When I started trading, I genuinely believed that profitability would change much more than it actually did. I imagined that once I became successful enough, people would finally understand why I spent so many hours staring at charts, why I disappeared on weekends to backtest and why I was willing to spend years pursuing something that most people around me considered either impossible or straight-up gambling.
I think a lot of traders secretly believe this, even if they don’t admit it out loud. It’s not necessarily because they want attention or because they want to show off. Most of the time it’s much simpler than that. They want validation. They want proof that all the effort was worth it. They want the people who doubted them to finally understand. They want family members who questioned their decisions to change their minds. They want friends to respect what they do. They want some kind of acknowledgement …