You are a busy person. You have a lot going on in your life. But you are very interested in the opportunities offered by the market, and you wonder if you can somehow successfully integrate trading into your daily life. You have read a lot about trading and it seems very labor intensive and basically like just another full time job. So the question is, can you successfully trade part-time, and if so, will it help or hurt your trading results?
Short answer: yes, you can successfully trade part-time. In fact, it can be very helpful for your trading. In this lesson, we will discuss how you can fit trading into your busy schedule and how it can really improve your trading results and make you a better trader.
Table of Contents
How to trade on a busy schedule
Despite what you might think or read on some online trading forum, you don’t need to spend hours looking at charts every day. My way of trading requires 30 minutes to an hour of your time every day, that’s all.
How is this possible you ask? The answer is simple; focusing on the timeframe of the daily chart. Whether you have a job, a business, a full-time school, or just a “busy routine”, daily schedule time frames are key here. Focusing on the daily chart, you only need to check the charts once a day if you want to, and twice if you’re feeling “ambitious”.
The New York close occurs at 5:00 pm New York time and represents the close of the current Forex trading day and then the next one begins. The close of the daily chart is indeed the most important closing price of the day because it shows you what happened that day on one price bar. If a price action signal has formed, you will see it on the daily chart after the New York close. This makes the whole process of analyzing and trading in the market very simple, fast and easy; if you see a signal on the day that meets your trading plan criteria, you place the trade and leave until tomorrow. If the signal doesn’t form, you leave and check again the next day.
This is basically how you can use the daily chart time frame to accommodate trading on any loaded chart you have. Also, don’t worry if you don’t live in the New York time zone. Every day I receive emails from people asking me what they should do if they live elsewhere. It’s simple, you just choose a convenient time for you every day to analyze the timeframes of the daily chart. If you want to check the markets twice a day, then just do it in the morning and in the evening, no more than 20-30 minutes each time. If you do this, trading should not cost you more than 1 hour per day.
Now let’s talk about the amazing “hidden” benefits of spending so little time in front of your cards…
Why you NEED to stay away from your charts
Focusing on daily charts and end-of-day New York closing data is not just a good way to adjust trading to fit your schedule. It is also a much better way to trade for most people and will greatly increase your chances of trading success.
Trading “part-time” means that you are doing other things, be it work, study, hobbies, etc. The bottom line is that people tend to over-trade and become addicted to trading. When you’re away all day for work, school, or just doing other things, you have a “natural” distraction from the market.
So, don’t think that you are “missing” opportunities because you are busy all day, these feelings are just greed and fear. Instead, believe that the only thing you are missing out on is losing money by trading too much and stressing yourself in the process.
Here’s a hint; in any case, the best/most obvious and profitable trading setups are formed on the daily chart, because the daily chart has more weight than any other time frame below it. These are the installations that have the greatest value and “power” potential. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather risk my money on a trade like this than a lower quality one.
Also, by spending less screen time monitoring your trades, you will reduce the mental errors and catalysts that lead to over-trading and over-analyzing the market. I have written other articles on why less is better in trading.‘ and “set it and forget it”‘ trading style. The point is that the less you interact with the market every day, the less likely you are to “shoot yourself in the foot” like entering a trade you knew you shouldn’t be taking or fiddling with your stops and stops. . goals. So partial trading on the daily time frame will help you a lot by giving you less temptation and therefore less chance of losing money by making stupid mistakes. Not to mention, it allows you to balance trading with a busy schedule, whether it be a full-time job, business, study, or whatever.
“Distraction” Can Help You Trade Better
You don’t have to be in the market all the time, and you don’t have to be. If you have a busy daily routine such as work, study, or maybe just a lot of hobbies, they should be seen as something good and something that can really help you succeed in trading.
First, by taking your mind off the market, you can do something else besides trading; no one can successfully trade sitting in front of their computer all day looking at charts, this will lead to you overtrading and losing money. So, if you don’t have hobbies, work, studies, or any routine “distractions” from trading, you should consider getting one. This will give you a natural way to avoid overtrading.
To be honest, if you have nothing to do but trade day and night, it will be difficult for you to achieve the right trading mindset because you will become addicted to trading.
You should think of your job as a good way to force yourself not to look at charts all day, in other words, it’s like an “easy” discipline. If you just look at the daily charts after you are done with the market “distraction” every day, you will develop a routine and see the most important view of the market; viewing the daily chart. While you were away, the market boiled and fell; does its job. Much of the price movement in the market is meaningless; it doesn’t mean anything, and sitting and looking at it is a waste of time. All it does is encourage you to jump into the market because you “think” you’re seeing “something”.
Thus, a distraction from the market, such as school, work or hobbies, is a kind of “shield” from a large number of meaningless price movements in the market. You really can have “everything” when it comes to trading and maintaining your daily routine…you can tailor your trading to that and it can really improve your results. All you have to do is recognize and accept the power of the daily chart time frame and focus your time and energy on it. If you want to learn how to integrate daily chart trading into your busy life, check out my trading course.
