My first big lesson: The allure of 'just a little more' in crypto

Hey everyone, just joined the forum. Been trading for a few years, mostly forex and some indices, but like many, got pulled into the crypto boom a couple of cycles ago. Wanted to share one of the harder lessons I learned early on.

It was back in 2021, when $BTC was making its run towards its then-ATH. I'd made some decent gains on a few alts and was feeling pretty good about myself. Had a chunk of capital in $ETH and it was performing well. My original plan was to take profits at a certain technical level, re-evaluate, and probably scale back in on a pullback. Simple enough, right? Except the market just kept going. Every day was green, and the FOMO started to set in. My brain started telling me that if I sold, I'd miss out on the real money. So I held, then I held some more, even buying a little extra near what I thought was a temporary dip, but turned out to be close to the top of that leg. When the inevitable correction came, it hit hard and fast. I ended up giving back a good 40% of my unrealized gains, turning a very healthy profit into something far more modest, all because I got greedy and deviated from my initial plan. It wasn't overtrading or revenge trading, but simply the inability to press the 'sell' button when my own strategy dictated it. The lesson was stark: have a plan, execute the plan, and don't let the noise or the euphoria of an uptrend convince you that 'this time it's different'. The market doesn't care about your gains, only your next trade.