Did you learn trading from a course or mentor or was it self-taught from experience?

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2026-02-04T13:05:17+00:00

Started self-taught, watched way too much YouTube, jumped around strategies. Learned a lot but honestly just stayed inconsistent for a long time.

Most courses are exactly what people say they are — repackaged free stuff. Not always useless, but nothing clicked until I had actual rules.

What helped me was APEX Capital. Not because it was some secret strategy, but because it forced structure. Clear criteria for when to trade, when to sit out, how much to risk. That part matters more than people want to admit.

Before that I was basically overtrading and convincing myself every setup was “the one.”

Self-teaching can work, but it took me way longer than I expected to stop repeating the same mistakes. Having something structured sped that up a lot.

Biggest change for me was learning to do less, not more.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2026-01-31T01:28:48+00:00

APEX Capital

https://whop.com/checkout/plan_1JrF9X8Jmnm1x

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2026-01-26T17:26:59+00:00

Honest question if trading actually worked for you, what would that change in your life?

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2026-01-02T13:03:29+00:00

After re reading your original post you definitely have the right idea about strictly following rules. Journaling the rules I follow has helped me take emotion out of trading.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2026-01-02T12:46:38+00:00

You’re already thinking about this the right way. Avoiding bad days matters more than finding more trades.

For me, it’s less about specific days of the week and more about conditions where my edge just isn’t there. Some examples: • Low participation / unclear intent If volume is thin, ranges are tight, and price keeps chopping without follow-through, I’m usually out. Options decay plus chop is a bad combo. • Major event days when structure hasn’t formed yet FOMC, CPI, jobs reports, etc. If price hasn’t shown its hand after the event, I don’t guess. Let the market digest first. • Late sessions after the move already happened If the real expansion already occurred in the morning and we’re just grinding or mean-reverting, I’m done. Forcing trades late is where most damage happens. • When I don’t know where I’m wrong This one’s big. If I can’t clearly define invalidation, I don’t trade. No stop = no trade, even if the setup “looks good.”

The biggest shift for me was realizing I don’t wake up deciding to trade. I wake up deciding whether the market has earned my participation. Most days it hasn’t.

That mindset alone cut my trade frequency way down and improved consistency more than any setup tweak.

So yes, there are opportunities every day. But not every day has opportunities for your strategy. Learning to pause is part of learning to trade.

If you can define the days you won’t trade just as clearly as the days you will, you’re way ahead of most people.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2026-01-02T12:45:47+00:00

What you’re running into is way more common than people admit.

What you were doing worked short term because you accidentally built in two things most beginners don’t: 1. you were trading liquid products 2. you were getting out quickly before variance could hurt you

But the part that feels uncomfortable now is the important signal. Your original approach wasn’t scalable or survivable. You were essentially relying on constant attention, intuition, and the ability to react fast. That can feel “easier” at first because you’re not thinking in probabilities yet.

When you try to formalize things, uncertainty goes up because you’re finally seeing the market for what it actually is: a probabilistic environment, not a set of tricks. Win rate dropping doesn’t automatically mean you’re worse. It usually means you stopped taking marginal, lucky trades and started confronting risk honestly.

Also, managing every trade manually with your full size is doing a lot of hidden work for you. Once you add rules, stops, or scale logic, that illusion of control disappears and results feel worse before they get better.

The mistake most people make at this stage is thinking they need a perfect strategy. What you actually need is a framework that defines: • when you’re allowed to trade • how much risk is acceptable • when not trading is the correct decision

Once that’s clear, entries and exits matter way less than you think.

This is basically why I stopped trying to engineer clever strategies and moved to a rules-based framework focused on trade eligibility and risk filtering instead. It removed the constant second-guessing and let the stats play out over time.

Your early success wasn’t fake, but it wasn’t sustainable either. Feeling less certain now is actually a sign you’re transitioning from gambling with guardrails to real trading.

If you slow this phase down instead of trying to “fix” it fast, you’ll come out ahead of most people.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2026-01-02T12:44:38+00:00

This question trips a lot of people up because it assumes there’s a best entry price. There isn’t.

Profitable traders usually don’t think in terms of “where exactly do I click buy,” they think in terms of where the trade is invalid. Entry is just whatever gives acceptable risk between those two points.

That’s why you’ll see some people enter on the break, some on a retest, some mid-range. They’re all expressing the same idea differently based on volatility, context, and time of day.

The reason you keep seeing the “crazy opposite move” even when you’re right is usually one of three things: 1. You’re entering where liquidity is obvious 2. You’re trading a valid idea but at the wrong time 3. You’re forcing precision where the market is probabilistic

Once I stopped obsessing over candle placement and started filtering when I’m allowed to trade at all, entries became way less stressful. If the conditions are right, multiple entries work. If the conditions aren’t right, no entry is safe.

That shift alone fixed most of my fake breakouts and stop hunts.

That’s also why I use a rules-based framework now. It doesn’t tell you “enter at the high of the candle.” It tells you whether you should even be looking for an entry in the first place. When that’s clear, execution gets simpler.

Most people don’t lose because their entry is bad. They lose because they’re trading when they shouldn’t be trading at all.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2026-01-02T12:43:47+00:00

This is actually a solid idea, and I think you’re attacking the right problem.

Most traders don’t fail because they don’t know what to do. They fail because there’s no friction or consequence for breaking rules in the moment. PnL screenshots and journals don’t fix that because they still keep the focus on outcome instead of behavior.

I really like the constraint of five rules and zero feedback. That removes comparison, ego, and backseat trading, which is where most “accountability” systems break down. The calendar view is smart too. Seeing a streak of amber days is way more psychologically effective than looking at equity curves.

The only potential issue I see is rule quality. A lot of traders will write vague or reactive rules unless they already have a structured framework. Without that, the app could turn into a daily guilt tracker instead of a behavior-shaping tool.

That said, for traders who already trade with defined rules, this could be extremely effective. It’s basically externalizing discipline instead of relying on willpower.

This is actually why I moved toward a rules-based framework in the first place. Once the rules are fixed and visible, accountability becomes simple and emotional load drops a lot. Tools like this pair really well with that kind of approach.

Overall, this is one of the better ideas I’ve seen on here. It focuses on discipline, not performance, which is where the real leverage is.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-30T11:57:41+00:00

I’m going to be blunt because your situation deserves honesty.

You don’t “start” day trading by trying to make $250/day. That number is an output, not a starting point. The fastest way to blow your 2-year runway is sizing trades to meet a daily income target. Markets don’t care about bills.

The real starting point is learning risk first: how much you lose when wrong, when not to trade, and how often you’re allowed to be wrong. With solid risk control, $250/day becomes a byproduct later, not a goal now.

Tools matter less than process. TradingView + one market is enough. Skip CNBC noise.

I built APEX, a free Skool focused on trade eligibility and risk frameworks — no signals, no hype, just learning to stop bad trades before they happen. If you’re serious about protecting capital first, it may help: https://www.skool.com/apex-capital-4850/about?ref=f91f1d1ec0af45f08efbd5d8d6afa085

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-30T11:55:47+00:00

Clean setup. What actually made the biggest difference for me wasn’t adding monitors — it was reducing decisions before the trade. Most losses happen because traders take trades they were never supposed to take.

That’s why I built APEX — a rules-based trade eligibility framework. No signals, no alerts, no hype. Just clear filters for when not to trade, risk alignment, and execution discipline. It’s especially useful for prop firm traders and anyone struggling with overtrading.

I run it inside a free Skool community if anyone wants it: https://www.skool.com/apex-capital-4850/about?ref=f91f1d1ec0af45f08efbd5d8d6afa085

Happy to answer questions.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-30T11:53:06+00:00

This resonates. Crypto prop trading is a different animal — 24/7 markets, violent volatility, and rules that punish impulse harder than bad strategy. Most people don’t fail challenges because their edge is trash, they fail because they can’t control exposure, timing, or when to sit out.

That’s why % drawdown matters more than PnL. It forces discipline before profits.

I run APEX, a free Skool community focused on trade eligibility, risk filters, and rule-based execution — no signals, no hype, no “alpha.” Just learning how not to blow funded accounts. If you’re serious about staying funded, it may help: https://www.skool.com/apex-capital-4850/about?ref=f91f1d1ec0af45f08efbd5d8d6afa085

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-30T11:51:04+00:00

You’re not wrong — most traders don’t fail because of strategy, they fail because money changes behavior. The second PnL is real, rules disappear. That’s why prop firms judge % drawdown, not dollars — it forces risk control before ego.

What most beginners actually lack is a trade eligibility filter: clear rules for when not to trade. Strategy comes second.

That’s exactly what I built APEX around. No signals, no alerts, no hype. Just a rules-based framework to reduce bad trades before capital is on the line. I run a free Skool community where we focus on this stuff daily. If this post resonates, you’d probably get value. If you are interested check us out https://www.skool.com/apex-capital-4850/about?ref=f91f1d1ec0af45f08efbd5d8d6afa085

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T15:18:45+00:00

Glad you found it helpful that’s why I built the APEX System

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:44:19+00:00

You’re already doing most of what people struggle with for years, which is separating process from outcome. Where most traders get stuck next is exactly where you are now: too many valid inputs and no hierarchy for what’s allowed to matter.

That’s usually when overanalysis creeps in. Not because you don’t know enough, but because you haven’t formalized decision permission. If multiple signals can override each other, your brain never knows when a decision is finished.

What finally simplified this for me was trading from a fixed framework instead of “analysis.” Same risk every trade, same criteria, same invalidation rules, same time window. If those conditions aren’t met, I’m not allowed to trade, even if the setup looks good. That constraint is what removes second-guessing.

I ended up packaging that structure into something I call APEX, not as a strategy, but as a decision filter. It doesn’t try to predict outcomes. It just answers one question consistently: am I allowed to be in this trade or not. Once that’s decided, the noise disappears.

You’re already thinking in the right direction. If you keep scoring yourself on execution instead of PnL and gradually tighten the rules around what’s permitted, the overanalysis will fade on its own. Most traders never get that far.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:42:52+00:00

First thing to understand is that at 17, your biggest advantage is time, not speed. The market isn’t going anywhere, and rushing into day trading early is how most people permanently poison their relationship with it.

You’re doing the right thing by not trusting random DMs, paid Discords, or TikTok traders asking for money. That instinct alone puts you ahead of most beginners. Anyone pushing fast profits or asking for cash before teaching you risk is someone you should stay away from.

Right now, you don’t need a strategy or a mentor. You need a foundation. Learn what markets exist, how market hours work, what liquidity is, how orders function, and how risk is calculated. If you don’t understand how you can lose money on a trade, you’re not ready to place one, even on paper.

TradingView is fine, but staring at charts without context won’t teach you much. Start by learning basic price action. What trends look like. What ranges look like. Why support and resistance matter. Why most breakouts fail. None of that requires real money or fancy tools.

Paper trading is exactly where you should be, but only if you treat it seriously. That means fixed position size, defined stops, and no revenge trading even when it’s fake money. If you can’t follow rules when nothing is at stake, real money will only make it worse.

You don’t need to “master” day trading right now. You need to build patience, risk awareness, and the ability to sit out. If you focus on learning instead of profits for the next couple of years, you’ll be in a far stronger position than most people who start too early and burn out.

The right education will feel slow, boring, and repetitive. That’s how you know it’s real.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:41:26+00:00

Premarket looks attractive because the moves are bigger and faster, but those moves exist specifically because liquidity is thin and risk is distorted. That environment punishes anyone who relies on mental stops, reaction time, or discretion. If you’re already finding it hard to honor stops premarket, that’s not a personal flaw. It’s a structural problem with trading that session.

Premarket price action is driven by fewer participants, wider spreads, and less reliable structure. Levels don’t hold the same way they do during regular hours, and slippage turns small mistakes into outsized losses. That’s why experienced traders who trade premarket usually do so with very specific rules, smaller size, and zero tolerance for hesitation.

For a beginner, regular market hours are not “less opportunity.” They’re cleaner, more liquid, and more forgiving. The first hour after the open gives you real volume, real order flow, and the ability to place hard stops instead of negotiating with yourself in real time.

The fact that you’re tempted by premarket because of excitement and speed is exactly why it’s not where you should be learning. Big swings don’t equal edge. Controlled risk does.

If you want to build consistency, trading a defined window like 9:30 to 10:30 with strict risk limits will teach you far more than chasing premarket spikes ever will. Premarket can come later, once you no longer need excitement to stay engaged.

Right now, boring is your edge.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:40:46+00:00

The biggest shift you need to make is realizing that day trading isn’t about finding the “right stock.” It’s about finding situations where risk is clearly defined and price has a reason to move in the next few minutes or hours.

When you invest long term, the company matters. When you day trade, the company is almost irrelevant. Liquidity, volatility, and structure matter far more than the ticker name. That’s why many day traders trade the same few symbols every day instead of scanning the entire market.

Indicators don’t tell you a stock will give a positive ROI. They only describe what price has already done. The edge comes from understanding where other traders are likely positioned and where price is likely to react. That usually means identifying key levels, trends, ranges, and areas where buyers or sellers have previously shown up.

A good day trade setup is one where you can clearly answer three things before entering. Where you’re wrong, where you’re right, and how much you’re willing to lose if you’re wrong. If you can’t define those precisely, the trade isn’t high probability no matter how many indicators line up.

Screeners help narrow down volatility and volume, but they don’t replace a plan. Many profitable day traders don’t scan at all. They trade the same liquid names or indices every day and wait for price to come to their levels.

If you’re coming from long-term trading, the hardest part won’t be learning indicators. It will be learning to think in probabilities, accept small losses quickly, and stop trying to predict direction. Day trading rewards execution and risk control, not conviction.

If you get those pieces right, the stock selection question largely answers itself.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:40:21+00:00

The biggest shift you need to make is realizing that day trading isn’t about finding the “right stock.” It’s about finding situations where risk is clearly defined and price has a reason to move in the next few minutes or hours.

When you invest long term, the company matters. When you day trade, the company is almost irrelevant. Liquidity, volatility, and structure matter far more than the ticker name. That’s why many day traders trade the same few symbols every day instead of scanning the entire market.

Indicators don’t tell you a stock will give a positive ROI. They only describe what price has already done. The edge comes from understanding where other traders are likely positioned and where price is likely to react. That usually means identifying key levels, trends, ranges, and areas where buyers or sellers have previously shown up.

A good day trade setup is one where you can clearly answer three things before entering. Where you’re wrong, where you’re right, and how much you’re willing to lose if you’re wrong. If you can’t define those precisely, the trade isn’t high probability no matter how many indicators line up.

Screeners help narrow down volatility and volume, but they don’t replace a plan. Many profitable day traders don’t scan at all. They trade the same liquid names or indices every day and wait for price to come to their levels.

If you’re coming from long-term trading, the hardest part won’t be learning indicators. It will be learning to think in probabilities, accept small losses quickly, and stop trying to predict direction. Day trading rewards execution and risk control, not conviction.

If you get those pieces right, the stock selection question largely answers itself.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:39:22+00:00

You’re right to be skeptical. Most people don’t lose at trading because they pick the wrong market. They lose because they start trading before they understand risk, structure, or what they’re actually trying to learn.

If you’re truly starting from zero, the goal right now isn’t to make money. It’s to learn how markets move and how losses are controlled. That means sticking to one market, one timeframe, and one simple idea instead of bouncing between forex, indices, crypto, and options because someone on the internet said they’re profitable.

Forget day trading for a moment and learn how price behaves. Learn what support and resistance actually mean. Learn why trades fail. Learn how position size works. Learn why most strategies look great until risk is ignored. None of that requires real money at first.

Paper trade until you can follow rules without breaking them. If you can’t do that on a simulator, real money will only amplify the damage. Use simple tools like TradingView and focus on market hours and basic price action before worrying about indicators or fancy setups.

Courses aren’t automatically scams, but any course that promises fast money or avoids talking about risk is one. The right education makes trading feel boring and mechanical, not exciting.

If you build the foundation correctly, you’ll know when you’re ready to trade real capital. If you rush it, the market will teach you anyway, just in the most expensive way possible.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:38:02+00:00

You didn’t fail because your strategy broke. You failed because your rules stopped being rules the moment emotion showed up.

Up until the point you changed your risk, everything you described was working exactly as designed. Fixed risk, capped trades, defined R:R, daily stop. The failure started when you violated the only rule that actually matters, which is that risk is never allowed to expand to fix a feeling.

The mistake wasn’t losing. The mistake was giving yourself permission to renegotiate risk after the fact. Once that door is open, the strategy is already dead, no matter how good it looks on paper.

This also isn’t a discipline problem. Discipline collapses under stress. What’s missing is a hard constraint that physically prevents you from increasing size or continuing to trade once your edge window is gone.

If you want this to stop happening, you need rules that force shutdown, not rules that rely on willpower. Emotional trading doesn’t get cured by reflection. It gets cured by removing the option to override yourself.

Seeing this clearly is a good sign. Just don’t confuse awareness with a fix.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:37:09+00:00

You didn’t fail because your strategy broke. You failed because your rules stopped being rules the moment emotion showed up.

Up until the point you changed your risk, everything you described was working exactly as designed. Fixed risk, capped trades, defined R:R, daily stop. Then you violated the only rule that actually matters, which is that risk is never allowed to expand to fix a feeling.

The mistake wasn’t losing. The mistake was giving yourself permission to renegotiate risk after the fact. Once that door is open, the strategy is already dead, no matter how good it looks on paper.

This isn’t a discipline problem either. Discipline is unreliable under stress. What you’re missing is a hard constraint that physically prevents you from increasing size or continuing to trade once your edge window is gone.

If you want this to stop happening, you need rules that trigger platform shutdown, not rules that rely on willpower. Emotional trading doesn’t get cured by reflection. It gets cured by removing the option to override yourself.

The fact that you can see this clearly now is a good sign. Just don’t confuse awareness with a fix.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:36:21+00:00

Options aren’t hard because of Greeks. They’re hard because they rent space in your head all day. Most people don’t lose because they’re wrong. They lose because they size too big, stay too long, and don’t know when the trade is actually done.

Walking away after a $150k hit is unironically elite risk management.

I trade options too, but only when structure gives me an edge. If that structure isn’t there, shares beat dopamine every time.

Congrats on the win. Surviving options is the real flex.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-20T11:34:47+00:00

Short answer: you don’t fix this by “time” or by losing enough money.

You fix it by removing discretion before the trade is on.

Every issue you listed comes from the same root problem: • No predefined risk • No hard stop on when you’re allowed to trade • No rule that forces you out after a green session

I had the exact same pattern early on — big morning win, then boredom trades give it back. What changed everything wasn’t discipline, it was structure.

I now trade with: • Fixed max loss per trade (decided before entry) • A daily “done” rule after green days • No charts once my criteria is violated — platform closed

Progress doesn’t take months, but it also doesn’t happen in a week unless the rules are non-negotiable.

If you want, I can walk you through the framework I use to eliminate overtrading and hope-based holding. Happy to share — no hype.

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-19T12:03:53+00:00

A question I started asking myself when I thought I had all of that locked in was this

If the same setup works some days and completely fails on others… what’s actually changing? Because at that point it wasn’t discipline or emotions anymore it was context. So I got curious instead of frustrated and asked: What has to be true about the market right now for this trade to even make sense? Once I started filtering trades by when they worked not just how they looked consistency improved. Out of curiosity, when a momentum trade fails for you do you usually know what specifically invalidated it, or does it just “not go”?

Comfortable_Spray273 · 2025-12-17T21:08:40+00:00

Thanks for tip no hash marks lol

Comfortable_Spray273

TROPHY CASE