Will Hu

One of my biggest regrets in my 27 years of trading wasn't losing money. It was the up and downs. It was being physically with someone I loved, but mentally I was somewhere else. I want to share something else about my past, because after reading all your comments on my previous post, I realized how many people have experienced similar things. For many years, being in a relationship with me wasn't easy. And I can admit that today. I had two big passions in my life. Bodybuilding and trading. Bodybuilding was already demanding enough. Cardio in the morning, training, preparing my meals, eating at certain times, following my routine every single day. Even when we went out for dinner, most of the time I had my chicken and rice with me. Imagine being with someone who organizes almost everything around his training and meals. And then add trading to that. I was constantly watching the markets. Checking positions on my phone, looking at charts, sometimes even bringing a tablet to dinner. I can understand today how annoying and frustrating that must have been. But you know what? The biggest problem wasn't any of that. It was me. How I felt inside. Sometimes I would finish a terrible trading day. Maybe I had lost a lot of money. Maybe I was frustrated, disappointed, or simply exhausted. Then I would go home, or go out with my partner, and pretend everything was normal. But it wasn't. I could be quiet, distant, irritated. Sometimes I didn't want to talk. Sometimes even a simple question could annoy me. And the person next to me didn't understand why. Because I wasn't sharing what was happening inside me. Maybe it was pride. Maybe I didn't want to admit I had lost money. Maybe I just wanted to forget about the day. But I couldn't. I was still thinking about my positions, what I did wrong, what I could have done differently. I had left the trading desk, but the trading desk hadn't left me. And something I learned later is that this isn't only psychological. There is a physical side to it. When you experience extreme financial stress, your body releases adrenaline and noradrenaline. Cortisol is also involved in the stress response. Your heart rate can increase, your nervous system becomes more alert, and your body prepares to deal with a threat. Studies on professional traders have actually measured how cortisol changes with market volatility and trading uncertainty. And this is what I find interesting. You can close your computer in one second. But you cannot necessarily switch off what is happening inside your body in one second. When that stress continues day after day, it can affect your sleep, your patience, your mood, and the way you treat other people. I experienced it. And looking back, I realize that sometimes I was a piece of shit to the people who loved me. Not because I didn't love them. But because I was so absorbed in my own world Today I still love trading. I still love bodybuilding. I still have my routines, my discipline, my ambitions. That's part of who I am, and it will probably never change. But what has changed is how I look at life, at money, and especially at the people around me. I don't want to spend my life making money and then realize I wasn't really living it. And if you're a trader reading this, especially if you're young and extremely ambitious like I was, think about it. Sometimes we become so obsessed with building the life we want that we forget the people who are supposed to share that life with us. Money can be made again. A losing trade can be recovered. BUt time and people around us won't be there forever. That's it, hope you can do and be better then me