Artan on using journal data to rebuild his trading strategy

0:00When you start off, you're going to be I'm better than you are. So, if you accept that you're and I'm good, how do you how you gonna get here? You genuinely want to improve in trading, you need to Most traders think that confidence only comes after profitability. Today's guest believes that's completely backwards. Cockiness is a superpower. Not every strategy is going to make sense to you.

0:19Not every strategy you're going to believe in. Like, forget about the money and focus on the process. Focus on what really makes sense to you. So, the strategy has to align with you first. And you have to believe. If you do not believe in your mentor and you do not believe in the strategy, it's not going to work for you. Meet Artan. He spent 3 years struggling to find profitability.

0:37But nothing changed for him until he stopped searching for motivation and started looking for evidence. It's ultimately a computer game that pays you for being right. I used Claude to go through all of my data that shows me my best setups, worst setups, average win rate. I know that I've got a 70% win rate on a New York reversal. So having that data to be like that works, trust me, it works.

0:58And if you don't believe it, here's the data. In today's conversation, we dive into why journaling is more than just recording trades. He shares how data will remove all of your doubts and the mindset shift that eventually led to more than $200,000 in prop firm payouts. If you're someone that's ever questioned your strategy after a losing streak, this episode might completely change the way you approach trading forever.

1:16I'm like, God, I spent like a year doing this where what was hidden in the data was that if you waited for a you got three R out of it. So then I'm like, oh my gosh, this is a Eureka moment for me. Let's get into it. I want to dive straight in if that's cool. I I think the thing that I'm most interested about, I've obviously seen you before the trip to Thailand and I've seen you take this massive

1:42arc of success now meeting you probably two years later. This is the first time we met in person, right? I am very keen to know much like I framed in the introduction what changed over that threeyear period right because you went from struggling losing money in the markets for 3 years to finally passing that funded account and finding a certain level of consistency. What changed for you? I think it was self-reflection and knowing what to do with that self-reflection. Um I've always been quite self-reflective but been the type of person that is like very head above water.

2:13So it was kind of like you know a negative mind state where I'm just trying to survive like my whole life I've been quite broke um did always felt like you know I hadn't achieved the success that I've wanted to achieve felt hard done by and all these negative connotations around everything that I was doing and I just decided like listen like this is the time where if you are going to do something with yourself and you want to reach the heights that you want to reach you need to make a little bit of a shift.

2:36So, funny enough, this is not a little bit of promo, but my album, my debut album is called Head Above Water because I it represented all of those sad songs. All of those things that I did in my music career, but all of those people that I looked up to, the Soundcloud generation like Juiceworld, Exorus, Inassion, Mac Miller, and all the they've all passed away. And it's very negative stuff they were speaking in the mic. So, I had to learn what I'd learned in music and apply that into trading and be like, "Okay, cool.

3:02Look, stop focusing on all the negative things, all the bad things that you're doing. start finding something that works and all the mistakes that you're making, all the bad habits, all of this stuff, you can figure that out cuz you analy you over analyze yourself anyway. But try and find some sort of positive in this trading right now and figure out how to capitalize on that. But at first, obviously, I weren't journaling at first. I was journaling, but not in the right way.

3:29Didn't know how to study or develop or anything like that. Um, and yeah, it was just the focusing on find some sort of positive positivity here. Even if I'm losing in the month or I'm in a negative month, what were those two wins that I got? Like what were the characteristics of those? What were the times that I did? What was the break of structure? What time frame was that on?

3:51You know, what was the mindset? Was I up early in the morning? And it was through journaling, but again, this is like no one really taught me how to do it properly at the start. So, I had to really learn by myself. So, it did take me a bit longer. It took like 3 years isn't even a long amount of time in my opinion.

4:06Um but it feels like it is like I wanted to become a full-time trader in 3 months. Like I was telling people genuinely I was telling like people that turn out to be scammers now but I was saying listen make me profitable in 3 months. I'll document the whole thing and it'll be like a rapper turn into and you'll get so many sales for your mentorship. But no one took me off on it. There's a reason. There's a reason why. Turns out there's a real reason why.

4:30So um yeah but that was it man. was just the the the mindset shift of trying to understand like how can you squeeze blood out of a stone here in terms of like looking at all these losses and just figuring out there's got to be something that you've learned here. Like there has to be something. I know that you're in a red month and you're blowing these accounts, but there's got to be something here. And over time, honestly, like over time, over time, I even I'd probably say to be honest with you, one of the biggest things for me was the strategy change.

5:02Really? Yeah. It was it was changing changing my strategy. Um I me along with a bunch of my friends uh would have so much emphasis on psychology that it got to a point where I was like look I am genuinely doing everything right. Like I am I am I'm entering correctly. I've waited for my key levels and I'm I'm still not even getting like small wins. I am just losing losing losing losing. So once I realized that like this you're an intelligent guy, you you're study you're studying hours every single day.

5:35You back test for an hour. Like every day I was back testing for years and it just it wasn't working. And I'm like surely it's it's a you problem. And then I started thinking that trading was actually not a real thing. Like there was a period where I I did think that the majority of people were just lying about trading. I was like maybe this is but I start I then went back to remember there was a point where you won three trades in a row.

6:04There's there's got to be some either whether it's probability or something or I don't know what but you got to find it. So anyway ended up uh stopped putting so much emphasis on the psychology and started to be like you know in music or when I was doing sport professionally or anything like that. You have to get your fundamentals right.

6:22Like you can't if you teach someone how to, you know, let's say David Beckham, right? Taking a free kick. If you taught David Beckham to back heal it and said, "Listen, it's your psychology though." Like you should be able to do it. He's never going to be David Beckham. It's like you you mad analogy, but like you do have to teach people how to do things in the right way and then it's on that journey of progressing in the right way.

6:42Like you can make tweaks and work on your mind how to stay on on point, but if your fundamentals are off, if ultimately someone's telling you an unprofitable strategy, you it's it's a you're just going to lose. Doesn't matter how good you are. If David Gogggins, for example, comes into trading and trades right now, he's going to lose. Like doesn't matter how many miles he can run, how disciplined he is, he is going to lose. So it's like, yes, the psychology is super important 100%. But if your fundamentals aren't right and you're not doing something that's profitable, you ain't got you ain't got a chance.

7:12So I I want to unpack that a little bit because I feel like there's a

7:20common idea that's thrown around in the retail space that the idea of like hopping strategy is a bad thing and you have to be consistent with your one approach. Where do you find the line between figuring out that actually there is no edge or my edge is completely broken, non-existent um to the other side which is actually there may be edge there. I just need to be consistent with it. Where does that line sit?

7:43I think that some people get lucky and they find a mentor that genuinely um does what they teach um and the strategy aligns with them. That's a really big thing. By the way, the second thing I said is does the strategy align with you? There's some people that can scalp on the one minute and go off IFGS at 4hour highs and lows and it works for them. You know, they get one R, two R, whatever.

8:05And um and they clean up. They're really good. There's there's other people that are like swing traders. They don't they cannot go on the one. It's too much information. They need to they need to uh uh wait for a long period of time. Be patient. Stick to the overall higher time frame. They like fundamentals. So the strategy has to align with you first. And you have to believe. If you do not believe in your mental and you do not believe in the strategy, it's not going to work for you.

8:30So you have to understand why. Why why is this strategy good in the first place? So for me, for example, the way that I trade now, I I want to stick to a daily bias. I want to cut out a lot of bad mistakes and overtrading. So that's why I came up with it. But it was it for example, to answer your question directly, the switching strategies gains you experience ultimately, right? It does give give you experience, but also you you need enough data. I use the word data a lot, but you do need to get enough data on certain strategies to understand what makes sense to you.

9:01Not every strategy is going to make sense to you. Not every strategy you're going to believe in. Like some some strategies you look at, let's say, for example, with me maybe for, you know, I'm not saying this doesn't work, but a VWAP or an EMA, sometimes I'm like, is it a delayed indicator? I just I'm not too sure about it, man. And if that's my opinion on it, I'll test it for a little bit.

9:25Not that I have, but if I test it and it starts to make sense and I'm like, okay, I'm confident in this. Cool. I'll build on it. But some people, they're just like, is that going to make me more money than the other one? All right, I'll do it. Does it make has it made me more money? More money? No, it hasn't. So, I'll sack it off. If you've got that approach, then cool.

9:43But you need to forget about the money and focus on the process. Focus on what what really makes sense to you. Like with me the daily bias and Asian well not Asian but session sweeps such as Asia, London or New York. I can tell you that no matter what strategy trader you need that you I would say you need those in it. You need to get some sort of a daily bias and you need to go off like session liquidity like and I can so wholeheartedly I believe in that as that's part of my identity now as a trader.

10:15But you need to find like what parts of that what makes you a trader like what are you? Are you FVGs, breaker blocks like you know ICT, SMC? But find something that you really believe in. And if that means trying a certain certain strategies, so be it. But believe like find that belief first before you start worrying about the profits because you might catch a certain strategy that's a great strategy that aligns with you, but it wasn't a great market. And if you just spent four weeks doing that strategy in a bad market, you're going to give up on it and move on.

10:44M so forget the P&L like I always say to people don't trade with life capital at the start if you're going to do props small account but just focus on the play the game first understand how to play the game and then you can actually enter the competition if you already know you can trade why are you still spending weeks proving it to prop firms with tradeify you don't actually have to if you want to take an evaluation their growth evaluation can be passed in as little as one trading day but with lightning you can skip the evaluation completely and go straight into a funded account.

11:19Now, getting funded quickly sounds great, but none of that matters if you can't trust the firm when it's time to actually get paid. Traderify has paid out over $250 million across more than 80,000 traders, and they currently report a 0% payout denial. And if you're someone that wants to scale, allegible traders can hold up to five funded accounts with each account size up to $150,000 each. So, look, if you already know you can trade, how much longer do you really need to spend proving it?

11:46hit the link below. Choose the Tradeify account that fits the way you trade and use code PFT for 40% off. There's um a big part of what you said there is finding what works for you, right? And that I think is huge. It's massively underrated in this day and age. There's a lot of people that come in with this kind of copy and paste mindset. I'm just going to buy this course or this mentorship and I'm going to do what they do and I should be able to have similar results.

12:13And a lot of people don't understand that ideology that like a strategy can work but it can also not work for you. Yeah. And that that's a big thing that people from a like psychology perspective have to understand. There's there's a big element about us as the trader that has a big impact. The you touched on something there which I'm a big advocate of um and I would love to hear

12:34your perspective on this a little bit more which is the data. Right. I truly think data is massive. It's it gives you the best foundation that you need to create the right mental expectations. It gives you the belief, the confidence, everything. But I have a couple of questions that I want to throw your way. Firstly, when you say collect your data, what sort of data are we talking about collecting?

12:55Like that would actually be helpful for most people. And then secondly, how much data is enough data to actually say, okay, I'm on to something here. Let's start rolling with this. Yeah. First thing is you need to datify your strategy, right? So I used to trade very much ICT. So I would trade off breaker blocks, uh, IGS, um, I would look at, you know, um, just a 618 pullback.

13:21Uh, I would go for 5R, 3R, 10R, even. I would trade, you know, 50% of the Asian range, the Asia sweep. Like, and even reeling this out to you, this is it's a bit much. It's a bit much right now. you need to find out what part like how can you uh fraction off your strategy basically into certain components. So it's like for me I have my uh my London manipulation, I have my Frankfurt continuation, my New York reversal and my New York continuation.

13:45I now have four models that I can collect data on over a certain period of time. If you are tra like you have 10 different entry models or you enter on different key levels and whatnot, it's very hard to understand what is actually working. If you move your stop loss to certain places, it's very hard to track, you know, was it a was it a good trade?

14:07Yes, but your stop loss was bad. It's like, okay, then you've got risk-to-reward, right? So, I go for fixed risk-to-reward of 3R. If you're doing, you know, four, five, you know, three or whatnot, you need to track that data. You need to find what is the most common risk-to-reward that you can go for. one so that you have confidence in the trade and you can be like I'm happy to close out there because I know that this is a good risk-to-reward that I go for or you know you um uh there's there's so many variables in there's literally so many what indicators was the EMA crossing here on but you need to filter it all down like filter it all down at least into certain models that you have such as a London model, New York model or Asian model or whatever it may be.

14:48Um, once you have that, you can then, and this is honestly I'm so grateful for to be where I am right now in this day and age cuz Claude, for example, chat GPT, I have my I have a visual data which is on my Discord where I screenshot all my trades and I have my actual data sheet which is on Excel. I I use Claude to go through all of my data, tell me uh create me a website that shows me my best setups, worst setups, my average uh win rate, my um worst pair, best pair, uh you know, average win streak, worst loss streak.

15:21So now I can be like, okay, I'm starting to get confident with this, you know, like I I know that if I've taken, for example, four losses in a row, like that's quite a lot for me. So that as long as these have met the criteria, I can take the fifth one for example like and still keep the same risk. My head's still on board, you know, it's it's normal like I can accept that that's normal once every few months to go for a five no streak.

15:46That's okay. Same way that you know uh if I'm if I'm in an R in about taking a trade in London, I know that but I'm I'm confident on my bias. I know that I've got 70% win rate on a New York reversal. Yeah, they're not they don't come in that often. But if I'm confident of, for example, looking for a sell like in the other video where we were talking about, I'm like, yo, I'm taking that trade the second it comes.

16:08And that confidence as a trader, like I'm someone that doubts myself quite a lot, whether I'm in a trade or just in life in general occasionally, like historically. So having that data to be like, "No, no, no, bro. That that works. Trust me, it works." And if you don't believe, here's the data, and you can go, "Oh, okay.

16:27Well, I have no choice but to take it." That's the type of trading that that's why I got into trading. I wanted to get in so I can be like I'm an I'm an I told you so kind of guy, but now I make money off it with like that really and truly that's why I'm in here, right? So knowing that and I'm like I've got data to tell me it's like well I'll throw my money at that then if it's what 70% you're saying 70 70%.

16:47For a one to three all right I'll take that you know and and that's where my confidence started growing. is where I started to be like okay I'm getting data this is positive data for the first time in my life how can I improve this maybe I take a few less Frankfurt sessions or this five and 50 minute break structure is great I what

17:12I did as well we're collecting data as well I used to enter on a change in state of delivery CISD right so it's basically when a lot of traders don't know this it's when you when it closes above uh the last high so break a structure a bit it just closes I used to enter like that but I still go for like three or five R but it means that price has to expand a lot to get that whereas in now I enter on a pullback so again I didn't just make that decision for for no reason like I made that decision because I went through all my trades and said if they pulled back to 50% of that recent break structure what would I have got out of those trades and I had a lot of trades that moved up and then reversed and I'm like god I spent like a year doing this where it just went to 1 R, 1.5R, 2 R and just reversed on me.

17:58And I'm like, maybe that was a bad trade. No, what was hidden in the data was that if you waited for a pullback, you got you would have get you got 3R out of it, but the other person was waiting for 2 R3R only went to 1.5. So then I'm like, oh my gosh, this is a Eureka moment for me. I can now do take the same trades. My analysis is great and everything. Just wait for that pullback.

18:22Don't be so like impulsive. Literally that change alone like significantly helped me. I'm not saying that's going to work for everyone, but like this is where I'm like, "Oh my gosh, I've got this data pool. Like what if I tweak this? What if I tweak that?" You know, like so that to me is what interests me, you know, and it's what gives me confidence in the market.

18:38And um I think that you should you should have data for I'd say minimum like I'd say like four months of of trying something. But it's not about trying a strategy. It's about in that strategy. Is there anything that you found that you're like this is A+ focus on that? What would you say is another version of what you're doing right now? Okay, we're going to call this one version A, this one version B.

19:06Can we accept that these components make sense? If you were to do a checklist on this trade, it would roughly meet the same thing. Yes. Cool. Now you've got like two different kind of models. Figure out what one's better. That's the first job. Do that for three months. Whether you want to back test it, for test it, whatever you you know people are comfortable doing, but that's how you you start the journey of gathering data.

19:25I know so many people that just go off the eye, you know, or or or they get stubborn after, you know, I've got friends that are very close friends that been trading for 5 years. They're doing the same thing as what they were doing when they first started. They got lucky, passed a challenge, they didn't know what they were doing, and they're still doing the same thing because they don't think they need to.

19:43I don't think they need to develop or need to improve, but their data tells them, you know, the data tells them this is this guy's [ __ ] mate. But the vibe and the the hope and the dream and the but I've watched these videos a h 100 times about XY support and resistance. It makes sense to me. It's like, yeah, but it doesn't make sense cuz look at your data. Yeah. You know, so yeah, I I just think data is so so important.

20:10Yeah. I I think that was a great breakdown and it it helps people to understand and again create the right mental expectations gives them that belief that confidence to actually stick with the things that are actually working and then importantly as you said start to eliminate the things that are not. Your your data is going to be basically the truest reflection of the you know the path to profitability for a lot of people. Yeah. Like is anything actually working?

20:34Like is anything working? You know what I mean? like actually ask yourself is anything genuinely working because it weren't for me like nothing was working and I'm like okay so what does that mean like after a certain period of time like it was like 6 months this was before like it was about a year before I moved to Thailand and I was like this is you've not had one profitable month or break even month it has been like straight up slappers I'm talking like - 7 - 10 I had like a minus 20 I'm certain of it and I'm like, listen, yeah, we're we're talking about finding positives here.

21:09There's not a single positive. And at this point, it's like you've actually got to like accept that this whole ICT one minute scalping model is it's actually it's too far, you know, you know, when it's just too far from this really isn't isn't working, bro. It's time for a big shift. And then and but because I was gathering data and understanding that, yeah, I could I could be like, maybe it is time for a big shift, like, you know.

21:30So yeah, I um again on the album I made a song called Master the Pivot. So that that was kind of like part of it as well. So um yeah, but sometimes remove your ego. Sometimes guys, the strategy is not working for you. Ex just accept it, but know that you've got enough experience from your trading to then potentially pivot into another strategy where it's not going to take you so long to get to where you were.

21:52But you might it might take you a much shorter time cuz you understand the market, the charts, and have brought stuff in from the last strategy that is now going to make you excel with this one. So, I'm not saying strategy hop and do all this. I'm saying like don't be an idiot like have like like have some critical thinking skills and be like if this is genuinely isn't working. Just accept it and and find something that does.

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23:11Choose the account that fits the way you trade and use code PFT for 40% off exclusively for PFT viewers. I I think one thing that's I I do want to loop

23:22back to because it's something that you touched on and I think it actually comes off the back of collecting your data really really well which is once you've got that data everyone hits a point where they have this battle with money. Yeah. And you mentioned like the importance of being able to forget the idea of actually worrying about money or needing to make it. But I find for a lot of people that's a very difficult thing to do in reality because the truth is none of us are trading for charity.

23:44We're all here to make money. We all know that intention as we get into the game. How do you teach someone that despite the need to make that money, the best way to do it is to start to forget about it. It all come like the best analogy that I think I can give. Yeah. Is just if you are learning to play like let's say I'm a professional FIFA player. Yeah. You've just seen me enter a FIFA tournament like on Xbox and I'm like making this money entering these tournaments and you're like you know what that looks like a good career.

24:18Yeah, I want to do that. So you go and buy an Xbox. You're like okay I'm ready to enter the tournament. I'd be like to you bro you do realize like I've been doing this for years and like you don't actually like like I would learn to play first. You're like okay cool yeah no problem. Well what's pass? You're like X and what this?

24:37You've learned, you've learned the buttons and stuff and you're like, "Okay, yeah, yeah, I can start the game, exit the game. Should I start? I enter." No, bro. Like, absolutely not. So, what do you do? You need to learn how to pause, dribble, experience. What do these all mad tricksters do and all of this? You need to gain some experience first. So, like the same way with trading, you're going to learn the tools, you're going to learn the environment, you're going to learn the strategy, then you need experience, and you've got to play the game first.

25:05Like it is ultimately a computer game that pays you for being right. Like stop looking at it from a a money perspective and learn how to get good at the game. The money is inevitable. All right? Whether you are trading on a 5K account or a million account or whatever, RR is RR. Focus on the RR first. If you are suddenly really good, like if you get really good and you're like making like a guaranteed, I don't know like five or 10% or whatever, it's just then becomes a capital problem.

25:28Look, not a problem. There's a capital problem to solve. Whether you go down prop firms, whether you get investor capital, whether you work a job, save up money, whether you rob a bank, right? Whatever you decide to do, focus on the game first. Play the game and then it's just like what size tournament can you enter in like with your accounts, you know? But I think if you start off and you're just trying to make money like I did, like everyone does, um it does hinder your process uh a little bit like your progress, sorry.

25:58So, like I lost I flipped like 1K to 25K in crypto and I'm lucky that I I lost it early on. I'm very lucky. I'm blessed that I lost that early on because maybe a couple years ago that might have meant a big big deal to me. But at the time, it was just lucky I hadn't taken it out. And that for me, losing that money, not knowing what I was doing, just made me think, imagine I got good at this game.

26:23And can you imagine how much money I'd make? I wasn't thinking how much I make this month. I was thinking out if I just got good at this. Surely it's inevitable, right? Like the same way if I want to become I don't get I don't play like not me but football players don't play football to get rich. They play football to get good at football and if they're in the Premier League, they're going to make a lot of money.

26:46The same way if you the best in the world at tiddlywinks or I don't know face slapping, you know what I mean? You're amazing at face slapping. Well, now there's actually a revenue you can get out of it. You know what I'm saying? So like don't worry about the money, man. like the money the the the the pursuit of money or the love of money is the root of all evil but you know as they say but like in tra in the trading sense yes we all want to be in this game to make money but stop looking at the end goal and start in it's hard to enjoy the process when you're losing but like like learn to like know where you're at you know play your position like just know where you're at in in the trading game and just get good first like get good don't like you know what I mean money will come.

27:27Yeah. There there's a part you said there that

27:32hit home for me especially, which was like it's hard to love it when you're losing. Yeah. Right. And you're getting slapped in the face. And and obviously I know this is something that you'll have some experience with because part of your story was going through that 3 years of struggles. Yeah. There's a lot of people that would have given up during that time, thrown in the towel, just presumed trading wasn't for them. How do you stay motivated during periods like that? Like what kept you going specifically?

27:57I was uh inspired by a bunch of people just that I see online and I did believe them. Like I have to have I I believe that they're traders, you know? I believe that they're traders. I met some traders that are doing well. Um and I just I' I'd rather find out like I know that I'm I'm progressing in some capacity. I know that I'm getting certain trades right and I want to find out like I've done music I did really well, you know, sport I did really well in.

28:20By the way, I'm not a footballer in case anyone asked. I'm not not built to do football. I used to play table tins, but irrelevant. Um, it was more so of just like that self-development knowing that I'm edging closer to that success. And if if if that if that like 1% chance at the time that I was thinking it is true that trading is is actually like you know you can you can make money from trading.

28:45I'm like that 1% excites me more than anything because if it is the case that what I can there's a 1% chance that if I work hard at this and I I could make let's just even say 10k a month from this from my laptop bear in mind and I can live where I want. I can travel. I can go to, you know, Asia for the first time in my entire life.

29:09Even though I'm half Asian, I can actually visit Asia for the first time. I can make Well, I can make music from home as well, cuz now I'll have enough money to like work from home. I don't have to go into my 9 to5. Like, there's a 1% chance. Yeah. All right. I'm like, give me some other options. I'm like, there's not really that many other options for me any not obviously.

29:29Look, sorry if everyone I know other people have opportunities, but for me it was like bro that I don't know what I'm going to do. Like genuinely that something that I would enjoy and I'm like I kind of enjoy this. I kind of enjoy being paid for saying I told you so. And I'm like okay it's a computer game as well. It's not like we're doing like mad vigorous like stuff here. We are playing a computer game. Might look a little bit boring to the naked eye, but we are playing a computer game and getting paid.

29:55So, I'm like that to me that I'm sold. I'm sold on it. And I'm the type of guy like I'm super like ADHD where I'm like if I have an idea, this is it. This is it. And I identify as this and I'm not turning back from it. So yeah. Um the motivation to do it was was I guess also instilled from music where um I I was working in funnily enough down literally across the road from the studio.

30:23um in a recruitment job. One of my best mates has just took took his own life and um we both hated work. Both hate we were in a very similar scenario. Obviously a little bit his a little bit different, more severe, but like I just hated my situation. So I was searching for something to like give me a bit of freedom, give me a bit of happiness.

30:43The only thing I thought of was rapping. Like mad like the the two worst things your parent parents want to hear, music or trading. Like what the like rapper or trading? What the [ __ ] You know what I mean? not what you want to hear. So, but I was just obsessed with it. I was like, this is the one thing that is going to like save my life. Like, as in it's the only thing I can enjoy is music.

31:02And then after music, it was like, you know, I had bit of success, whatnot, didn't make the money I wanted. And then it was like, what's going to I I I want to travel. I need a bit of freedom. I don't like my 9 to5. Is there someone just told me is there a chance? I don't believe most of you, but is there a chance that this is real? And I'm like, I'm gonna take that chance.

31:23Yeah. Yeah. It's It's crazy though because a big part of that story started from the struggling period, going through the lows, finding something within to keep you going through that. Yeah. And now we're sitting here having a conversation about you having a 25k

31:41month last month. What's that like mentally? Like when you look back on the money made that month, what does that feel like for you? Do you know what it the I'd probably say the the I've never had money. Like I've literally like never had up until like two years ago and I'm 32. Yeah. I've been in overdraft in my account. I There was two periods where I had like 10K in my account. Like two When I say two periods, I mean like two days.

32:08Yeah. Like I'm not talking about two periods where for a year I had Yeah. I've I am overdraft in my account using the maximum amount since my uni days. So whether I was working I even was earning decent money at a sales job one time and I was still using my overdraft because I was invested in music. So the stress for me was incredible. And don't get me wrong like you know I'm I'm not a millionaire yet or anything like that. I'm not earn six I'm not having six figure months or something like that.

32:32Still reinvested in myself. I'm a music all of this. So I don't want people to think like I'm I'm gone clear and I've made it. But it was it's just the it's just knowing that that that can happen like knowing that you can make that money and it was true like even if this was like when the first time I did it a five figure a month I was like even if this is a oneoff and I never do it again do you know what it's possible and I was like the fact that you spent three years well it wasn't three it wasn't like the second I got profitable I got my first five pay but like three and a half years right I was like I told you so you Oh, my younger self.

33:09I was like, I told you so. I was like, what else am I earning five figures in a month from? I was like, what else? I haven't done that in music. I haven't done that in trading. Sorry, in training. In uh sales. I was like, it's true. Like, it's true.

33:26You can. And I was like, now I need to get a little bit better. I know this isn't going to be every month. I I get it. It might be a one-off, but bro, if I can make even 2K 2K in a month, I tell you what, this is a great life now. this is I'm I'm I'm living cuz I was earning 2K doing sales or working at the Chinese restaurant like scrubbing the floors. So I'm like, yo, belief.

33:47It was more belief, like, you know, and then I was like, okay, if you keep this going, you could make this a consistent thing, like even if it's 2K, 5K, whatever. All you just need is to get a little bit better. Make that next Eureka, you know, one-off month a bit bigger and that means the smaller months will also be a bit bigger. And I'm like, oh, oh [ __ ] Like, oh [ __ ] But it it was more so just the belief, bro.

34:12Like cuz you know I've done so many things in my life where I've worked so so hard and I've always felt like you know like the head above water stage I was saying always felt hard done by always felt like I hadn't achieved something that I wanted to achieve and kind of like money was really the the one thing that like I had never really even had a glimpse of.

34:33Yeah. So yeah, that that doing that 25K in a month just gave me it was less so of the money, it was more so of the belief and to be like, "Oh my god, it's it's real." Like, you

34:46know what I mean? Yeah, 100%. Are you Do you feel like you're conscious of the fact that there's a possibility that a really good month like that can [ __ ] with your psychology? Yeah. And I I asked this purely because I speak to so many traders that have these record months or they reach this milestone that they've been working towards for years. They develop this belief and actually it goes a little bit too far and everything they work for just disappears.

35:09So I I guess the the insight I'm looking for you here is if this is something you're conscious of, which it sounds like you are, is there anything you're doing mentally, strategically to ensure that yes, I've made money, but I need to make sure that I can actually keep it now. Yeah. So my answer to that is, I've heard this a million times. So I'm like, bring it on. I'm like, you know what? Yeah. I'll lock up that 20.

35:37Like so for example, right? Like the first five figure was like 12K, right? Okay. I'm like, listen, I've heard this a million times. You get your big payout, you blow all your accounts, you start from scratch, and then you have this moment, this light bulb moment when you go, do you know what? Things are going to be different now. Yeah. So, I was like, "Okay, 12K, I was like, I'm going to put 2K back into challenges, and I'm going to trade the accounts as if I if I even like lose for the next few months, as long as it doesn't equal like 5K of let's say worth of challenge fees or or whatever, then, bro, you've just done a 6K month."

36:04I'm like, it doesn't matter. Like, you also need to experience this like a positive spiral and a negative spiral. You've gone through negative spirals your whole life. You've had your first positive spiral. So, it's going to be normal for you to actually have a bad month or a bad two months or a bad three months, but knowing that you're in that, what can you do to stop that from happening? Like, what it might it might just be unavoidable.

36:37Your edge might just not play out. You know, you've you've done enough uh in your account to get to this point to get this payout. So, what can you do to actually like mitigate, I guess, if that's the right word, those losses for the next time. So I what I do is I always kind of like go straight back to basics. I I look over my data. I try not to look at the last month as like this is this is the golden month.

36:58You performed so good. No, it was your strategy that performed really good. So how can you go back to performing really good and if the strategy performs well whilst you're performing good then great. But if you are not performing good and your strategy is not performing good, which may happen because of obviously you just you're in that uh uh euphoria moment and your strategyy's just had a really good edge that month, the chances of you having a pullback are very high.

37:27So what you need to do is make sure that everything that you decide, all of your decisions are as on point as possible, but just accept that it will probably be a bad month. M so the same way that um I speak about you know people going through uh winning streaks to pass their challenge and then as soon as they get they're funded they blow their account it's because in terms of the equity curve in terms of like your progress you've just done a mad thing you've just done 15% to pass the account of course the chances of you losing that next trade is going to be lower you know so drop your risk focus a bit more on your process like you know just take a step back so for me I just like that that really happened to me the first time I didn't blow everything but I I had a bad month, but cuz I was expecting it and I've heard this story a million times.

38:14I was like, "Bring it on, mate." Cuz next thing you know, I want the guy who made 2 million, for example, and then lost like half of it. Mate, it doesn't sound that bad to me. Give me the I'll lose the half of 2 million. Just give me the 2 million first and we'll call it a deal. I'll lose half of it right now if you want.

38:28You know what I mean? Like, just give me the 2 mill. So, um yeah, like it's just, you know, more money, more problems or as you grow, you know, you get new issues that you got to do, new psychology, new levels. But I'm like a 5k account to a 10k account to a 50k account to 100k account to life capital to having a meal to lose. It's all different stages.

38:46You have to go through it anyway. So just bring it on. You know what I mean? You you've come across like this entire conversation as someone that at least now is quite optimistic.

38:58Like you actively seek to find positives both in trading, in life. like you described the the situation with making a lot of money in crypto and then losing it as like one of the best things to ever happen. Um that's not something that I think a lot of people will naturally do. Is there have you always been like this or is this something that you've purposely trained yourself to start thinking like?

39:15Yeah, I definitely have to train yourself like I am I I kind of identify like to be honest with you as quite a pessimistic person. Like when I'm in trades I'm one of the worst traders. Like I my post entry trader self is terrible. I doubt myself. I start going m even in my group sometimes I'll be like I'm always very transparent and I'll go okay this is the reason why this trade may lose and stuff but sometimes I'm just like shut up.

39:39Like shut up. You're in the trade. Yeah. No one wants to hear why this trade may lose, bro. Like I get it. You might be right but like just shut up and accept it. So, I I kind of like throughout my whole music career, uh, sorry to talk about music so much, but like my whole music career at the start was all based on like a place of pain. It was survival. It was I don't know what to do with my life. I'm I'm trying to survive.

40:09I want to I want this, you know, this uh uh this diamond that I'm digging for, you know, like that's what I want. But I realized that it was just coming from a glass half empty perspective. And as I got older and as I grew, I just realized like nobody I know that has the same mentality as me that complains that thinks they should have got a better result or or thinks, "Yeah, you know what?

40:29It is just unfair, you know, like we're just the type of people that have to suck it up and and go to work, you know, suck it up, mate. It's the real world." And I'm like, I had to get to a point in my life where I go, what do I want and what do I genuinely believe? If I can just actually accept, yeah, that like there's people in the world that I don't rate, I don't like, but they're living their life and I don't know what they're doing.

40:51Maybe they're just stupidly optimistic. Maybe they're cocky. Like, can I swear on this? Yeah. Cocky wankers. Yeah. All right. And I'm like, I don't like them, but if I could take anything like to learn from them, it's that they don't give a [ __ ] about any like hardship. They're just like, bro, I'm getting my goal.

41:12I don't care what happens, but I am going to get there. And you can moan, you can cry, but I'm going to get there. I'm not like some like Andrew Tate, you know, like no emotions and all this all this crap. Yeah, I'm not that kind of guy. But you have to accept that like cockiness is is a superpower because it does mean that like you're like you're zoned in, you're focused, you're going to get what you want.

41:28And if you can have a little bit of that mentality with trading and actually do the work to to get to where you want like over time you will you will change like you will start to see the positives. Um, but one of the I think it was Grant Cordone that uh I can't remember if it was Grant Cordone. Someone said this, but they were like in the room right now, for example, have a look around and look at things that are green, right?

41:54You look around, you're like, "Oh, it's good." You've probably seen this, right? You, bro, I Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you. You know what's mad? I was thinking of the exact same example. I genuinely was going to be the next thing that I came up with, but please continue because it's a great way to see. Yeah. So, it's just it it mainly is like just the way that you shape your mind, the way that you see things, right?

42:12And I'm very pessimistic. So, if you were to ask me, you know, look around, see what's green. I'll look around, you know, cool, amazing. And then you go, okay, what what did you see green? Well, maybe that those books over there, those books over there, but you go, really, that's actually like it's kind of dark blue or black. So, I've just then made that because I said, "Oh, I'm looking for green." I've made that that's really actually like black or like even like dark blue. I'm looking at it as green.

42:45The same way that you might see a really positive scenario that is actually coming your way that you you maybe you're a bit confused about or whatever, but because you're in the mindset of looking at everything that is negative, you are not going to spot that, you know, those positive opportunities. You're just going to see it as negative like the green. So knowing that after like seeing so many people my seeing my life really like kind of um go the way it did for the majority of my life, I started to be like rather than looking at everything as you know someone's out to get you or you know someone's going to do you dirty so you shouldn't get a manager.

43:18That trader's a scammer, don't listen to him. Oh yeah, he's making money but no no trust me this way is the way. Like for me it was ICT. I was like, "No, no, no, no, bro. ICT, it's the way, bro. I know. I know it's the way." It was like, "Get off your high horse and start to look at everything as an opportunity." All right. And be smart about it. The second I started to do that, the second I started to see even meeting people and networking as an opportunity,

43:42I met a 21-year-old who told me 10 years younger, only been trading for like one year. All right, shout out to like Berg for example, that's his name, right? And it was him, for example, with like session sweeps. And I'm like, first of all, I looked at I was like, he trades fully mechanical. I'm just like, bro, you're like 21.

43:57What do you know? What do you know about trading, bro? I've been doing it. This is it's for three years. What do you know about [ __ ] I was like, get off your high horse, bro. Get What could you learn? What could you learn? I know there's an age difference, less experience. Don't be an old granddad hater and learn something. And that really helped. Like in the same way, I was like, "Cool, apply that to everything in life. See what you can learn. Not everything's going to be, you know, golden, but just try and take something whether you take it away for life or not.

44:23Cool. But you can always learn something. And that for me was like the the optimism, the excitement, the opp like opportunities are like coming left, right, and center to learn, grow, all these things. And and then like we were talking about at the start, the data journal. Now I'm looking at things going, what is working? Yeah. One loss out of eight. Let me [ __ ] it.

44:51you want to challenge me to find something, I'll find something that was good out of it. And let me now and that's and if you have that mindset in life genuinely, like you're gonna go so far. Yeah. Like and and I would like to say I'm a I'm a testament to that cuz anyone can go through all my music. I was depressed as a [ __ ] Like every song was depressing, suicidal, talking about the Reaper, like everything, you know?

45:08And then you look at like what blew me up. She's a 10bot, which was a fun relaxed song. The one song that, you know, I just didn't give a [ __ ] about, right? different energy towards it. Yeah. And it's the same thing in trading as well. I'm not saying if you don't care about the trade, it's gonna you're gonna, you know what I mean?

45:27Like you got to change your mindset towards it, man. Don't be don't be dying to make money like it [clears throat] won't work. You you can't be sometimes when you you know with the law of attraction and stuff just cuz you want something so badly sometime like it doesn't always work like that. You might push it away. It's always about pushing and pulling, you know. So, um yeah, that learning that energy and that balance is was key.

45:45Yeah. I I had a I've had a lot of lessons like that throughout life where exactly like you said, you find what you're looking for. I I learned the lesson and the exercise that you did, I actually did it at a Tony Robbins event. Don't know if you've ever done one. Tony Robbins. Yeah. [ __ ] amazing. Uh I did Unleash the Power Within. It's quite a popular one. It's like one of the ones where you walk on fire at the end. Nuts. Um, but he did it very similar, which is like you look around the room and he gets you he gives you like five or 10 seconds to count the number of things that you can see that are, let's say, green, for example, and then he gets you to close your eyes and then he says, "How many things did you see that were red?"

46:22And you're like, "Well, [ __ ] none." Right? And then he says, "Well, open your eyes and have a look around the room and see how many things that are red." The room is exactly the same. It's the same room from 10 seconds ago. The only difference and the only thing that has changed is your perception. Yeah. Right. You've shifted your focus and now suddenly that exact same environment is producing a completely different thing for you. And that like it changed my perception forever.

46:51And I was like, "Wow." Like I could choose to be a negative person or I could choose to be positive. I could choose to find the good in everything. And ultimately I'm not saying life is always going to be good and sunshine and rainbows as we both know. Yeah. But if you choose to focus on the positive things, I truly believe it leads to more opportunity, uh, networking, better outcomes.

47:14Like I the the most poetic way that I heard it is you're better off being I'm going to [ __ ] this up now. You're better off being the optimist that's wrong rather than the pessimist that's right. And I was like, I like that. Get that tattooed on my chest right now. Are you dumb? I'll get my name underneath as well. I'll get your face. Don't worry. No, you're all right.

47:36No, I like that. I like that. Yeah, it's it's an interesting way, but it it really changes how you look at everything, right? I I know this is very obviously trading focused but everything because well if we go on to trading exactly that like exactly that analogy right with

47:51trading if you are unprofitable right now and you are taking all these losses are you going to worry about all the losses or the the reality is you you are dead. Yeah you're you're [ __ ] at trading when you start off you're going to be [ __ ] might get a little bit of beginner's luck whatever but you're [ __ ] you're [ __ ] at this game that we're playing. All right I'm probably better than you.

48:12Let's just be completely honest about it. I'm better than you are. So, if you accept that you're [ __ ] and I'm good, how do you how are you going to get here? You're not going to get there by just getting lucky with wins and then figuring it out. Go and be like, okay, if I accept that I'm dead at this, let's start looking at some positives now. Okay, so these losses, even though these lost, right?

48:35What may what may be out of this? Well, it did run to 3R and even though it's a loss, I was trying to go for five R. So maybe, oh, I could have got three R out of that. Interesting. Or it might be, I entered in London, but actually the reversal came in New York. Interesting. Did I get the daily bias correct on that day? Interesting. Could I have gone break even? Interesting.

48:55That is what, for example, the the optimist would say, the negative person who is probably more than likely risking a lot or buying accounts that are too big, whatever it may be. they've got too much on the line or they're desperate for money and they're actually trading real capital, the that person will be like, "Oh, I just took like three losses in a row, man. Do you know what it is?

49:17It's just like, bro, I didn't go to the ice bath this morning and then um my guy called me and you know, like I was distracted. I had to shoot off and do this and that." I'm like, that's what the pessimist would say. Like, and you need to get out of that mindset. If you genuinely want to improve in trading, you need to switch over to this. I'm not saying be a blind optimist and just trust anything and but like critique yourself in an optimistic way because there's no in my opinion there's no way to get out of this losing period without being critical but also figuring out where could I improve like if you don't know if you're not thinking like that's great how could I do more of that then trading is not for you because otherwise you're just yeah you're not playing the same game as me.

50:00Yeah 100% 100%. Um, Artan, I want to start to wind this down

50:06slowly. I have a uh a couple of segments that I usually do towards the end of every episode. Uh, one of them is a little bit of like quickfire questions, hot takes. Uh, the other one is confessions of a trader, and I'll explain a little bit about what that is when we get on to it. Um, I'll start with a quick fire. I did not have sexual relations with that woman. Oh god, if it was that type of party.

50:28So, we've got a photo of you uh in the bathroom with the editors are going to throw it up now, right? Um, quickfire. Prop firms or personal capital. [snorts] Prop firms to start off. Personal capital long-term. Nice. I like that. Uh, mechanical or discretionary trading? Mechanical. Nice. Um, FX or equities? Equities. Even though I'm an FX boy, honestly, like it's it's uh Yeah, I know it's quick five, but bro, I think equities might have to be taking the lead at this point. Fair. Fair. Um, few hot takes for you.

51:15True or false? Most traders don't actually need a new strategy. False. True or false? The average trader would improve a lot by taking fewer trades. Uh, true. Super true. Nice. Uh, [snorts] true or false? Prop firms are the reason for a lot of bad habits. Completely false. I think they enforce really good habits. Nice. I like this. Um, what do you think is one of the most overrated aspects of trading? I'd probably say, uh, the amount of money that you make.

51:49Interesting. Yeah. And the reason why I say that is because there's people with who when I started had a like I had no money. So I don't want to say a lot more money than me. I had nothing. Yeah. Like but like I had like £100 account to trade with and they had a £10,000 account to trade with and they made £250 that week versus me I made like was it 20 was like 30 quid. So I'm looking at them and I'm like ra like you're good.

52:13You're making so much money. But really it's just risk to reward. Yeah. Yeah, like start looking at things as risk to reward. You can either up your risk or whatever, but yeah, the money you make is like, bro, I don't know what life path you had. I don't know what life path you had, and I'm not going to worry about that. I worry about my risk to reward and and that's it. Nice. Nice. Um, we're going to flip that question. What do you think is one of the most underrated aspects of trading?

52:35I'd say the most underrated aspect of trading is your self reflection, your self-development. I think that trading exposes you as a person and you have no choice but to listen to yourself and improve otherwise it just won't work for you. So for me um I come from a very uh chaotic environment both my domestic life and my career path like with music and stuff and that promotes creativity you know um impulsive decisions and doing things normally people wouldn't whereas trading made made me more regimented maybe more listen to myself look at myself and focus on the process and that has actually benefited me significantly in my life my relationships my traveling my decisions in general my risk taken everything.

53:19So, um it's made me a more confident person in everything. And so, yeah, that's why I say that that's the underrated part is the the self-reflection part cuz you ain't got a choice. Yeah, I love that, man. Uh last one for you. What is something that profitable traders do differently to unprofitable traders? I would say profitable traders accept that not every loss is a bad loss and not every win is a good win. And when you can actually genuinely identify that, that means either you've done the homework because you've you know what a good setup is, you know what a bad setup is, but the unprofitable trader will just look at it as a loss.

53:57And then because it's a loss, there has to be something that that is improved. But rather than focusing on the edge or the probability or am I proud of myself for actually like turning up today and sticking to the rules and doing that um they're just crying about the loss and that's why they'll never improve because they are just stuck here. And every trader has to go through this though like they have to make that transition and accept like you know I need to focus on that.

54:23I I do need to do that. But um unfortunately a lot of people just focus on the money for too long and then they just quit because of that. 100% 100%. Um, okay, last one for today,

54:39confessions of a trader, right? So, uh, what I like to do is compile questions, experiences, conversations that I've had with traders, um, into something which is probably fitting for our guest. Uh, think of it like a struggling trader is confessing something to you about their journey of trading, nothing else. Yeah. Right. Right. Um, and I want to hear your honest take, your advice, your wisdom, your experience to help that person overcome this.

55:03All right. So, today's confession of a trader. Every time I take a loss, I start questioning my strategy. I know that losses are part of trading, but emotionally I still feel like something is broken. How did you build trust in your system to execute consistently? Okay, so first things first is an exercise and I'm going to answer the question. Go to your journal if you have one and I want you to put together all of your winning trades.

55:28Yeah. Into a folder, right? I want you to go through all of those and see the main components of of your strategy to gain confidence in them. First of all, I want you to just understand like does does this actually work? Like be honest with yourself. Does this actually work? Then I want you to go over the characteristics of the losing trades and just see it just initially and just see is there any big correlations there. Right? Tell me honestly like you know afterwards obviously tell me honestly that like do you believe in the strategy and what is the parts of your strategy that you really genuinely believe in and has this worked for you for any period of time like is there any periods that you've you know had positive months or negative months if the answer is do you know what Artan I have genuinely stuck to my strategy that I'm showing you right now and I I am consistently losing you know I've got 100% hit rate in terms of execution of what I believe the strategy is and I've had six months of losing and but occasional wins.

56:28Listen m maybe that is your probably your gut speaking to you and telling you that genuinely this is not it. If however you are seeing a few wins but there are moments of you know you're not actually 100% you know at the charts all the time you're you are taking a few trades that you know when we go through all these trades there's like 50% of these are impulsive. 50% of these are what on the one minute when you say you trade on the 5minute then it's like well actually it's a really good positive because you now you can understand that your strategy when you are 100% and you stick to it it's good it's like you're you're poisoning yourself by taking too many trades that are bad that's actually making you doubt your strategy because if I'm honest you're bundling it in and saying it's your strategy when actually this isn't part of your strat but it's like you again not to keep going I hate to be the the data journal guy.

57:17Yeah. But like really you do need that to look at to just be like are you correct? Like is your the voice in your head correct? And you do actually need to change your strategy because you're doubtful. Um or do you just need to work on yourself a little bit more to get a bit more confident? And the confidence, you know, the removal of the doubt comes from data. I was going to chime in there. We're going to become one of those people that finish each other's sentences.

57:44Hey, I was about to say data. I swear to God. So yeah, I hope that answers. That was perfect. Oh god. Right, Artton, it's been an absolute pleasure, man. Thank you so much for your time, your wisdom. I think there are so many gems in there for people to unpack and take away. So I appreciate you being here, man.

58:09Thank you, my boy. I appreciate you having me, man. What a full circle moment, eh? 100%. Crazy crazy. Awesome. Right guys and girls, that is another episode in the bag. As always, we want to hear from you. What was your biggest takeaway from today's episode? Was there something that Artan said which changed your perspective? Change the way that you're thinking about your trading.

58:30You're taking some advice on board to help change the outcomes that you're ultimately not yet getting. If there is, let us know in the comments below. We'll be reading every single one. And if you're someone that wants to have your confession of a trader read out to a future guest, check the description box below. There'll be a form in there where you can fill yours out and we'll read it out to a future guest to help you on your journey to profitability.

58:50Thank you so much for tuning in. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like it, subscribe to the channel for more episodes just like this, and I will see you in the next one. Take care. Welcome to the Propirm Trader YouTube channel, the number one channel in the world for funded traders. The best way to continue to support us is make sure that you're subscribed to the channel and you like this video. That's going to help us to continue to reach the best prop firm traders and best prop firms in the game.

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