How do you deal with excruciatingly long periods when it doesn't make sense to trade?

[dmedin]

80% of the time the markets go sideways and 20% of the time they trend.  At least 80% of the time you shouldn't be doing any trading.

There are certain periods when it makes sense to enter a trade and hold on to it.  In these cases you don't care about not making any new trades.

I've tried zooming in to short time frames and trying to day trade with the inevitable result that I lose all my money.

All you need to do it take one look at the chart a day and you can tell whether there's any point doing anything at all that day.