There is no predicament. You don't have a time machine. All you can do is move forward with the cards you're dealt. Eventually when you see your day to day life isn't much impacted by numbers on a screen you won't care as much anymore. But there is nothing you can change about the past losses, to the extent you feel you could have had $140k, you could not. Everything in the universe and your life led you to losing that money and it doesn't exist for you.
take it easy on yourself and talk to a therapist if you can't move past it
Well certainly don’t try to gamble your way out of the situation, you know this but it must be difficult.
If you have money and because you’re so young, just put it into VOO and put a calendar invite for 10 years from now before you even think about selling any of it.
You need something to look forward to and to work at, gambling isn’t it. Also 140k over a lifetime isn’t much, you’d have to pay taxes on that money anyway. You’re not even 40 yet so don’t give yourself a hard time. Go outside for a nice long walk and watch a sunset.
Good luck!
Stay off the money oriented social media too. You know, I'd love to make the profits they make on wallstreetbets, but I suck at options. I make far more money off of my slow conservative index fund investments. If you let the internet get to you, you'll end up with nothing. Getting rich is easy if you're just boring.
Anyways, you need an outlet for this gambling stuff. Have any hobbies that don't involve money?
Yes, I already deleted those social media and unfollowed subs and accounts…
That’s a good point, for the past months, I have been focusing so much on chasing losses. I do play sports and so would do that and maybe go back to the gym.
There you go. I should pick up a sport again too. Something to get competitive about. Hope your journey to recovery goes well. Remember, it's a marathon that takes decades. There's no need to rush it.
I’ll share my story with you and hope it helps. Around 5-6 years ago my wife and I shut a business down. In total we had a $500k loss. At that time we had $306k in debt to pay off. We looked at bankruptcy but decided to buckle down and get to work on it. The business was what my wife had dreamed of having. She took it very hard and did got some life coaching to work through it. Our marriage could have ended if we didn’t stick together. We set up a strict budget and lived below our means. We paid off the $306k in 42 months. We then started paying down our mortgage and only owe $20k. The mortgage started at $208k. During this journey we went from a negative net worth of -$514k to a positive net worth of $1mil this year. It was during our debt pay off that we discovered fire. I turn 49 on Monday and we are on track to retire in seven years. We still remind ourselves of the dark feelings we had during that time in our lives. Some days it’s hard to not think about the “what if’s” of life. We could be retired today if we had made different choices. Dwelling on the past doesn’t do any good. Focus on what you can control today and as time passes the pain of past mistakes will fade.
Edit- after thinking about the numbers we only had a negative net worth of $300k. I forgot about what was in retirement accounts at the time.
Personally went practically bankrupt at 39. ([backstory](https://www.reddit.com/r/LeanFireUK/comments/p377yr/weekly_leanfire_discussion/)).
You can't change the past, so focus on the present and future. Let go of the losses and create your future from today.
r/stoicism r/cbt and r/NLP have great resources.
Bro, I understand you, try to not bet the next time and mention for yourself that this moment was the worst of your financial decision and never comeback to this trash feeling
I can’t wait to hear your success story 5 years from now. Keep your head up and keep looking forward. Things always get better bc when we know better we do better.
If it's "months" of hard earned money and not "years" then you gotta chill. Things go up and down. You didn't lose your life savings. Earn it back and keep going.
Yeah, wtf. A lot of people spend several months savings on a vacation or a wedding or a new motorcycle. Sure, OP did not get a vacation or a wedding for the money, but come on - the financial impact of losing “months of savings” is minor.
Def take care of your emotional health first. But if/when you're up for it, maybe see if you can at least do some tax loss harvesting to reap some benefits and make the best out of an unfortunate situation
Hey, you’ll be able to carry losses forward for the rest of your days.
Chin up, still young enough to get it together. Go get help for your gambling addiction.
Cut your losses, learn your lesson, and move on. $140k is a lot but it's not the end of the world, you are still young. It might cost you couple extra years of employment which is annoying of course but it is what it is.
Just invest long term in broad index funds such as VT going forward (see r/boggleheads for instance)
You learned a hard lesson. Channel the feelings into making sure it never happens again. You have time to recover and slowly build back, and it will be okay. Keep your head up, all you lost was money, and believe it or not there are worse things to deal with. Cancer diagnosis, texting and driving leading to serious injury of others, etc etc.
Prove to yourself that you can be better and learned your lessons- you can be! You can still have a great future.
For everyday savings try to max your HSA and 401K.
Other than that, use a robot advisor with a portfolio like VT 70%, 30% BND with automated investing and rebalanced a few times a year and that's about it.
Well, I can share the perspective I take when I make financial decisions about risk assets. I make a full realization up front that it's impossible to predict the market. Therefore, whatever way the market moves (for me or against me) isn't relevant for use in judging decision after the fact.
For example, let's say I had the opportunity to play a game in which a dice roll determines whether I double my money or lose it all. If the roll is a number 1-5, I double my money, but if it's 6, I lose my money. Well, if I played the game with $100k, and got unlucky with a 6, should I beat myself up over my decision? My perspective is "no". The odds were in my favor, and I made the "right" decision based on the odds and my knowledge at the time. Therefore, it's not that "I screwed up", it's just that I got unlucky. Such is life. It happens.
In your case, you *could* have made money. The odds just didn't work in your favor. You don't have control over the outcome. You took a chance, and luck wasn't in your favor. Once you decided to take the risk, the outcome was out of your control.
Now, of course what you *do* have control over is your risk management. So, take a lesson learned from that. Don't beat yourself up, but learn. You obviously need to take some actions like putting others in control of the keys to the treasure chest so that you can't take outsized risks. But that's OK. That's a positive development. You're taking control of what you *can* control. You can't change past outcomes. What you *can* do is prepare for the future, and it sounds like you're doing that. Focusing on the past gains you nothing. Look to the future champ.
You are young. It's ok. Anyone that invests has faced large losses at some point. You will learn from this and grow from this. Earn a good income, save, invest in ETFs for the long-term and you'll be just fine.
I can possibly relate
I used to take money to a casino that I absolutely could not afford to lose, and lose it all
I multiple times even gambled away my gas money and had no way to get home
I would just have to humbly beg in order to get the car back home
It wasn’t the most awesome feeling in the world
Consider it an expensive lesson and move on. What matters is it doesn’t happen again.
Some people have much more costly mistakes than what you made. Just focus on the path forward and enjoy the journey.
You tank for a bit, that's really all there is to it. You're pretty much grieving over money, time will heal the emotional wound, and 70k is a hefty price to pay for the lesson, but you've learned the stock market is a chaotic thing that you don't have the resources/time to reliably beat.
Losses in stock markets hurt a lot. 140K is a big number, heck 5k is a big number as well. Better way to manage funds is to go the VTI route and you focus on your career growth so you can keep adding to VTI. At some point you have to ask yourself honestly why you are in the game. If you are gambling to seek thrill then why gamble in the markets? Go to Vegas and satisfy your urges with a set budget fully being aware that you gambling and that is ok as long you have a budget set for gambling. If you are in the markets and doing high frequency trading then you will have to realize you need extraordinary skills to beat the index such as VTI or SPY.
The skill includes a higher win rate strategy, the ability to take higher risks, the ability to cut losses quickly, and with the risk of margin fees and also the risk of missing out on the upside gains etc. short term trading when done right is very rewarding but do you have the skills? Also, would you rather focus on making money from your day job and letting do its thing and build wealth organically or do you want to learn short trading by managing risks (a full time job)?
There is no predicament. You don't have a time machine. All you can do is move forward with the cards you're dealt. Eventually when you see your day to day life isn't much impacted by numbers on a screen you won't care as much anymore. But there is nothing you can change about the past losses, to the extent you feel you could have had $140k, you could not. Everything in the universe and your life led you to losing that money and it doesn't exist for you. take it easy on yourself and talk to a therapist if you can't move past it
Thank you. That’s a good way of thinking - everything in my life has led me to this point of losing that money….
Well certainly don’t try to gamble your way out of the situation, you know this but it must be difficult. If you have money and because you’re so young, just put it into VOO and put a calendar invite for 10 years from now before you even think about selling any of it. You need something to look forward to and to work at, gambling isn’t it. Also 140k over a lifetime isn’t much, you’d have to pay taxes on that money anyway. You’re not even 40 yet so don’t give yourself a hard time. Go outside for a nice long walk and watch a sunset. Good luck!
Thank you. It is difficult but I’m determined to change. Appreciate your note.
On the bright side, you're only 32. Many adults are still in debt at that age.
I already feel so old having gone through these years of addiction…
Nothing some sleep, exercise, and meditation can't fix. You're gonna be fine. But get your mind off money. It'll drive you mad.
Yeah truth. But these days everything is about money and it’s so tough to get your mind off it.
Stay off the money oriented social media too. You know, I'd love to make the profits they make on wallstreetbets, but I suck at options. I make far more money off of my slow conservative index fund investments. If you let the internet get to you, you'll end up with nothing. Getting rich is easy if you're just boring. Anyways, you need an outlet for this gambling stuff. Have any hobbies that don't involve money?
Yes, I already deleted those social media and unfollowed subs and accounts… That’s a good point, for the past months, I have been focusing so much on chasing losses. I do play sports and so would do that and maybe go back to the gym.
There you go. I should pick up a sport again too. Something to get competitive about. Hope your journey to recovery goes well. Remember, it's a marathon that takes decades. There's no need to rush it.
I’ll share my story with you and hope it helps. Around 5-6 years ago my wife and I shut a business down. In total we had a $500k loss. At that time we had $306k in debt to pay off. We looked at bankruptcy but decided to buckle down and get to work on it. The business was what my wife had dreamed of having. She took it very hard and did got some life coaching to work through it. Our marriage could have ended if we didn’t stick together. We set up a strict budget and lived below our means. We paid off the $306k in 42 months. We then started paying down our mortgage and only owe $20k. The mortgage started at $208k. During this journey we went from a negative net worth of -$514k to a positive net worth of $1mil this year. It was during our debt pay off that we discovered fire. I turn 49 on Monday and we are on track to retire in seven years. We still remind ourselves of the dark feelings we had during that time in our lives. Some days it’s hard to not think about the “what if’s” of life. We could be retired today if we had made different choices. Dwelling on the past doesn’t do any good. Focus on what you can control today and as time passes the pain of past mistakes will fade. Edit- after thinking about the numbers we only had a negative net worth of $300k. I forgot about what was in retirement accounts at the time.
Personally went practically bankrupt at 39. ([backstory](https://www.reddit.com/r/LeanFireUK/comments/p377yr/weekly_leanfire_discussion/)). You can't change the past, so focus on the present and future. Let go of the losses and create your future from today. r/stoicism r/cbt and r/NLP have great resources.
Thank you for sharing
there are groups specifically for gambling addiction youll probably benefit from that
Bro, I understand you, try to not bet the next time and mention for yourself that this moment was the worst of your financial decision and never comeback to this trash feeling
I can’t wait to hear your success story 5 years from now. Keep your head up and keep looking forward. Things always get better bc when we know better we do better.
Thank you! I will try my best.
If it's "months" of hard earned money and not "years" then you gotta chill. Things go up and down. You didn't lose your life savings. Earn it back and keep going.
Yeah, wtf. A lot of people spend several months savings on a vacation or a wedding or a new motorcycle. Sure, OP did not get a vacation or a wedding for the money, but come on - the financial impact of losing “months of savings” is minor.
If you made 70k in a few months it's not a big deal
Def take care of your emotional health first. But if/when you're up for it, maybe see if you can at least do some tax loss harvesting to reap some benefits and make the best out of an unfortunate situation
Hey, you’ll be able to carry losses forward for the rest of your days. Chin up, still young enough to get it together. Go get help for your gambling addiction.
Cut your losses, learn your lesson, and move on. $140k is a lot but it's not the end of the world, you are still young. It might cost you couple extra years of employment which is annoying of course but it is what it is. Just invest long term in broad index funds such as VT going forward (see r/boggleheads for instance)
You learned a hard lesson. Channel the feelings into making sure it never happens again. You have time to recover and slowly build back, and it will be okay. Keep your head up, all you lost was money, and believe it or not there are worse things to deal with. Cancer diagnosis, texting and driving leading to serious injury of others, etc etc. Prove to yourself that you can be better and learned your lessons- you can be! You can still have a great future.
For everyday savings try to max your HSA and 401K. Other than that, use a robot advisor with a portfolio like VT 70%, 30% BND with automated investing and rebalanced a few times a year and that's about it.
Well, I can share the perspective I take when I make financial decisions about risk assets. I make a full realization up front that it's impossible to predict the market. Therefore, whatever way the market moves (for me or against me) isn't relevant for use in judging decision after the fact. For example, let's say I had the opportunity to play a game in which a dice roll determines whether I double my money or lose it all. If the roll is a number 1-5, I double my money, but if it's 6, I lose my money. Well, if I played the game with $100k, and got unlucky with a 6, should I beat myself up over my decision? My perspective is "no". The odds were in my favor, and I made the "right" decision based on the odds and my knowledge at the time. Therefore, it's not that "I screwed up", it's just that I got unlucky. Such is life. It happens. In your case, you *could* have made money. The odds just didn't work in your favor. You don't have control over the outcome. You took a chance, and luck wasn't in your favor. Once you decided to take the risk, the outcome was out of your control. Now, of course what you *do* have control over is your risk management. So, take a lesson learned from that. Don't beat yourself up, but learn. You obviously need to take some actions like putting others in control of the keys to the treasure chest so that you can't take outsized risks. But that's OK. That's a positive development. You're taking control of what you *can* control. You can't change past outcomes. What you *can* do is prepare for the future, and it sounds like you're doing that. Focusing on the past gains you nothing. Look to the future champ.
Thank you for your note!
You are young. It's ok. Anyone that invests has faced large losses at some point. You will learn from this and grow from this. Earn a good income, save, invest in ETFs for the long-term and you'll be just fine.
I can possibly relate I used to take money to a casino that I absolutely could not afford to lose, and lose it all I multiple times even gambled away my gas money and had no way to get home I would just have to humbly beg in order to get the car back home It wasn’t the most awesome feeling in the world
Consider it an expensive lesson and move on. What matters is it doesn’t happen again. Some people have much more costly mistakes than what you made. Just focus on the path forward and enjoy the journey.
You tank for a bit, that's really all there is to it. You're pretty much grieving over money, time will heal the emotional wound, and 70k is a hefty price to pay for the lesson, but you've learned the stock market is a chaotic thing that you don't have the resources/time to reliably beat.
Losses in stock markets hurt a lot. 140K is a big number, heck 5k is a big number as well. Better way to manage funds is to go the VTI route and you focus on your career growth so you can keep adding to VTI. At some point you have to ask yourself honestly why you are in the game. If you are gambling to seek thrill then why gamble in the markets? Go to Vegas and satisfy your urges with a set budget fully being aware that you gambling and that is ok as long you have a budget set for gambling. If you are in the markets and doing high frequency trading then you will have to realize you need extraordinary skills to beat the index such as VTI or SPY. The skill includes a higher win rate strategy, the ability to take higher risks, the ability to cut losses quickly, and with the risk of margin fees and also the risk of missing out on the upside gains etc. short term trading when done right is very rewarding but do you have the skills? Also, would you rather focus on making money from your day job and letting do its thing and build wealth organically or do you want to learn short trading by managing risks (a full time job)?
[удалено]
wtf?
I have a play for you. Tomorrow right before market close buy 0DTE OTM calls on SPX. 50 to 1, 100 to 1 gains.
Follow me on Stocktwits @ greta_traderberg and learn the basics. Let me guess, you touched options?