How many of us willing to walk away if you have committed +5 years into the game without results to show for it. ps. breaking even is NOT winning
I greatly depends on what type of a commitment occurred in each of those +5 years into the game. Someone once said - Trade with money you can afford to lose without impacting your lifestyle and then quit when there's no more money or quit when it begins to impact your lifestyle in a negative way. Too many people trade with money they can not afford to lose or keep trading when it impacts their lifestyle in a negative way. In my opinion, traders stay in the game too long because they have a few days, few weeks or few months of successful trading to then lose it all or lose most of it in a shorter time span of poor trade decisions. Those days of successful trading before they lost it all encourages their illusions they will one day become a consistently successful trader. Admitting failure involving money is one of the toughest things a trader can do (cutting their loses and walking away from the game...forever). Only a small percentage of traders have the cognitive capacity to be successful for many years as if it was just a job that someone stays with until retirement. wrbtrader
If you take into account the other factors like stress, toxin release, time, opportunity cost, etc it makes it easier to answer.
I cant see anyone lasting 5 years of serious effort without showing profits in the first few years. If you have bills to pay it means you cant spend 5 years doing this seriously full time without showing a profit anyway, will have to give-up within 3 to 18 months and find something that pays the bills. But lots of people last 5+ years as a non serious pastime hobby, eg Trading 1 micro lot or 50 share lots.
Solid thread. Its a rough decision that requires one to let go of the self delusion and be totally honest. I was around the 5 year mark and still a net loser with no desire to continue. Walked away and haven't placed a single trade in around a year. For me the regret just stacked up so much and the daily failures got so painful it wasn't worth it anymore. Its like...you lose the ability to even pretend that its possible...the dream dies. I still often think about about trading...going over methods and strategies...finding some clarity in errors of judgement and behavior. I dont have that "I've got to win my money back" feeling or anything like that but just cant seem to really let it go.