I would say, if you would be happy making 25k a year from trading by yourself, then go for it. If you would require 250k a year (or 2.5 mill or whatever), then forget it. The chance of making big money is there, but it is not high enough to spend the necessary few years learning the business, unless you actually enjoy the process and the subject for its own sake. If you find the analysis, understanding, and prediction of markets to be fascinating, and especially the idea of risking hard-earned money and living or dying by how well you bet on those ideas, then trading may be for you. If you just want to be "free" and earn good money so you can do other things, then not only is trading not a good idea IMO, but you are very unlikely to succeed at it. Even if you do, you will have wasted 10 years+ on a field you don't intrinsically find interesting. If you want to setup a non-profit, then go work at non-profits, learn how they work, and make contacts with rich people and institutions that want to fund them, then propose starting one up in 5 years or so once you have learned the business. The idea of becoming a trader in order to make money to fund a non-profit startup is so absurd I don't really know where to start in criticizing it. If you want to be "free" then become a truck driver or a self-employed plumber or something. No boss, steady reliable pay, and if you want more $$$ you can set up your own agency employing people and easily make a few million from it if you are hard-working and disciplined. In trading, a few % of people actually are net profitable over their careers. In truck-driving or plumbing, a far higher % are net profitable. The biggest obstacle to trading is not lack of capital. Believe me, if you can reliably make good money, there is an almost infinite supply of capital in the world waiting to be tapped. Show me someone who can make 20% per year consistently with single-digit drawdowns, and they only need to hire a good salesman and they will be managing 1 billion within 5-10 years tops. If you are a budding trader then 99% of your effort should be focused on improving performance - reducing risk, increasing consistency, and increasing annual returns (in that order). Overall you give the impression of being interested in trading for the wrong reasons. It looks like you are attracted to it as a potential escape from the harsh realities of life i.e. having to actually work for a living. It reminds me of the hordes of people who got into real estate a few years ago, or dot.coms before them, or who are always trying pyramid marketing schemes. There are always people who want to make a lot of money without putting in the effort required to do so. They get attracted to "get rich quick" schemes or ideas which seem to offer the potential for wealth without the requirement for slaving away working hard for years, or possessing any particular skills or experience other than the ability to bullshit convincingly. Ironically, if they actually just focused on being good salesmen, they could probably make millions marketing yachts, high-end real estate, or investment funds. The other type that likes the idea of trading but doesn't really like trading, is the type of person who wants to avoid working for "the man", who likes the idea of rebelling against "the system" and doing things for themselves. Again, this by itself isn't a good reason to become a trader. Surf bums and ski instructors also drop out of "the system" and earn a living, and it's a much easier living than trying to out-trade the market each year. My advice would be keep studying the markets for a while longer, keep your risk low, and ask yourself at the end of each month "is this what I really want to do for the rest of my life?". If the answer is not clearly "yes, I love doing this, I would do it for 20k a year if I could" then it's probably not for you.