On the second day of the Lunar New Year, many people are still visiting friends and relatives, with hot dishes on the table and laughter in the air. But I know that many traders' hearts are not entirely in the festivities. You can raise a glass, and you can express your blessings perfectly, but there is a part of you that remains quiet like the night. That part holds the wins and losses of the past year, holds the pressures you haven't voiced, and holds the moments when you forced yourself to stay calm amidst the fluctuations.
Today I want to chat a bit about a New Year's message, chatting for those ordinary people, traders like me, and those who want to break out from the bottom. Today we won't talk about the market, we won't talk about strategies, we won't discuss how this year will be; let's talk about how difficult it is for ordinary people to break out from the bottom, and how challenging it is for ordinary people to break out from the trading market.
Many people have a misunderstanding of 'class leap', thinking it relies on a single opportunity, a windfall, or luck. But once you truly step in, you will understand that the most solid foundation at the bottom is not poverty, but structure. Structure will pull you in many subtle ways: you must bear the cost of living earlier, you lack trial and error space, you do not have enough safety nets, your time is fragmented, and your emotions are repeatedly consumed by reality. You are not not working hard; your cost of effort is higher, and the room for error after effort is lower.
The hardest part for ordinary people is that you have almost no chance to 'start over'.
You look like you have tomorrow, but your tomorrow involves paying rent, supporting a family, repaying debt, and shouldering various necessities. You can dream, but you cannot keep dreaming. You can fail, but you cannot fail for too long. Many people are not defeated; they are consumed, ground down by life until all possibilities are gradually eroded. You do not lack ambition; you are just too tired, tired to the point that you are even embarrassed to mention ambition.
This is what 'Cousin' represents. It is not a specific person, but a base color of fate: no support, no background, no ready-made path, you can only rely on yourself to carve out the way. You are forced by reality to survive, yet you are unwilling to just survive. You are very clear that you do not have the right to be pretentious; you must even restrain your breakdown, because once you fall, no one will step in for you.
But the trading market happens to be the most unemotional place.
It will not give you any care just because you come from an ordinary background, nor will it be gentler with you just because you work hard. The moment you step into the market, everyone's starting line looks the same, but in reality, it is completely different. Because this game competes not on intelligence, but on stability. It competes on whether you can maintain discipline in uncertainty for the long term, whether you can remain composed after continuous setbacks, and whether you can avoid self-destruction when no one is supervising you.
Where is the difficulty in trading? It lies in facing results every day, and these results do not consider feelings. It lies in the fact that you can never trade 'I've already worked hard' for any compensation. It lies in the necessity of admitting mistakes, enduring drawdowns, and pressing the brakes when you most want to recover losses. It lies in the fact that you have no one to blame but yourself in the end. It lies in wanting to become a stronger person, but the market will force you to first become more honest in the most direct way.
Many ordinary people enter trading because they are too eager to change their fate.
They do not want to be locked in by salary for a lifetime, do not want to hand over their future to some industry’s prosperity, and do not want to be passive in life forever. They want a sense of control, a possibility of reversal. But the harsh reality is that the trading market does not reward 'desire'; it only rewards 'worthiness'.
Desire can ignite you, but it can also burn you.
A person who is extremely eager for success will indeed be closer to success than others because he has a stronger driving force. He will learn more aggressively, review more diligently, and endure longer. But desire also has a shadow: it can make you anxious, make you act when you shouldn't, make you treat a fluctuation as the turning point of destiny, and make you see trading as a lifeline.
This is the most dangerous place for ordinary people to trade. You are not using spare money to try things; you are using hope to try things.
So ordinary people want to break out of the trading market, the difficulty is actually far greater than most people's imagination. Because this is not just a technical issue, but a psychological structure issue. What you need to accomplish is not just to learn a method, but to reshape an entire personality: you need to learn self-restraint, learn to wait, learn not to be kidnapped by emotions, learn to admit when you're wrong, learn to do the right thing at the right time, learn to stop in time when things are wrong, and learn to prioritize 'survival' over 'making more money'.
Trading is the path of a few, and the reason is not mysterious. It is not because most people are not smart enough, but because most people cannot withstand this long-term mental wear and tear. Most people want certainty, while trading provides uncertainty; most people want immediate feedback, while trading gives delayed feedback; most people want recognition, while trading often relies on self-recognition.
The loneliest point on this road is that you must believe in yourself when no one else does.
You will encounter continuous denial, from the market and from those around you. You will be doubted in your lows, misunderstood in your silence, and ridiculed in your hesitation. You might not even be able to explain clearly to those closest to you what you are doing, because you know that explanation is useless; only results matter. But results often do not come immediately; they arrive late when you doubt yourself the most, and remain silent when you need encouragement the most.
So the ones who can truly break out are often not the smartest, but those who can repair themselves.
He will fall, but he will fix himself. He will incur losses, but he will not shatter his bottom line because of it. He will collapse, but he will not use collapse as an excuse. He will face setbacks, but he will not define himself by setbacks. He will maintain discipline on the darkest days, keep rhythm in the loneliest stages, and hold himself back when he most wants to take a gamble.
This is the most remarkable ability of ordinary people: to continue growing without support.
Writing this on the second day of the New Year is not to be sentimental, but because the meaning of the New Year is not about festivity, but about restarting. Restarting a person's rhythm, restarting a person's spirit, restarting a person's requirements for themselves. You may not have won in the past year, or even lost badly, but that does not mean you are incapable. It can only mean you are still on the way, still training, still paying the price for being 'worthy'.
In 2026, don't rush to prove that you can win; first prove that you won't collapse.
Don't rush to seek an explosion; first seek a year of stability. Don't rush to seek others' recognition; first seek to stop deceiving yourself. Don't rush to defeat the market; first defeat your last year's self. As long as you are a little more stable, a little clearer, a little more disciplined, and a little less emotional than last year, you are already winning.
I have seen too many people treating the New Year as a time for wishes, writing their wishes beautifully, yet returning to their old ways by March. True change is never just a phrase, but a whole year of execution. This is especially true for traders. You do not need grand vows; you need to not deviate from your bottom line every day. You do not need to be excited all the time; you need long-term patience. You do not need to be right every time; you need to not lose control every time.
If you, like me, are an 'ordinary person', if you have no background, if you have reached today all on your own, then please be a little 'hard' on yourself, and also a little gentle. Being hard means not letting emotions drag you, not wasting opportunities with impulsiveness, and not betting hope on a stroke of luck. Being gentle means allowing yourself to go slower, allowing yourself a recovery period, and allowing yourself to take care of yourself in the lows.
Because those who can walk to the end of this road are often not the most desperate, but the ones who can persist the longest.
May every ordinary person in 2026 be able to pull themselves up a little bit. May every trader be able to tighten their discipline a little bit, extend their patience a little bit, and reduce their emotions a little bit. May you truly overcome last year's more anxious, irritable, and easily uncontrolled self this year.
May you continue to sharpen yourself into a sharp knife and also into a steady shield in the unremarkable days. May you no longer fantasize about miracles, but instead turn yourself into a miracle.
As the New Year begins, we set off again.
Keep it up, those 'comrades' you have never met yet are familiar!
To all the traders fighting in the market, Happy Spring Festival.