You must think about the opportunity cost, especially if you are in your prime working years. Understand that your peers are now 3 years ahead of you in the career/corporate ladder, not to mention the social networks they have built. Of course if you are a 65 year old retiree like many around here and have nothing better to do with your time, carry on.
Last year was supposed to be my best year. I did everything right and it ended up being my worst year (completely flat). My first two years, even with diddling around and the big screwups I ended 10 and 20% up. When you do everything right, and spend a whole year of your life on it, and you get absolutely nothing in return...
I'm not interested in your typical white collar career ladder. I am not interested in wasting my life in that type of life. I spent my entire childhood in a world controlled by others where I had zero freedom. No amount of money is going to make me go back to that again. I am however working in a field that has no chance for advancement and very low wages (no I'm not working at mcdonalds). I enjoy what I do and I am good at it. I am trying to open my own business in this field. However, unless a major stroke of luck comes along I simply do not have the cash to start it (after talking to banks and relatives). I am 25 years old and I see myself making essentially nothing money and of myself for the rest of my life. Whoopee.
I too am quite young (28) and have been doing this for a year full time. I live frugal, but I'm up 1% for the year but I m also definitely see myself improving each month. That's the only thing keeping me going at this point. That and the fact I love doing this and despise 9-5 like you.
You are likely too young to achieve success. You are likely too much of a gambler lacking the emotional IQ to do what is required. My process: Define what I want Decide on how to get there Do the above. Analyze Adapt What I see: Many do not know what they want. Many can't choose the best action Many don't do the plan Many don't analyze failures Clearly people do not adapt. What about you? After years of failure I was up 39% last year and about 600% YTD. Lots of pain to get to here. My equity is at all time highs. I do not day trade. Having a day job helped with capital replenishment. I do not have to earn my bed and board doing this so the pressure to push is not there. I also could stay quite comfortable staying on career track. I have great comfort with 3 sources of "retirement" income. 1. Pension 2. Rentals 3. Investments Any three of these could be enough. I expect that the investments will significantly change my lifestyle in coming years. Rigorous post trade analysis was key for me. I went thru the clouds and the sky is blue.
A) Look for market fundamentals to generate ideas. B) See if ideas suite my personality, time schedule, and is realistically executable. C) Backtest 3 months to see if it shows any promise. D) Backtest another 3-6 months from another year if C satisfies. E) Test out of sample 6 months if D shows promise. F) Run Monte Carlo on 2 years minimum of data. G) Execute to same accuracy and precision as backtesting. H) Observe while executing. I) Make no money and wonder why.
What is your goal? What is your mission statement? What guides you? Ambiguous or not, I have a goal. I can't read yours in what you write. Many people have no goal and mistake the thrills and risk as being enough.