When a swing does not earn a line
In classroom drills we ask participants to mark every obvious swing on a daily FTSE chart, then delete half of them. The exercise feels rude at first. Traders are taught that more structure equals more clarity. On a crowded index, the opposite is usually true.
A swing earns a zone when three things line up. First, the rejection should be visible without squinting — a clear turn, not a single weak wick. Second, the area should have been defended or attacked more than once, or sit at a prior multi-week reference. Third, you must be able to write one plain sentence: who was active there, and why that still matters after the last close.
If any of those fail, leave the swing unmarked. Blank space is not laziness; it is a decision that the market has not given you a usable shelf. In the intensive we practise saying that sentence aloud before the pen touches the chart. The habit transfers: fewer lines, fewer mid-candle arguments.