{"id":26022,"date":"2013-04-10T11:49:42","date_gmt":"2013-04-10T15:49:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.smbtraining.com\/blog\/?p=26022"},"modified":"2021-05-07T10:55:45","modified_gmt":"2021-05-07T14:55:45","slug":"10-ideas-to-create-a-good-trading-journal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.smbtraining.com\/blog\/10-ideas-to-create-a-good-trading-journal","title":{"rendered":"Ten Ideas for Creating a Good Trading Journal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Mike,<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>You&#8217;ve mentioned having a journal, and a detailed journal on a number of occasions. It always makes me feel guilty because I haven&#8217;t been keeping one and I don&#8217;t know what I&#8217;m missing. In the <em>Wall Street Warrior<\/em> video, I think I saw your recruits carrying paper notebooks. So I&#8217;ve been wondering:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<ul>\n<li>\u00a0what do you write in the journal?<\/li>\n<li>\u00a0when do you look in the journal?<\/li>\n<li>\u00a0do you move journal info to a spread sheet for analysis?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<div>I guess I can figure out the basics, like entry info, why you got in, why you got out, but I was wondering if there&#8217;s a post somewhere that dives deep into how to make and use a good journal?<\/div>\n<div>Sincerely,<\/div>\n<div>Thanks!<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\n<p><strong>@mikebellafiore<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\n<p>What makes for a good trading journal?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>1) Make it your own. This is your business. You know best what&#8217;s most important to your trading business.<\/div>\n<div>2) Identify your strengths. Build from your strengths. What setups made the most sense to you on this trading session?<\/div>\n<div>3) Crunch your <a href=\"http:\/\/www.smbtraining.com\/blog\/the-importance-of-using-statistics-to-gain-an-edge\">trading statistics<\/a>. Embrace this age of Moneyball for all sports. For your sport of trading, quantify your trading efficiency.<\/div>\n<div>4) Outline trade ideas for tomorrow. Take the info from today and use it to make money tomorrow.<\/div>\n<div>5) Be hard on yourself with your best setups that worked. Where could you have added more size responsibly?<\/div>\n<div>6) Keep a separate psychology trading journal. This is your trading strategies and executions journal.<\/div>\n<div>7) Review whether you were in the right stocks. You are only as good as the stocks you trade.<\/div>\n<div>8) Understand the market structure for the day. Most traders just place trades no matter whether it is a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.smbtraining.com\/blog\/the-trend-trend-trade\">Trend Day<\/a> or <a href=\"http:\/\/http:\/\/www.smbtraining.com\/blog\/playing-the-range\">Range Day<\/a> without recognition or the day&#8217;s market structure. Certain patterns work best during certain market structures. It may not have been you. It could have just been a day where those trades weren&#8217;t gonna work.<\/div>\n<div>9) Keep playing with your journal. Add, subtract, change, improve.<\/div>\n<div>10) Be consistent. A trading journal works if you do the work everyday.<\/div>\n<div>Here is a<a href=\"http:\/\/www.slideshare.net\/smbcapital\/a-daily-review-from-an-smb-trader\"> daily trade review<\/a> from an SMB Trader.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>I hope that helps.<\/div>\n<div>You can be better tomorrow than you are today.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<p>Mike Bellafiore<\/p>\n<p><em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/The-Playbook-Inside-Professional-Trader\/dp\/0132937646\/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1362680637&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=the+playbook+mike+bellafiore\">The PlayBook<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/One-Good-Trade-Competitive-Proprietary\/dp\/0470529407\/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1362681466&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=one+good+trade\">One Good Trade<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/mikebellafiore\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/twitter-badges.s3.amazonaws.com\/follow_me-c.png\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>no relevant positions<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mike, You&#8217;ve mentioned having a journal, and a detailed journal on a number of occasions. It always makes me feel guilty because I haven&#8217;t been keeping one and I don&#8217;t know what I&#8217;m missing. In the Wall Street Warrior video, I think I saw your recruits carrying paper notebooks. So I&#8217;ve been wondering: \u00a0what do you write in the journal? &#8230; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.smbtraining.com\/blog\/10-ideas-to-create-a-good-trading-journal\" class=\"more-link\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":144,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[2444,4703,2448,2451,4706,4707,1718,653,38,2445,1989,4712,4690,1888,207],"class_list":["post-26022","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mike-bellafiore-bellas-blogs","tag-daytrading","tag-learn-trading","tag-prop-trade","tag-stock-market-course","tag-stock-trading-education","tag-stock-training","tag-the-playbook","tag-trader-training","tag-trading","tag-trading-careers","tag-trading-course","tag-trading-courses","tag-trading-education","tag-trading-school","tag-trading-stocks","no-post-thumbnail"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Ten Ideas for Creating a Good Trading Journal | SMB Training<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.smbtraining.com\/blog\/10-ideas-to-create-a-good-trading-journal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Ten Ideas for Creating a Good Trading Journal | SMB Training\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Mike, You&#8217;ve mentioned having a journal, and a detailed journal on a number of occasions. It always makes me feel guilty because I haven&#8217;t been keeping one and I don&#8217;t know what I&#8217;m missing. In the Wall Street Warrior video, I think I saw your recruits carrying paper notebooks. So I&#8217;ve been wondering: \u00a0what do you write in the journal? ... 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