What do we do when it all comes crashing down?

So the last couple of days of ETH correction had me thinking. Eventually this market (and the crypto market in general) will take a big bear turn. Then what? Personally, I don't want to be trading ETH pairs when ETH might dive 40% in a day. So, what will I do? I guess I will just trade USDT pairs? Perhaps switch to an exchange that allows for more USD pairs or shorting options.

I'm not really that interested in shorting or margins. It seems much too complicated, to be honest. I also don't want to wait passively for that big bear to sneak up on me and eat my lunch. So, no real plan as of yet, but I'm thinking about it and I'm watching some videos and reading up on how to trade in a bear market. Not only will this help me in some of the present day alt-coin markets that have their bear days, but when the inevitable does happen and we enter into a year or two of down-market trends, I want to be ready. I have heard it over and over that any idiot can make money in a bull market. I am proof of that. We need to learn how to survive the Bear too!

However, today the bull showed up. Overnight, ETH recovered nicely and just as I was having my first coffee and checking the markets, I decided to sell out my position. I bought in and out a couple of times during the next proceeding waves and had locked my profit in by lunch. If I would have stopped there, I would have been ahead, but I traded a little on the alt-coins. Got my ETH locked up in some slow trades at the point I should have been selling it off and then ended up losing money by the time I was able to off-load it.

As always, as soon as I cashed out, the market decided to show me all the signals that I should have stayed in. This is a very annoying trend. I swear if I hold out for a turn around, it will never happen and I will continue to bleed profits. But as soon as I cash out (8/10 times?) the market gets a giant bump or decides to reverse trend.

Honestly, I feel like ETH could take a little dive overnight and present a decent entry for the morning. That being said, it will probably reach $5000 tomorrow. I have to be happy with my small daily profits, because I am not meant to ever catch the big train it seems.

Here is a picture of my ETH trades which represent most of my gains today.

A is was my first sale of the day and that helped consolidate a lot of my smaller gains from the past two days while trading with deflated ETH/alt-coin pairs.

Then I bought the first dip perfect, but sold a little early. The RSI was looking healthy, so I bought in again when the bulls CRUSHED a huge wall at $1400. Again, I timed the exit pretty good. I caught the next wave very good as well. But then, I did not get out at B because my funds were tied up in some some slow trades. I should have cashed out for small losses or even on those trades and took this peak, This is where I lost $3-400 on my day. I'm still happy with what I came away with, but who doesn't like an extra $300? At C is where I finally had my ETH back from the alt trades and I decided to buy in again if I was going to wait for another bump anyway.

Don't ask how I missed the peak there. I had my stop set for ~$10 too high and I wasn't fast enough to make the decision to sell when it started turning. I was lucky to catch a small rebound and get out with the tiniest of profits on my 2nd buy and a small loss for the one before that, coming out ahead for the day. I call it a win. Stupid, but a win.

Today was my first day using the RSI oscillator to try and make decisions beyond "base-cracking" and I had pretty good success. Again, my main problem is identifying when I've missed the trade. This takes a surprising amount of self-awareness to realize when the brain has switched into "hope" mode instead of "observation" mode.

I need to become more comfortable with "leaving money on the table" and practicing making quick in the moment decisions when I realize my trade has been missed or the pattern I was expecting did not develop. Every now and then, a pattern will change just because you "will" it too. :) But usually just hoping that the data you see in front of you is not real, does not work. Yet I find myself doing just that more times than I care to admit. These habits are detrimental and I will attempt to curb them, starting tomorrow.

I saw a slight decrease in my average daily % needed to reach $1M before the end of the year and a healthy increase in my over all daily % average. Again, this was mostly due to ETH finally coming back up so that I could realize the gains on the deflated ETH I had been trading with. But profit is profit and I'll take it!

Remember friends, don't trade like an idiot!