Bull? Bear? Who cares?
On a daily basis, the main theme of my trading plan is to get into a "risk free" trade and then catch a runner. After that, I don't care what side of the market I am on. So, how do I do this? The first thing I want to do is take the emotion out of my trading. The way I do this is by defining my risk, ie picking a place I want my stop to be and then scaling out of my trade to reduce my risk and get to a breakeven trade ASAP by hitting my first target and then tightening my stop to breakeven.
Since, the ES is so widely traded I will use this as my example:
In order for this to work exactly as I have it layed out, I must trade in multiples of 4. On most days, when day trading, I like to risk 2 ES points per trade. I have my 1st target set at +1 ES point, to scale out or cover 1/2 of my position, and then on the 2nd 1/2 of my trade, move my stop to -1 ES point from my entry, so that once my 1st target is hit, I am already in a "risk free" trade. From there, my next target is +2 ES points to scale out of another 1/4 of my trade. My choice from here then, with my stop on the last 1/4 of my trade, is to leave it where it's at (-1 ES point) or move it to my entry. I almost always move my stop to entry and then on my last 1/4, either get stopped out at entry or catch a runner. Generally, I go for 10+ ES points on a runner or exit on the market close for a day trade. My parameters can change depending on what market I am trading and how much size I am using, but I always want to have a defined risk or a percentage amount I am willing to lose if the trade takes a full stop out. Essentially, that is how basic I want to keep my trading plan. No emotion, no thinking, no wondering am I a bull or a bear? Just take the trades and let them work. Like a machine, time after time, day after day. Sounds boring, but it's not.
Theoretically, since I have a defined trading plan, this means I could throw a dart at a dart board and as long as I have a risk plan mapped out and I can stick to it, I can randomly take any trade I want, from any spot, in any market. Now, I'm never going to get that "crazy," and I realize there is a lot more to it than that, but underneath it all, why complicate things?