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Questions

(Quotes from Ed in Red)

Mon, 27 Feb 2006

Graduating from IVTT


Hi Ed,

I am not going to be at the tribe meeting this Thursday. I decide to stay in [City] and not renew my apartment lease in South Lake Tahoe. I miss my friends and family too much to stay another 6 months.

My experience with The Trading Tribe is incredible.

Please extend my thanks to all of the IV-TT members for their support and encouragement. I intend to share TTP with everyone in my area who shows an interest.

Please post my name and e-mail address in the directory for [City]. I intend to honor the commitments I make to The Trading Tribe.

Thank you for sharing your process, your self and for contributing to the evolution of the work.

Transitions

are generally from one self

to another.

Tue, 28 Feb 2006

Chess Problem

White to mate in two moves

OK.

Sometimes the Receiver

discovers the gift comes with strings.

Clip: http://www.thomasfuchs.com/site/

Tue, 28 Feb 2006
 

I don't know how to do things in the future.

Tue, 28 Feb 2006
 

Hotseat Recap - Frustration

Hi Ed,

My last hotseat session centers around the issue of frustration. I continually present a snapshot with a common theme, yet in the real world my actions do nothing to support the ownership of my snapshot. I am frustrated and angry with myself.

The tribe encourage me to get into the feeling of frustration. I recall showing a grimace, squeezing my head and stretching out my body. My conscience mind kicks in as I question how or why this has anything to do with my issue. The process manager continues to encourage me to get into the feelings, however I feel I am yet again suppressing something.

I then notice that the person sitting a few seats away is drumming lightly. Boy does that p..s me off. I tell the tribe manager the drumming is annoying and the tribe jump all over me. As the tribe encourage me to get more into the feeling of annoyance I notice that it is quite easy for me to tune out the drumming (by now the entire tribe is drumming). This stuffing of feelings is a knot I address often on the hotseat.

The process manager asks if I am willing to go forward. It pains me to say yes, but at the same time I know this is a huge issue for me and I agree to continue. As the tribe continues to drum I get into the annoyance feeling yet again. The annoyance I feel turns into anger.

Experiencing  feelings

of anger

... may help eliminate the need

for violence.

Clips:

http://www.staleywise.com/

collection/piel/big/frustration

http://webpages.ursinus.edu/

daduffy/Portfolio/ESS%20265/Duffy_Web/

images/Anger.JPG

Mon, 27 Feb 2006

Hot Seat Follow up

Hi Ed,

I hope you are well. My hot seat follows:

The tribe meeting begins and upon conclusion of the
drumming I notice strong feelings of anxiety and
tingling in my chest. This is the same feeling I had
during the snapshot process earlier in the afternoon.
I tend to get anxious making presentations and being
in front of groups of people. I do not like this
feeling.

I get into TTP with the help of the process manager.
Soon I'm into forms of stretching, rubbing the legs,
and heavy breathing. I realize these forms are all too
familiar, things I used to do before races when I swam
competitively.

If you got it

flaunt it.

If you don't got it

flaunt it anyway.

Someone might think you got it.

Clips:

http://www.menshealth.gr/id/files/

14904/lefterhs-speedo-eksoxiko.jpg

http://www.chicus.com/images/

santa_speedo/our_group.jpg

Mon, 27 Feb 2006
 

Mon, 27 Feb 2006

Down 6 Stone

About me:

I am of Indian (Hindu) origin.

My background is in Mathematics and Computer Science. Most of my professional life I have worked as a Systems Designer / Programmer.

I have always been interested in the Markets and when
I read the Market Wizards I got hooked. I have ever
since been on a journey to figure out the Markets.
 

Thank you for sharing your process.

1 stone = 14 pounds, so you are now at 126 pounds, down 84 pounds from 210 pounds.

Mon, 27 Feb 2006

Many commercial packages work fairly well for examining a single system on a single instrument trading a constant amount. 

To simulate interactive portfolios with multiple systems, multiple instruments, multiple entry and exit points - that also respond to upswings and drawdowns in equity, you may have to write your own simulator.

I am currently writing my applications in C#.

C# views C++ pointers

as intentionally unsafe.

Sun, 26 Feb 2006
 

Workshop Snapshot Materializes +

Incline Village Trading Tribe Visit Report

Hi Chief and the Tribe Community,  Been a while since the January workshop, but I wanted to share my experiences there, my visit to the Incline Village tribe, and my subsequent local tribe meeting.

My strongest impressions from the workshop

- Learning from experienced TTP practitioners

- Being inspired by newbies jumping into TTP

- My first experience with the snapshot process.

My snapshot at the workshop was me with a bunch of
kids benefiting from my eduational foundation.

Lo and behold, a few days later I was recruited
to be on the board of directors of an educational
foundation that was just starting up. I'm now
on that board of directors!

Observing the relative levels of willingness of everyone, myself included, and seeing how t is really fundamental. TTP doesn't work without willingness, and the more willingness there is, the greater the results.

Learning to be careful to not send out my feelings while being a process manager, e.g. frustration with the slow pace. Just encourage and let the sender experience whatever he/she is experiencing, and in whatever manner it manifests itself.

Impression from my visit to the IV Tribe

Snapshot process:

I had my hot buttons pushed when getting feedback.
Could feel my defensiveness. Good entry point fodder.

I was struck by how the giving of feedback and championing of snapshots says something about the person sending.

TTP Session:

Sun, 26 Feb 2006

Down 60 pounds.

My Before and After Pictures


Ed writes:
"You might consider including before and after photos of yourself - as stunning proof of your ability to stick to a winning system."

Here you go, Ed. These photos aren't of the snazzy shirtless variety you feature on the FAQ. I guess now that I am leaner (and continuing to trim) I might get used to the idea of posing while wearing less.

The 0206 photo is a picture of me this afternoon in the back yard. The 1104 photo is from around the time of the November 2004 workshop. The setting is the wine country of California as my wife and I tour around the area before the workshop. The 0605 photo is from a trip to Jamaica in June of 2005. That is me looking pretty windblown, sunburned, and heavy about one month before I commit to my fitness plan.

As of the date of the Jamaica photo I weigh between 250-255 pounds. As of today I weigh 194 pounds. I intend to continue my new lifestyle indefinitely. My weight likely stabilizes around whatever the appropriate level is for my individual body without too much change in eating or exercise habits. Given the rate of my fat loss so far, my body type and frame, and my current physical condition, I estimate that my proper weight might be somewhere between 170-180 pounds.

I am fine with posting these photos on FAQ. It may be difficult to publish them without revealing my identity. You can blot out the face, but I think that hides one of the areas that shows the most change.

November 2004

Attends the TTP Workshop

June 2005

Makes the Commitment to Health

February 2006

Now - Sticking to the System

Thank you for sharing your process.

And for demonstrating the power of willingness.

Willingness to stick to a system

tends to pay off big time

in losing weight,

rock climbing,

trading the markets

and life in general.

Clip: http://www.100plusposters.com/

PerseveranceCliffHanger.html

Sun, 26 Feb 2006

Feel Like Writing to You

Hello Ed,

I just feel like writing to you, like many people on the FAQ I trust you but you are not a model to me, the only model is what I am experiencing in developing the system.

Not sure if you remember me, I tell you before that I am creating a chart that matches how the system I am trading works, everything I stand for depends on creating it and no matter it works or not and from there I will keep trying.

I recently read a book called ‘The Logical Trader’ by Mark Fisher, this book is really good in explaining how to trade using time based charts but as I went through it I could not swallow the information because I use price only to trade and do not use time and his method is based on time and price, I decide to stick to what I know and take it from there, am I wrong?

Thank you for sharing your process.

You might consider taking your feelings about developing a unique system to your Tribe as entry points.

You might also consider running historical simulations on your system to see how how it compares with conventional approaches.

Comparing Things

is a standard method

for finding the good stuff.

Clip:

http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/edtech/

Sun, 26 Feb 2006

Thoughts on the System Model

God trades his trending self!

Hi Ed,

Thank you for your elaboration of the system model in your Feb. 9 post. I ask you to elaborate some more if you’re willing, in response to the points I make below:

1) Paraphrasing your paragraph 5, it seems that you say: A causal model can be a useful approximation of a system, and it is initially created by ignoring elements with small effects. Can you offer insight into what elements have been ignored in western legal / political systems, and in general the playing of the “judgment” game, that make those causal models as “soul-killing” as they often are?

2) In paragraphs 9 and 10 (the last two), you say that a system changes when elements change their internal response (processing) to reception. Why do you exclude system changes as a result of elements changing what they send?

If “manipulation” is defined as changing what is sent without changing the processing of what is received, I still don’t exactly see why changing what is sent would fail to change the system. I DO see the effects on the individual element that manipulates: there is a “break” in integrity between what is received and what is sent within that element. Would you say that, for a person, such a break has the effect of isolating the person from the flow of the system? If one is isolated from the system he can neither gain, nor lose, from the flow of the system; is that correct?

3) What are systems then ultimately composed of? Is there free will? I assume that elements that can “change” can do so only because they themselves are systems. If you keep breaking things down into smaller system you have to eventually get to a simplified system level whose elements can’t change, i.e., can’t be broken down further into sub-systems. I wonder, can it be shown, perhaps, that a system cannot exist without having changeable elements, except one in which all possible states are definable? What does this say about us.

Can we really change? Can we direct change within ourselves? Do you perhaps see the full development of a human as simply the complete untying of all k-nots that hamper total reception of the wider system, following by the unadulterated flow of the system through that human? Given that, what is “intention” then?

What underlies most of my post is the question: is there free will, and if not, what is “intention.” I have thought about this before and concluded that a desire for “free will” is a desire to have that part of us that “intends things” to lie outside the system, really, to be some sort of supernatural soul that can operate on the system of the real world yet be isolated from it. Of course, there’s no more reason to believe such a thing than there is to believe there’s some guy with a beard floating around in space who wants us to be a member of whatever religion we’re arbitrarily born into.

The notion that what I “am” is not “me” but rather just an element of the system (but a nice element—one that has consciousness: an element that can see and act within and on the system) - well, it sometimes makes me feel small and powerless and anything BUT free - until I realize that, more accurately, it makes me nothing other than EVERYTHING! I see this as it relates to trading (hey, “everything’s” gotta eat, too) as typical trading attempting to be outside the system and controlling/predicting it vs being IN the system by going with the flow of trends. So, I guess I can go from feeling small and powerless to being GOD: being everything and conscious of it too! God trades his trending self!

Thank you for presenting some of the essential puzzles at the current core of physics and philosophy. 

I do not claim to know the right solutions for you.  I can, however share my own current thinking on these matters. 

You might consider taking the feelings of these puzzles to your Tribe as entry points - to help find your own answers - and perhaps help to extend the boundaries of science a little further out into the mystery.

-----

My best guesses, so far:

The causal notions of blame, guilt, and right-wrong provide essential support for the Western legal / political system.  The system model, lacking these elements, does not provide such support.

A model, a mental convenience to facilitate thinking and imagination. A system model assists us think about how a structure of components generates various modes of behavior.

The transfer function of a component describes the way it generates output in response to its  inputs.  Another name for transfer function is policy. 

In TTP we intend to gain control of our personal policies by untying k-nots that aim our policies toward re-living situations that entrain feelings we don't like.

The choice of what components to include in a model depends upon the purpose of the model and the level of aggregation.  For example:

A driver's model of his car generally ignores the interplay of pistons, valves and cams in the engine.  A mechanic, however, may find these to be key elements in understanding how the engine operates, although he may ignore the elastic properties of steel.  A materials design engineer, however, may consider how the individual molecules behave under various conditions of pressure and temperature.

I wonder what element  you consider to be the ultimate smallest one. The official scientific answer keeps migrating toward smaller and smaller (atoms, protons & electrons, quarks, etc.).

Heisenberg's uncertainty principle (1927) states that in the moment of now, you cannot know both the position and momentum of a particle.

This profoundly contradicts the causality model; The causality model implies that if you know the present dynamic, you can predict the future.  If, as Heisenberg claims,  you can't know the present dynamic, then the causality model never applies.

Schrödinger's earlier attempt at this puzzle formulates charge density as an electron wave function.  Max Born arrives to declare that the function has to be a probability wave function.

According to Heisenberg, we may not predict the future; we may, however, compute probabilities.  Heisenberg does not say life is uncertain; Heisenberg says certainty has limits.

The "free-will" model and the "deterministic" model are likely life-style models - neither necessarily have anything to do with mathematics or with real life.  They have to do with life-style preferences.

Pro-active, successful types may embrace the free-will model as it gives them a "reason" for taking credit for how events evolve.

Others may embrace the deterministic model as it gives them a "reason" they don't have to take responsibility for how things turn out.

In the system (responsibility) model, the distinction is moot; you know your intentions by your results. 

If you want to increase your personal scope, you learn to work within the system; you develop a personal transfer functions that manifest your intentions.

Schrödinger's Cat

is a curious animal

whose intention to live or die

depends on someone else

finding out

by looking at it.

Clips:

http://www.aip.org/history/heisenberg/p08c.htm

 http://www.howe.k12.ok.us/

~jimaskew/shrodcat.gif

Sat, 25 Feb 2006
 

I am currently preparing software to support the extension of TSP.  I am also open to an associate editor / apprentice to assist with this work. 

Sat, 25 Feb 2006
 

If you would like to prepare an index, I can post it to this site.  I am currently preparing a sequel book about TTP and it, too, can use an index.

Thank you for the catch. For a full list of errata, (five so far) click.

Google

is essentially

a multi-billion-dollar

index.

Sat, 25 Feb 2006

A Stone in the Pit of my Stomach

Dear Ed,

I thoroughly enjoy reading The Trading Tribe. I am on
my second reread.

I want to start a Tribe here in [City]. I sent my details but they do not appear in the tribe directory.  Could you please add [my] details in the tribe directory?

Reading the book being an avid reader of FAQ implies
my Trading style and results are different. I am
removing the chaff from the wheat.

Stones in the Stomach

Sometimes they disappear

by slow disintegration.

Sometimes they disappear

in a flash of insight and laughter,

per the aha-haha.

Clip: http://www.detectiveservices.com.au/

This Banjo Player

bears a remarkable resemblance

to a younger me.

Sat, 25 Feb 2006

Just Curious 

No problem. It's a pleasure to read the FAQ. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us. I feel very grateful.

I have been reviewing old FAQ pages for a while and jotting down notes, starting from the very first FAQ in Nov '02. Recently I start a commitment to read two old FAQ pages every week. I feel pleased and inspired when I read, and sometimes I do more than two pages a week - there's no reason to stop when I feel great learning. I'm now at October 1-10 of 2004.

Thanks Ed.

P.S.

You might consider putting your favorites into a Brief History of Now.

Thank you for the catch.

It's Still and Forever

Now.

CLip: http://www.goodhandarts.com/

Sat, 25 Feb 2006

In the Incline Village Trading Tribe, we begin the session with drumming.  This tends to center the Tribe and put us all in a mild trance state.

Drumming during hot seats is another valuable tool for an expert Tribe.

Once a Tribe is up to speed on how TTP works (creating a healing field of acknowledgment, purposefully experiencing k-nots, finding positive intentions, getting to the zero-point, etc.) drumming by receivers, to create the healing field seems to add another dimension of acknowledgment.

At IVTT, we keep our drums handy during the sessions. Sometimes some of us drum and others encourage in other ways.  Sometimes we all drum and sometimes no one drums.  Like many things in TTP, The level of drumming tends to seek its own level.

TTP is empirical.  We learn by doing.  You might consider joining a drum circle in your city to experience drumming without a conscious intention to work through k-nots.

 Drumming

Like many growth processes

drumming seem to work well with TTP

Clip: https://www.healthyshopping.com/

Remo/images/CircleOnly_250.jpg

Sat 25, Feb 2006
 

Sat, 25 Feb 2006

Sat, 25 Feb 2006

Thoughts

Hi Ed

In an effort to cut a long story short, here's my life and questions - hope u can offer thoughts

Born 1964
1985-89 (lost all sense of hearing - gradually)
1986 - 2006 (got married & had three children)
1987- Felt lost - cant hear - cant hear my children - cant hear advice, crying out to be hear, to be part, to access the subconscious that most people take for granted as part of conversation- search very deep to survive - who am i ? - how can i be me? - in the void i studied people/shares, anything to find me. Amongst other work, I read the Jade master and saw myself.
1993 - decided i need to hear again
1996- had a cochlear implant at [Name] Hospital
1996- Heard my 3 children for first time (overwhelming as you can imagine) - felt like a coiled spring - now what can i do?
1997- Go to night school
1999- Finish full time employment - Go to university full time
2004- Graduate with the first class honours (computers) at the age of 40 can you believe
2005 - Work for software and promoted manager of two new products

In the system model, everything "figures" into everything else.

You might consider having your senders acknowledge you with noisy instruments, like drums or megaphones.  You can also get devices that amplify sound and project it to your torso so you can feel it "in your bones".

TTP seem to support most forms of spirituality.

Beethoven

composes music while deaf.

Drumming

gets through to the gut.

Clips:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/

entertainment/music/2229138.stm

http://www.rustlers.co.za/albums/adrumming/

bigimages/marimba%20drum%20circle%20