The screen blinked with red—again. For the past five hours, Raka had sat cross-legged on the thin mattress in his shared room, watching numbers dance on his secondhand smartphone like spirits mocking his ambition. Just last night, his small investment had grown by 40%, and now, in less than a day, half of it had vanished.
He blinked, eyes dry and sore. "-27.41%," the screen displayed. His balance had shrunk from $48 to just under $34.
It was as if the app had punched him in the chest. He stared, hoping the numbers would bounce back like before. They didn't.
His fingers trembled, not just from the cold Jakarta night, but from the invisible weight pressing down on him. His dreams had been soaring—charts moving up, wealth accumulating, maybe even his mother smiling again someday. But now, reality crashed in: this wasn't a game.
It was blood. It was survival.
He took a deep breath and stood, pacing the narrow space. His roommate, Rey, glanced up from his side of the room, earbuds still in, mouthing lyrics to a pop song.
"Loss again?" Rey asked, tone casual.
Raka only nodded.
"Crypto's like that, man. It's fire. You can warm your house with it, or you can burn it down."
Raka managed a weak smile but said nothing. It wasn't that he hadn't expected risk—it's just that no one told him how much it hurts. Not until you feel your hopes draining with every red candle on the chart.
He opened his notes app and wrote down the lessons he'd learned today:
Don't enter just because it's rising.
Don't FOMO in.
Set a stop-loss.
Never invest what you can't afford to lose.
The last one stabbed hardest. He couldn't afford to lose anything. His $50 wasn't extra money—it was food, transport, survival.
Later that night, unable to sleep, Raka opened YouTube again. His feed was full of crypto influencers, some with gold chains and rented Lamborghinis, others calmly drawing patterns on charts. He clicked on a video titled "Why Most Traders Fail in Year One".
"Volatility is the tax of opportunity," the speaker said. "You want high rewards? You pay the price—in nerves, in sleepless nights, in mistakes."
That phrase stuck.
The tax of opportunity.
He wasn't being punished. He was being tested.
The next day, he took a break from watching charts and visited the dusty local library. Inside, rows of forgotten finance books waited patiently for readers. He pulled out one: "The Psychology of Trading." It wasn't exciting, but something about it felt grounding.
He learned that traders who survive the early storms don't always have better strategies—but they manage their emotions better.
It wasn't the volatility that broke people. It was fear. Greed. Ego.
He flipped to a highlighted sentence:
"The market is a mirror. It reflects your discipline, not your dreams."
He closed the book slowly. He'd been trading like a dreamer. But now? He needed to trade like a warrior. Scarred, maybe. But prepared.
That night, Raka set his phone aside. He didn't check charts. He didn't scroll Twitter. Instead, he opened a notebook and began to write out a plan.
Goal: Become a full-time investor within 2 years.
Focus: Learn. Document. Control emotions.
Next Steps:
Study technical analysis (candlestick patterns, RSI, MACD).
Learn fundamental analysis for projects.
Practice with small amounts only.
Journal every trade. Win or lose.
Never revenge trade.
He underlined that last one. His mistake today? He lost money on one coin and jumped into another blindly, trying to "win it back." That made things worse.
Revenge trading was like trying to fix a broken leg by running a marathon.
He wasn't just hurt by the volatility of crypto. He was hurt by the volatility inside himself.
Days passed. Raka stopped chasing pumps. He started practicing with simulated trades and revisited every mistake he'd made. He rewrote his mindset.
He wasn't here for overnight riches anymore.
He was here for mastery.
Sometimes, his hands still itched to tap "buy" when he saw something skyrocket. But now, he paused. He waited. He asked himself: Why am I entering this trade? What's my plan? What if I'm wrong?
Discipline was painful. But losing everything? That was worse.
One evening, as he closed his charting app, Raka whispered to himself, "This is war. And I'll be the last one standing."
Crypto wasn't a magic lamp. It was a battlefield.
And now, for the first time, he was learning how to survive.