Once penniless, spending nights in cheap hotels, I later turned 1500 USDT into an eight-figure profit in the crypto world. This experience taught me a simple but brutal truth: in this market, surviving long enough is far more important than chasing quick riches.

How poor was I back then? My entire daily food was a packet of instant noodles. All hope was pinned on the borrowed 1500U, with no way out. I divided this money into 5 parts, opening each trade with a fixed 300U principal, using leverage of over a hundred times. It sounds crazy, but at the time I didn’t think there was anything wrong with it.

My trading logic was as simple as it could be: once I opened a position, I immediately set a stop-loss. A single point of fluctuation could be a life-or-death line. No holding through losses, no waiting for a pullback, no illusions. Later, I realized that the market’s movement is never wrong; only my judgment of the market can be wrong. This realization changed everything.

To survive longer, I set three unshakable rules for myself.

**Rule 1: Emotional Switch Mechanism.** If I lose three trades in a row, I stop all operations for the day. Losses are contagious; they can drive you crazy and make you aggressive. Only strict discipline can cure this poison. I’ve seen too many people lose control after consecutive losses, ending up liquidating their accounts.

**Rule 2: Profits Must Be Immediately Locked In.** For every profit I make, I withdraw 40% and convert it into stablecoins. Why? Because seeing the actual increase in my wallet balance counters the illusion created by those digital numbers on the screen. The benefit is a more solid psychological state and reduced temptation to go all-in.

**Rule 3: Only trigger trades when the trend is clear.** When I can’t see the direction clearly, I’d rather miss the opportunity than open a blind trade. Waiting isn’t wasting time; it’s accumulating enough firepower for the next wave of the market.

The 300U unit means a lot to me; it’s the cost of testing the market. If I’m wrong, the loss is within controllable limits. Right, I use a trailing stop to lock in profits, letting the trend itself push me forward. Interestingly, the big moves often start quietly when you’re most cautious and least aggressive.

Looking back now, I realize this market is designed to cure all kinds of dissatisfaction. Consistent profitability doesn’t come from some divine prediction ability but from coldly executing a set of rules. When you stop chasing the illusion of “getting rich overnight” and instead build a system of “never getting liquidated,” profits become a natural result.

What is the essence of a trading system? It’s using a rational framework to lock down that emotional, always-smart-aleck version of yourself. On this path, as long as you control your drawdowns, you’ve already won more than most in the market.