If I'm hearing what your saying, yes your doing something very wrong.
Your supposed to use the bar in the down positon only during the climb up or down. Once your at the desired hunting height your supposed to flip the bar up behind your back so you can hunt with an open front area (without the bar getting in the way of a sitting shot). They could have easily engineered this stand to be an either or option like the Python, but as it is it's bar up only for hunting(unless you stand the whole time or are 4'0" tall-lol)
If I misread your post forgive me.

My take on this stand so-far..........I like my API grand stand shooting star better.

One thing you need to do asap with the cobra is wrap the two back brace bars that contact the seat with cloth material tape (I used the camo stuff). Without some sort of break between the metal and seat material. Without the break the seat moan and growns, creaks and whines any time weight is shifted while sitting.