From First Contract to a Durable Process

The curriculum as a loop, not a trophy.

Expert 5 min read Course 60 of 60

Course 60 of 60 in the futures hub. This last lesson ties the course together into a routine you can repeat for years: plan, size, trade or skip, review, and cut what isn't working.

The routine is the point

Fifty-nine lessons in, the temptation is to start another course. Don't. What separates people who last from people who don't is a plain routine they repeat week after week: plan the session, size the trade, take it or skip it, review it, and cut what isn't working. It's repetitive on purpose.

The failure here is collecting knowledge instead of running the routine. Each new idea feels like progress, and none of it gets tested properly. Currency traders face the same trap, and the forex course ends on its own version of this.

1. The loop

Plan: which contract, which session, and what the day can cost. Size: the stop in ticks, converted to dollars, against a fixed slice of the account. Trade or skip: only what the plan allows. Review: one line per trade, read weekly. Cut: drop whatever the review says is losing.

That loop is the whole course squeezed into five steps. Every earlier lesson fills in one of them. Size is where most people cheat, so keep the risk calculator open until doing it by hand feels dull.

The loop is the trophy — plan, size, click or skip, review, cut Plan root + session Size 1% math Click or skip Review cut first

2. What to cut first after a bad week

Bad weeks happen. What matters is the order you cut things in. Size first, since dropping to micros is the quickest way to slow the bleeding. Then how often you trade: fewer windows, fewer setups. Then products: back to the one market you know best. Here's one way to write it as a rule:

Daily cap $620 (two losers of $310). Break it once in a week and the next 10 sessions run at half size: same products, nothing new.

The rule is boring, which is why it works. It doesn't depend on how you feel on Monday. Notice what it never says: it never adds anything. Track whether the half-size stretch actually ran at half size using the P&L calculator, because it's easy to drift back up after two good days.

Cut size, then frequency, then products — never add in a hole Cut size micros / skip Cut frequency fewer windows Cut products back to flagship Add a new root in a hole how books die

3. What never to add when you are down

Never add a new market, a new automated system or a bigger size because the week went badly. Those decisions feel like action, and they're usually the start of a much worse month. Doubling up to win it back is the oldest version of this mistake, and it hasn't improved with age.

If you genuinely think a new market would suit you better, write that down and look at it again after a good month, when you're thinking clearly. Ideas that survive that wait are worth testing. The free calculators can show you what a new contract's ticks are worth before you try it.

Never add a market, an EA, or a second factor because this week hurt Never in a hole A new complex.Martingale 'to get back'.Max leverage because 'I know this one'.

4. What to keep on paper

Four things are worth having in writing. The journal, read weekly. The daily dollar cap. A short list of things you don't do, such as trading the first minute after a report or holding through a roll. And an event policy that says what you do before scheduled reports: flatten, cut size or stand aside.

If one of those is missing, that's usually where the trouble is coming from. A trader without a written cap trades by mood; without an event policy, every report becomes a gamble.

Artifacts you can hold: journal, cap, forbidden list, event policy ArtifactCadenceIf missingFixJournalweeklyvibesexport fillsCapdailymoodwrite $Forbiddenstatichobbywrite itEvent policyper printheroflatten/haircut

5. Stay with a market or leave it

Every quarter or so, ask whether the market you trade still fits. Do its hours suit your day? Is one tick an amount you can afford to be wrong by? Does the review show you have an edge after costs? If the answers are yes, stay and keep running the loop. Boredom is a good sign.

If the answers are no, leave cleanly and stop checking the chart. Moving on is a skill too. Futures can also sit beside a stock portfolio, which the lesson on futures with equities covers.

After a quarter: does the product still fit hours and tick math? Still a fit? Stay. Run the loop boredom is a feature Leave. Do not haunt it a clean exit is a skill

6. Mistakes that end careers

Starting a new market after every loss. Sizing from available margin instead of the stop. Keeping no records, so nothing can be reviewed. Treating the course as finished instead of as a routine to run.

That's the futures course. If you want to see how the same habits apply to shares, the stock trading course is the place to go next.

Curriculum as a loop, not a trophy shelf Durable Same rootSame capSame review Costume New product every lossSize from marginNo artifacts

A weekly review that takes twenty minutes

Once a week, read every trade line from the past five sessions. Mark each one: followed the plan or didn't, and mark any stop you moved or loser you added to. Add up the dollars for each group. Then look at next week's calendar for roll dates and scheduled reports, and write down which days you'll trade smaller or not at all.

If a setup is still losing after a fair stretch with costs counted, drop it, and don't go looking for a replacement the same afternoon. And if, after an honest trial, futures don't suit you, stopping is a sound decision. Plenty of people trade better once they stop forcing a market that never fit them.

What lasts

  • Plan, size, trade or skip, review, cut: repeat it every week.
  • After a bad week, cut size first, then frequency, then products.
  • Never add a market or size while you're in a hole.
  • Every quarter, decide whether the market still fits you.

Most of what keeps an account alive is the dull part: the review, the size rule, the day off after a bad one. Educational only. Not a recommendation to buy, sell, or hold any contract or pair.