I realise this is
your CFD trading thread and can post whatever but when these baseless opinions are posted it detracts from what could be a learned thread.
For me, charts are like surfing waves. You can show me a picture of any of the major breaks in the world and I'll tell you in a split second where it is. The colour of the water, the lighting, the shape of the wave (wedge, barrel, fat, foam ball, pitching, wrapping etc), the number of people in the water, how close it is to shore, whether the surfers are wearing wetsuits, where the picture is taken from (cliff top, boat/jetski, in water, drone), time of day, whether there's wind and and chop, whether you can see through the peak to the other side, the thickness of the lip, whether there's hot girls on the beach (Pipeline!), the slope of the beach, the length of the ride, the types of surf craft in the water (boards, bodyboards, windsurfers, foil boards, skimboards), and so on.
Instruments are like waves - they have signature appearance and behaviour. Chart behaviour (like waves) can change depending on the 'weather'. For perfect surfing conditions, you want a lot of wind a longway offshore, and a light offshore wind close to shore. Tide can make a difference to some breaks and not others. Wind offshore = higher TF - this creates the swell. Wind close to shore = lower TF - this shapes the wave and smooths it out. Tide is akin to 'time of day' for a chart. This is the degree of observation that happens if your mind is attracted to something. I love water, waves, the beach, so it's easy...and I can see a parallel with trading.
In terms of trading, I like watching how a chart moves and what happens with volume (volume = swell size). That's my edge. But psychology is the single most important thing. Find a way that you like to trade, and don't do things that don't suit you. I would never read a NFP report because that would be incredibly boring to me. Same goes for all fundamentals. Movement, shapes, patterns and volume - that's me. I don't know what 'CME' stands for and I have no interest in looking it up on Google- none! But also, I don't want to waste my life looking at charts. I want to know the entire context within a minute, with all relevant info avaliable quickly and on 2 uncluttered chart panes.
The difficulty of the wave should = positions size. Confidence will disappear if things are too big for you, and obviously the best surfers are going hard on the most difficult waves. And confidence is everything. Once you have a small and simple edge, it's
all about confidence and fun.
One last thing: if you're making more money than me (and you may well be), you can disregard everything I've written here.