Surviving in the Crypto Market is More Important Than Anything Else

In the cryptocurrency market, I have witnessed far too many people entering with the mindset of “betting everything to change their life.” They obsessively learn indicators, chase every hot trend, dive into small waves hoping to turn things around quickly. But the outcome is often the same: just one uncontrolled wrong order, or one emotional slip-up, and they get eliminated from the game by the market. The truth is cold: the market doesn’t care how many times you’ve won before; it only cares how long you can survive.

1. About Surviving First, Making Money Later The harshest point of crypto is: a single mistake can wipe out the results of dozens, even hundreds of correct trades beforehand. You may win continuously, but just one full margin call, a sudden crash, and everything resets to zero. No “reward for effort,” only the final result. Capital is the entry ticket. Only by preserving your capital do you have the right to continue playing. Low but stable profits, avoiding critical mistakes, will let compound interest gradually do its work. Conversely, those who like to bet big may look flashy in the short term, but just one 50% drop means they need a 100% gain to break even — which rarely happens in panic-driven psychology. Defense is more important than offense. Long-term survivors usually: Lose less in bad marketsMake average profits when the market is good Meanwhile, losers always want to catch every opportunity, and ultimately get drained by volatility—both energy and money.
2. Risk Management Is a Life-and-Death Line, Not a Choice Many people obsess over “beautiful entry points,” but almost never think about: Where to sell?How much to lose if wrong? In reality, risk management is what determines how far you can go. Control your position: For each trade, maximum risk should not exceed 2% of your total account. For example: with a capital of 100,000, only accept losing a maximum of 2,000 per trade. Even if you’re wrong five times in a row, you still keep about 90% of your capital to fix mistakes. Stop-loss is not weakness. Set a hard stop-loss (for example -10% or -15%) and stick to it absolutely. Don’t “love” a position. The market has no obligation to turn around just because you don’t want to cut. Don’t try to catch falling knives. Catching the bottom during a price plunge is human instinct, but many “bottoms” are just pauses before falling further. Wait for trend confirmation; even if you make less, it’s better than losing everything.
3. The Simpler the Rules, the Longer You Can Survive Complex strategies require extremely high discipline. For most people, simplicity is the sustainable path. Few but effective indicators: Moving averagesRSISupport – resistance Are even more effective than stacking 7–10 overlapping indicators. When signals conflict, most of the time the market is sideways — staying out is the wise decision. Avoid overtrading. You don’t need to enter trades every day. High-quality opportunities in a year are only a handful. Trading out of boredom only enriches the exchange through transaction fees. Practice with a demo account. Before using real money, test your strategy on a simulation account. Get familiar with the volatility and your own emotions; it’s much cheaper than “paying school fees” with real money.
4. Emotional Management: The Market’s Therapist for the Stubborn The two biggest enemies of traders are greed and fear. They often appear as: Revenge trading: wanting to recover immediately after a loss, leading to bigger lossesFOMO chasing tops: seeing others boast profits and jumping in, becoming liquidityNarcissistic psychology: losing but refusing to sell, waiting to “recover,” while capital gets stuck and opportunities pass How to fix: Write a trading plan before entering a position: Entry pointStop-loss pointProfit target Once in a trade, act like a machine. The fewer decisions you make during market volatility, the safer you are.
5. Long-Term Thinking: Stay at the Table and Wait for the Winds to Turn Crypto operates in very clear cycles. Bad markets weed out over-leveraged usersGood markets reward those who are patient enough to survive Core coins for the portfolio: BTC and ETH should make up at least 30% or more, helping the portfolio withstand strong volatility. Learn but think for yourself. Don’t blindly follow KOLs. Do your own research, understand the project’s logic, cash flow, and the story behind it, rather than just listening to stories and going all-in. Maintain a balanced life. Lack of sleep, stress, and negative emotions will directly destroy your decision quality. Trading isn’t your entire life — but making wrong decisions when tired can affect your whole life. Conclusion I always believe that the crypto market doesn’t reward the smartest, but the most resilient. Those who have been taught by the market, but know how to stand up, learn from experience, and use discipline to protect themselves — they are the ones who reach the end of the cycle. If you keep repeating the cycle: lose – reload – start over, the problem is often not knowledge, but that you haven’t made “survival” your number one instinct. Build a system that helps you control the worst-case scenario first. Profits will come afterward. Because once capital is lost, all correct judgments become meaningless.