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How to Develop Winning Trading Systems That Fit You

Understanding how to develop a system will allow you trade whatever timeframe, frequency, market conditions, style, or trading market/instrument you prefer. Whether you trade stocks, futures, currencies or gold, etc., and whether you place 50 trades per day or 50 trades per year, you will learn how to think about and assemble all of the components that work together in every functional trading system.

By the time you’ve completed the How to Develop a Winning Trading System that Fits You Workshop, system development will seem almost second nature for you.

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Blueprint for Trading Success

Some people take years to discover just a portion of what you will learn in a 3-day period. You’ll do so much more than just learn about building a successful trading business, you will personalize each of the tasks and steps during the three days into your own customized action plan. After completing the Blueprint for Trading Success Workshop, you return home knowing exactly what you need to do to reach your trading objectives. 

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The New Infinite Wealth Workshop

In 2016, I am bringing back Infinite Wealth. In this new version of the workshop, I will emphasize the psychological principles of wealth rather than any technical strategies — because those change over time. The psychological principles of wealth or inner wealth, however, remain constant and actually, they will lead you to the “right” technical strategies. We will call this course the “New Infinite Wealth Workshop” and it will be one of our core workshop offerings.

Think about the following for a moment: If you stopped working today, how many months would you survive maintaining your current standard of living? Three months? Maybe five months? 18 months? Perhaps 10 years? Or, could you last indefinitely — for the rest of your life? Once you can maintain your level of living for the rest of your life, then you are infinitely wealthy. Very few people say they could stop working for the rest of their lives.

 

This event was sold out but we have had a cancellation. Contact us if you'd like to get this seat.

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Feature ArticleDR

Making 2016 Meaningful

by Michael Hall

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I'm often asked, "What is Neuro-Semantics?" The shortest answer is, "It is about the meaningfulness of your life." That's because the term "semantics" refers to meaning and meaningfulness and "neuro-" refers to where you experience meaning, namely, in your body and in your experiences. Given that, how meaningful is your current life experience? How much meaning do you experience on a daily basis?

These initial questions about meaning and meaningfulness are just the beginning. There are a lot more to ask. For example, we can take any aspect of life (well-being, health, fitness, relationships, family, job/career, finances, wealth-creation, hobbies, creativity, sports, faith/spirituality, etc.) and ask these questions regarding meaning.

  • How meaningful is exercise for you?
  • What meanings do you give to staying fit?
  • How meaningful is your work, the job you do, your career path?
  • What meanings do you give to your loved ones?
  • How much meaning do you invest in them?
  • How much more meaning would you like to invest?

One of the central models we use in Neuro-Semantics, which takes it beyond the ken of NLP, is The Meaning-Performance Axes. This model arose from the study of self-actualization and the research into the history of the Human Potential Movement. (The Human Potential Movement was also the background for the emergence of NLP, see "The Secret History of NLP"). These axes enable us to sort out the two dimensions of life, the inner and outer dimensions, which uniquely and still mysteriously defines our lives.

The Meaning Axis

You and I are meaning-makers. We create, construct, and invent meaning. This lies at the heart of our essential nature. Without formal "instincts" which animals have, we create our "instinct-like" responses by the meanings we construct. Nor is this optional. You have to invent meanings. Why? Because by itself, nothing meanings anything. For anything to have "meaning," you have to attribute meaning to it. And when you think, when you feel, when you respond — that is what is happening, you are attributing, appraising, and constructing meaning. What meaning you create then becomes the question. So also the quality of the meaning that you invent. That's because the quality of your life is the quality of your meanings. This is the inner dimension — the dimension that you cannot see, hear, smell, or taste. It is your inner game. And all of the truly meaningful and significant facets of your life comes from this dimension. That's why it is inside-out.

The Performance Axis

You and I are also responders. We act. We speak, emote, behave, react, respond, and do things. And the key to our actions, the meaning of our actions, the quality of our behaviors lies in our meanings. That's because behind or within every response is a meaning, and the response is the acting-out of meaning. That's also what every emotion is — the feel of meaning. Regarding this outward dimension, this is the outer game and is what you can see, hear, smell, and taste. It is empirical and sensory-based. And, the quality of your actions or performances depends on the quality of your meanings.

This is Neuro-Semantics: the synthesis of meaning and performance which enables you to manage your life — both your inner and outer dimensions of life so that you find it significant and highly meaningful. If there's some aspect of life that you don't experience as rich and meaningful as you would like, you have two areas or dimensions that you can work with — the inner and the outer games.

As you begin the new year, the structure of experience requires that you must choose and act, for better or worse, to determine the meaning of your life. No one can do this for you. No one or no thing will come along to relieve you of that responsibility. You are the meaning-maker and you are the responder. So your life — and the quality of your life, the quality of your actions, the effectiveness of what you do — is ultimately in your hands. If you try to live off of the meanings that someone else gives you — you do so to your own detriment. If you procrastinate, waiting for some great meaning to come to you — the odds are against you and you will more likely just be wasting your time.

To make your life meaningful — you need to learn what meaning is, how you make it, how you can suspend old meanings, how to reframe new meanings, how to integrate meanings into your neurology, to translate what you know into what you do, and how to perform your highest meanings. That's what Neuro-Semantics is all about.

Yes, this is about "how to run your own brain" (the basic NLP theme) and yes, it is about "how to manage your states" (another NLP theme). It is also about how to become a professional communicator in using language with precision and clarity (after all, NLP is essentially a Communication Model). Yet it is about much more. It is about discovering your uniqueness and stepping into your very best states so that you can unleash your highest meanings and values. That's what the Accessing Personal Genius (APG) focuses on as the flagship training of Neuro-Semantics.

From there we move into the unleashing processes, that is, how actualizing your highest meanings into your best performances work. Accordingly, picking up on the modeling emphasis of Maslow and NLP, Neuro-Semantics focuses on the structure of experience and how to model excellent and highly meaningful performances. If you're committed to raising the level of meaningfulness in your life this year, try Neuro-Semantics.

L. Michael Hall, Ph.D.

Making 2016 Meaningful
Reprinted with permission
Meta Reflections #1: January 4, 2016

Dr. Hall is known as a prolific writer with 30 some books to his name, more than 100 published articles and is recognized as a leading NLP Trainer and developer of many models, most notably the revolutionary Meta-States model and more recently the Matrix model. Learn more...


Workshops

2016 - January

$700 Early Enrollment Discounts Ends Today!

We typically only hold these January workshops once each year in the US.

Be sure to register now before the $700 early enrollment discount ends.

Please note: The New Infinite Wealth workshop is nearly sold out. If you'd like to enroll, email us: [email protected].

January 22-24

How to Develop A Winning Trading System

Presented by RJ Hixson and Van Tharp

January 26-28

Blueprint For Trading Success

Presented by RJ Hixson and Kirk Cooper

January 29-31


The New Infinite Wealth Workshop

Presented by Van Tharp

2016 - February

February 13-14

Oneness Awakening

With Van Tharp and Rebecca Price

 

Bring Your Valentine for Half Price!

February 19-21

Forex Trading Systems
Presented by Gabriel Grammatidis

Learn to Trade Three Forex Trading Systems with an Edge

Join us for this three-day workshop and leave prepared to trade the system right away. Presented by professional Forex Trader and Super Trader graduate Gabriel Grammatidis.

Have you ever attended a trading workshop that taught a lot of methodology and a bunch of rules, only to find that you had trouble trading it when you got back home because you had so little experience with it? Gabriel had that experience and wants to better prepare the traders at his workshop.

Students in his course come away with a solid understanding of the trading process because they practice the setups, entries and exits in groups with other students in the class. Gabriel makes extensive use of a trading simulator (live history replay) with which actual trades are traded in class as if “live.” So you leave the workshop already having a good idea on how to trade the systems.

After a thorough review of each system, he slowly walks you through a number of trades on each system that has multiple time frame charts—basically the same screen setup that Gabriel uses to identify setups, entries and exits. All of these trades use recorded historical data run on a software system that reproduces the price charts from the date and time in the live market. You will be able to watch the setups happen as he explains how to get ready for and make the entry, and then how to get ready for and make the exit. After walking the class through several simulations, Gabriel involves the students in the decision process for pattern detection, entry and exits as the acquire competence.

When you get home, you’ll already have a good sense of trading each system—which means you’ll have a running start. And just to be sure, Gabriel provides everyone with pages of additional example trades to take home and study.


Plus, you have the option to continue with your training in  two days of live Forex trading so you can trade the systems live!

Learn more...

February 22-23

Live Forex Trading
Presented by Gabriel Grammatidis

2016 March - Van Returns to Sydney Australia

March workshops dates are firm and open for registrations!


March 11-13


March 15-17


March 19-21

Sydney, Australia

Peak Performance 101
Presented by Van Tharp with co-instructor RJ Hixson

Blueprint for Trading Success
Presented by RJ Hixson and Van Tharp

How to Develop A Winning Trading System
Presented by RJ Hixson and Van Tharp

2016 - May

May 13-15

Peak Performance 101

Presented by Van Tharp with RJ Hixson and Kirk Cooper

May 17-19

Peak Performance 203 — Happiness Workshop
Presented by RJ Hixson and Kirk Cooper

May 21-23

New! Modeling Great Trading Through Mental Strategies (Peak 204)
Presented by Van Tharp

Combo Discounts available for all back-to-back workshops!

See our workshop page for details.


Free Book

We're Giving You a FREE Book!

TRADING BEYOND THE MATRIX
The Red Pill for Traders and Investors

We pay for the book, you pay for shipping.
ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS CLICK HERE!

Below is a brief video on how powerful this book is to traders.



Trading Tip

DR

What to Expect with Markets at a Near-Term Extreme

by D.R. Barton, Jr.

Click here to resolve formatting problems

The start of the trading and investing year has certainly been eventful. China’s market woes and crude oil’s further price implosion have been major drivers in pushing the U.S. equity markets lower.

And I know you’ve seen the recent headlines: The Dow Jones Industrial Average had its worst first five trading days ever for a new year. That’s a pretty catchy headline but actually, it’s also quite important for a couple of reasons. Let’s look at the two biggest ones today — the annual flow of money in the new year and the technical extreme the market just reached.

Against the Tide


The market drop last week runs contra to an important institutional money flow tendency. At the end of 2015 I wrote:

There is also the reality that institutions and funds have new money coming into them during the first couple of days of the quarter and of the New Year. Automatically funded accounts like pension funds or any systematically invested money has to be put to work. This well-known money flow effect caused the first two days of the month and quarter to be better performers on average, than any other two-day period.

I remind readers of this now because it indicates how harsh the recent downtrend has been even in the face of this well-known phenomenon. The downtrend has also put us in to an extremely overstretched position that only happens a couple of times a year on average. Let’s take a look at that next.

When the Rubber Band Stretches Too Far

The market drop last week was so rapid that it triggered a technical condition that only happened once in all of 2015: four consecutive days where the Dow Jones Industrial Average ETF Trust (DIA) closed below the lower Bollinger Band.

First we’ll look at a chart to help us see this and then we’ll follow with some explanation:

van tharp

The dotted line plots the 20 day simple moving average (SMA) for price. The solid blue lines above and below the SMA are Bollinger Bands which were developed by John Bollinger. Price moves around the SMA and those blue lines express the volatility of that price movement using the statistical measurement of standard deviation. Bollinger bands are spaced a specified number of standard deviations away from the 20 day SMA. In this case, the bands are the default distance on many charting packages — two standard deviations above and below the mid-band.

The bands are fairly adaptive and move with the price so it takes a pretty strong move for a big index to close outside of a Bollinger Band. Multiple consecutive closes outside the bands represent significant moves and they are generally rare. How rare? Since the beginning of 2000, “four consecutive closes below the lower Bollinger Band” has only occurred 34 times.

What came after those “four consecutive closes below the lower Bollinger Band” since 2000 is also interesting. The folks out at paststat.com ran the numbers for what happened after each of those occurrences and found that 82% of the time, the market was higher 20 trading days later. Interestingly, the market reaction was more mixed on shorter time frames: up only 52% of the time after 5 trading days and up 59% of the time after 10 trading days.

So What?

Over the long haul, markets have had an upward bias, so patterns that call out downside extremes tend to resolve to the upside more often than not. But an 82% of the time edge is fairly significant in the near-to-intermediate-term and you could use that in your trading and investing decision making processes for the coming weeks.

Your thoughts and comments are always welcome — please send them to drbarton “at” vantharp.com

Great Trading,
D. R.

About the Author: A passion for the systematic approach to the markets and lifelong love of teaching and learning have propelled D.R. Barton, Jr. to the top of the investment and trading arena. He is a regularly featured analyst on Fox Business’ Varney & Co. TV show (catch him most Thursdays between 12:30 and 12:45), on Bloomberg Radio Taking Stock and MarketWatch’s Money Life Show. He is also a frequent guest analyst on CNBC’s Closing Bell, WTOP News Radio in Washington, D.C., and has been a guest on China Central Television — America and Canada’s Business News Network. His articles have appeared on SmartMoney.com MarketWatch.com and Financial Advisor magazine. You may contact D.R. at "drbarton" at "vantharp.com".


Swing Trading Systems E-Learning Course

 

Swing with Ken Long The new Swing Trading Systems home study course is now available! Learn with Dr. Ken Long as he teaches his Swing Trading Systems Workshop via streaming video!

This new e-learning course includes Ken Long's Swing Trading Workshop, 5 swing trading systems and a bonus workshop featuring Van Tharp on Tharp Think principles. The course also includes extensive downloadable files to support your learning.

You can complete this course at your own pace, from the comfort of your own home or office, and access the materials as many times as you wish during your 1 year subscription period.


Take a look at this video from Ken to learn more about this course.

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We have extensive information about the Swing Trading System e-learning course, including how to purchase...click the link below!

Learn More About The Swing E-Learning Course...

 

In the six minute video below, Ken analyzes several trades from the relatively quiet session on Monday, October 12. He opens with a swing trade that started last week on XIV talking about the entry, initial stop, target, and progress of the trade so far. That swing trade offers the opportunity trade XIV intraday with some confidence in the long bias. Ken provides two tradeable intraday scenarios for the XIV move during the Monday session and the position sizing ramifications for each. Ken then discusses a second trade where one of the traders in the chat room went short USO and earned a couple of R for the effort.

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Matrix Contest

MatrixEnter the Matrix Contest 
for a chance to win a free workshop!

We want to hear about the one most profound insight that you got from reading Van's new book, Trading Beyond the Matrix, and how it has impacted your life. If you would like to enter, send an email to [email protected].

If you haven't purchased Trading Beyond the Matrix yet, click here.

For more information about the contest, click here.


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January 13, 2016 #767

 

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