Mistakes were made by me.

I had a great Q1 (+58% gains) and then a flat Q2. The bad news: I made mistakes in Q2. The good news: I know what mistakes I made.

Here is what I did wrong in Q2:

1. I did not wait for trends to be confirmed. In many situations I put on the trade early and because I trade options, I was not left with enough time for the trade to play out.

2. I unconsciously started predicting what the market is going to do next instead of letting the market tell me what it is going to do next.

3. I did not use my standard discipline to let the winners ride enough and cut the losers early.

4. I sometimes overtraded when I just needed to sit back and let the market do its thing.

5. I got swayed by experts on TV and elsewhere by their thesis and predictions.

6. I tried out variations of my system instead of sticking to what I know works for me.

As anyone can tell from the above, the mistakes were all internal to me. There were no external factors for me not making money in Q2. That just means that it is a problem I can avoid going forward.

None of my thesis and systems have changed. They still work. I was just not disciplined enough to follow them to the letter. That is what I intend to do going forward.