Hey Keith,
You are so not alone. My experience parallels yours, and we're about the same age. Having my account plummet after such a breathtaking rise was the most wrenching thing I've ever known. I could have done anything, stopped working, paid off my house, done things for people...sickening is right. It's hard to let that go. And how do you explain it to anyone? What you did, how it happened, how you let it get away from you? My Dad, when I let him know the (partial) extent of my losses- seemed relatively nonplussed (God bless him- he lived through the Depression and has worked his whole life)- and quoted Kipling: "If you can meet Success and Failure/ And treat these two Imposters just the same"...I had to think about that a while <g> !
But dammit, yes, there's a lesson in here. And now, although I'd hardly go so far as to say I'm grateful for what happened, I've come to think of it as the mother of all learning experiences. And really, what a privilege, in a strange way, to have been there and done that. I've learned a few things- one of those things being the real value and purpose of money. Money has to circulate, it has to be spent. Although I really didn't have the big sum long enough to consider how best to spend it, if I had been readier to translate the coin into deed- to take my profits-I would have been much better off. Also, I've learned that money isn't money until it's sitting somewhere other than my brokerage account. And the truth is, as Jill says- it can happen again. Most probably not as quickly, as dramatically, as before, but fortunes are made and lost every single day in this market. Have you ever read "Market Wizards", or "Reminiscences of a Stock Operator"? Almost ALL these (mostly) guys have a story- some bruising, crushing experience, that wrung them out emotionally and financially. From that, they grew, they learned, ("That which does not kill us makes us stronger!") and then recovered their losses and then some. I'm glad I had, ahem, MILLIONs for a short time-I'll try to build it up again slowly, warily, with new inviolable rules in place(such as using stop losses)! It's still early in the game for you, take heart- know that people out here are on your side.
-Kate
p,s, sorry about the long post- I guess you touched a nerve! |
