for me. I appreciated it finally, and I ended up opening my own Pandora's box...
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