Bitcoin Forum

I learned about Bitcoin at a quite young age, not really understanding why it was for, but liked its concept. I was 13 or 14 years old at max back then, didn't understand much, and didn't actually bother to research any further. I am not sure how much it was worth then, if I am not mistaken, it was valued at $200-300.

The faucet concept was really appealing to me, "Why are people giving out this coin for free?, I thought". Faucets would distribute hundreds, if not thousands of Satoshi for each claim/roll. I managed to earn a decent amount that way, but as I already mentioned, I didn't know much, thus, I didn't see it as an investment or anything close to that.

And how did I spend my Bitcoin? Buying Minecraft accounts, because they were cheaper than buying from the official store. Stupid me, wish I knew better back then. Those accounts turned to be the most expensive ones they could ever be, I really regret spending $5-10 each now. I feel like I spent more than $500 now. At that point, if I remember correctly, started browsing Bitcointalk and created an account, if I spent more time here, lol.

That was my first mistake. The second one was giving up/forgetting about it after a while. I mean, I didn't do much, but if I had continued playing with faucets, now I would definitely have a good sum of money, provided that I kept them in a wallet till now.

Got back a little before the 2017 price pump, started posting here and being active, learned about Altcoin mining, it was popular back then, set up my computer and even bought a second GPU. Was making daily profit, in Bitcoin and was delighted, within a couple of days, I had a full return on the GPU, and managed to acquire a decent amount of BTC. However, I sold some of it later, some before and some when the price skyrocketed, and deposited some to Bitstamp for trading. That's what I deem as my third mistake, should have kept them intact.

Unfortunately, when the price crashed, I lost faith and abandoned it and the forum shortly after. I return just a few months before, regretting being absent for so long, instead of taking advantage of such an opportunity, I got disappointed. I didn't sell though, I had set my coins aside, because deep down, I felt it would recover some day. My mistake was not buying any, since I have easily afforded to do.

Summarizing, I've always returned to Bitcoin, deep down I always knew it would become that successful, I'm trying to learn from my mistakes. Now, I'm trading several times throughout the week, managing a decent profit with each trade. There's no point in regretting what I COULD have done, but only to look forward, and what I can achieve now.

Why do you even consider yourself a returnee when you did not leave in the first place? Well, you sold some, but also kept some to yourself. That means you're still with Bitcoin. And that's always been the case with almost all of us. I guess nobody ever earned Bitcoin in those old days and kept everything intact since then. At some point in time, they must have sold or spent a Bitcoin or two.

I assume you still have a decent amount of Bitcoin kept safe somewhere. No regrets, then. But if you want to make up for your period of inactivity, then you may begin to stack more Sats right now.

You are not alone, bro!

After the 2018 dump, I stopped reading about Bitcoin and moved my focus to my 9-5 job. And now with the whole DOGE hype, I felt obligated to dust off my old wallets. And I find the crypto super fun again!

Hope that the spark in you becomes a blazing flame that wouldn't die again. This is the first that I have heard of someone that has quit because of the 2018 dump and then came back because of the hype, although I root for you I find your behavior of being a bandwagon seem to be a bad thing that keeps you from growing. Remember what the other users say about trusting in bitcoin, there will be dire times but the good things will soon follow. Don't worry because I find you changing your focus into other things like that 9-5 job that you mentioned a good indicator that you don't give up on life. I did learn about bitcoin when I was younger but I was one of those who are skeptic that do not want to anything that involves money online because back then online scams are at their height in my country so I tried my best to stay away to anything that is related to online transactions.

Those several mistakes that we did are our foundation. You're not alone in making those mistakes, every one of us sold at the early time before bull runs. And there's this scene that whenever we sell, the price suddenly goes up.

Forget about the past and those mistakes won't happen again. We've learned from those and we're applying the right strategy based on how we should tackle the current situation of the market.

So many have made those same mistakes, me included.  What really matters is to do what you have already done: to have learned from those mistakes.  This is all you need to be successful.  All signs suggest that you will succeed.

As you have said, and to reiterate:   we have no control over the future, we can't change the past, the best we can do is to modulate the present as it happens.

same phase as I did, almost 2 years I was not active in cryptocurrency. because I spent 5 bitcoins in 2017. and early 2020 I started over with good wishes. we have the spirit up and down. That's the cycle, at this point we understand that there is something we left behind that is very valuable. seeing the growth of bitcoin excites us to this day.
I hope that in the future we will find even greater success.

I think the majority of crypto enthusiasts lost some interest in crypto in 2018 because of the market dump. I was on this team as well ;D I had heard about Bitcoin when I was young and there were a lot of different rumors but I started to reading properly about Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies at the end of 2017.
Back at that time, I remember I liked LiteCoin among other altcoins because of the low-cost fees of transactions in the network and I invested some of my savings in this asset as well. I had my coins in EXMO and decided to keep holding because I hadn't much knowledge about trading.
Unfortunately, I had scared a bit when the prices fell down so I cashed out but I saved a quarter of my coins and got back to Bitcoin at the start of this year. Sure, I regret my nervousness and panic but it's ok, eventually it's a great experience for me.

Way back 2018 I also gave myself a break from crypto especially Bitcoin because that time because that time I have nothing left but shitcoins on my wallet and the market crashed that is why I looked for a day job and fortunately got it and lost it again when pandemic arrives and here I am again in crypto. I think we have the same experience but I do not consider it as "failure" it was just a lesson learned for me. You are not alone.

Honestly I Never left but I do agree on the faucets point though this is something that everyone experienced sooner or later , back in the early days I was online all day and would collect Satoshi through faucets etc.. then when I would have like some good amount I would spend them on this gambling site 🤣 with no winning strategy ! nothing I would just spend my coins like that and at the end of the day I was left with nothing 😅. After that I saved up all my savings and there was a campaign managed by Lauda if I remember correctly it went on for 1 year or so and I didn't use even a single coins from there. The amount of btc I had back then before the first high price was 0.1 btc but it's unfortunate that I had to sell all of them back in 2019 when the price was very very less. But I do not have any problems because it helped my family. Then I again purchased bitcoins right now but this time used them for interday trading and got like 100$ from them. Now I really want to save the government from India wants to ban Bitcoins therefore I would have to make new local wallets where am living therefore for the while would keep the money safe , this is weird man does the government fails to see all these ups and downs ?

You really came into the space  at a very tender  age, bitcoin would always be the major cryptocurrency  with all the uniqueness. Mistakes are bound to happen, but with experience  we  can always bounce  back. Some of us came into this space not long ago, despite the numerous  altcoins  around,bitcoin has largely remained the reference  coin at any point in time.  

What a great experience that deserves deep reflective thinking. But, the way to have a better future is to maximize the present.

Who knows, I would've done the same thing if I were you. But, you know profit will always be made in btc because the causality for price rise is no longer the halving which happen every 4 years but it's now institutional investors who buy frequently.

Good to know that the Op knows bitcoin really early and that's when the faucet era was started where they can earn bitcoin or satoshi for free and it is unlimited where they can just claim it for free. If I were there that time maybe I will just do it more times in order to get free satoshis. Even though you abandon bitcoin or cryptocurrency you are still going back where you brlong and where you started, that's the spirit bro just go back whenever you like.

What a great realization you had, OP.

It's true that we need to fail in order to succeed and your experience with Bitcoin in the past serves you right since you can't do anything good about it if you don't know what you are doing plus at a young age like that, I know how it feels when you are enjoying yourself playing videogames. Wished you could have someone to guide you during the early stages of adopting Bitcoin but only those who understands about can make a fortune in the future.

Although, you said you did leave Bitcoin after it went down but to be exact, you aren't leaving it yet since you did not forget about your experiences and you did gained it from a mere faucet before. But, look at you now, you are slowly trying to keep in track again because you knew that Bitcoin has a future.

My story has many similarities with yours OP.

At first I thought that altcoins are a better choice because Bitcoin is expensive, so I was buying cheap coins which was a mistake because most of them gained much less than Bitcoin over time and some lost a lot in the bear market of 2018.

When I finally had some bitcoins I made a bad choice of selling a bit each year at levels that I thought to be high. Looking at that now they weren't high enough. ;)

We learn while being her. Worst thing you can do is give up and leave.

I think that's a story of almost everyone who knows bitcoin during the value is not yet too high like in 2018 or much earlier. But what the good point of this story is that, you always stand up and keep walking, what I mean is, you always try to invest in bitcoin despite of your mistakes. Honestly, we can learn better through our own mistakes and experiences.

Hey, if you keep coming back to bitcoin, then i have a couple of stories (if you don't already know them) to confirm your point of view. I wish you all the best.

The Bitcoin Story… mh, maybe
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5310010.msg56113346#msg56113346

No matter what happen, a real individual who understands the importance and the concept of Bitcoin will be parted apart but can still make his way finding his way back to Bitcoin again. Well there are lots stories coming from other people who have the same story just like you who happens to be parted their ways from Bitcoin because they become easy into other stuffs that concern them and now are making their return into Bitcoin claiming they were the old ones who happened to be the pioneering batch that have the cheapest price of Bitcoin purchased. The point is that as long as you know Bitcoin is always there and will be there, you will still find yourself returning to Bitcoin because you know its importance not just on the benefits it can give but also with the concept it have.

There are a lot of stories like what he experienced and I guess, in some ways, we have the same story to tell to.
This is how we realized that bitcoin has a lot to offer to the community.
Though people are exposed to other alts or tokens out there, bitcoin remains its top spot.
Many have attempted to "kill" bitcoin or created more advanced features, and yet, bitcoin still hold its position.
We can surmise then that, no matter what, bitcoin will always be the reference point in crypto community.

you returned to bitcoin and bitcointalk . your not alone but legends on bitcointalk once leaved to foccus on the outside world but they did also returned after a long years .
bitcoin and bitcointalk was like our parents because we as a kid we want to get wild and explore life but after we fail and knew that we are wrong we eventually go back to our home and to our parents .
other scenario is when we leave btc to invest in altcoins and if we got scammed we will return to btc .

Your story is almost same with me, when the price crashed i already lost my faith and move into another investment.

But in the end of 2020 when the price of bitcoin keep rising up, once again bitcoin proof me wrong.

And here we go again, i'm back into this cryptocurrency world and i don't want to leave this crypto investment anymore!

Thanks for sharing your experience, OP.
It reminded me that I saw on Twitter someone who shared a tweet about bitcoin when its price was $ 500 in 2014. The tweet invited to buy bitcoin I had skepticism and it took three years for me to realize that bitcoin it was revolutionizing around the world.

They were years of absence because I was away from the crypto communities. Definitely social networks have given a great contribution by spreading about bitcoin and the growth of the crypto space.

Same for me. when bitcoin was hyped way back 2017 I have high hopes for my holdings that I'm thinking that I can buy my own motorbike but suddenly price went down crazy that time. I was very disappointed for 2 years because my portfolio keeps going down. Fast forward to 2020 I got interested in bitcoin again because more people are starting to study about it, more people are aware that it is not a scam unlike what some people say way back 2017. My friends introduced me to a new way of trading which is futures trading, I enjoy doing it because you can earn 2 ways. I'm expanding my knowledge now in that field to reduce the risk of losing.

You don't have to regret what you get because you still have many times to change all of your regrets into happiness in the future. Many of us have almost the same experience, but we still do what we believe because we want to try to have more and more bitcoin, and I am sure that we still have that chance. I believe that bitcoin will not disappoint us. Although we sometimes feel sad to see the price is down, the price will increase in the next few days. What you need to do now is trying to make more bitcoin in many ways, and never give up because we have time before the price increases so high and we are too late to make that bitcoin.

The successful people are the ones,who don't give up after the first failure.I guess that you will never be truly successful. :-\
I joined the Bitcoin community back in 2016 and I have never left Bitcoin or the community ever since.
I can't say that I'm successful,even though I have never abandoned Bitcoin ;D
I really regret that I didn't join this wonderful forum back in 2013 or maybe earlier.The problem is,that I have found out that Bitcointalk.org exists in the summer of 2015,when I read a post on another forum about Bitcoin loans. ;D
Just never give up and don't leave Bitcoin(when the BTC price crashes again). ;D

Yeah, me, too. Always return to Bitcoin

This is how it works haha. You will always be back, no matter how many times to "leave". There is nothing to regret on how you spent your coins back then. Faucets were paying good amount of coins during those times because the price of bitcoin was very low. At least you spent all those coins you earned on something you actually wanted.
How is this a mistake? You already made your profit. You can't keep on holding forever. You will have to convert it to fiat eventually once your profit goal has been reached.

Those are some great replies!
Of course, we've all made mistakes and I definitely don't feel alone anymore, however, we couldn't have known that it would advance like that, so we can actually excuse ourselves for not knowing any better. Looking back to my trade history, I've done some really stupid mistakes, can't stand to look at them.

I can't keep regretting my choices of course, there's no point in that, just wasting time. However, sometimes I do look back and think that if I had done the X Y moves, now I would have a lot more cash or Bitcoin.

Unfortunately, I do not hold a decent amount currently, that's what I do regret, I could have kept more aside.

Do not get me started about Doge, I sold 30.000 coins back in the early days.  ::)

Unfortunately, I don't think that mistakes ever stop, I think that we're just balancing the right and the wrong moves we make. I still catch myself, chickening out and making wrong moves.Well, I did make some profit, but I actually didn't need the money back then, I guess I could have kept my Bitcoin aside. But I guess you are right, it could have been worse, I could have bought at $16.000 and sold at $5.000, or I could have sold after the crash.

Base from your whole experience, you were not really stupid since its already great that you were not ignorant at first and really indulge and dived within the Cryptocurrency Industry by gaining small amounts from faucets. Its still a great way to earn money because all you are doing is just claim free satoshis. I believe what you are telling publicly is that whenever it is possible, you return to Bitcoin because it is always there to provide for you which is something useful since its another income generator. This is a really great experience since you really started at a triple digit value at your own currency while I already heard about Bitcoin when its at least more than thousand dollars each.

Yes.... there are a lot of people like you... I call them the "good weather" friends. They will support you and be with you in the "good weather" ...but the moment when the weather turns bad, they abandon you and forget about you. (This is typical speculative behavior)

If you want to change this, then I have a good piece of advice for you... "Look at Bitcoin as a currency and not as a Commodity" Then you will use it regularly and also buy more regularly and not just when the price is high. (You want to buy when the price is low and if you use it as a currency... you would jump at the opportunity to buy when the price is low)  ;)

This is a great and inspiring write up and shows the urge to know more, push on and not to back down. This case or aspect of regret is what has kept many people from moving forward,  I mean we are humans and it is very likely we will get skeptical and/or doubtful all the time in order to be safe, but when we miss opportunities because of what we failed to do, and later realizes how wonderful that particular thing is, I think it's better letting go of the past and moving forward to the future through doing the right thing. You knew about Bitcoin at an early stage but failed to do what is demanded of it then, doesn't mean you are stupid or you won't achieve whatever you want again, but with dedication you will, you only need to put in more effort and open up your mind to all opportunities the crypto space has to offer.

What does that mean? returning on how and what?This is the test if how hard we can hold , and sad that you have no Guts like mine.
Well we will realized things after our wrong decisions made.
Even if the price falls down to 1k again? lol

This looks like the story you first learned about bitcoin and your journey so far, not about you losing bitcoin and leaving. in a few years you are back again to bitcoin to take again the losses you ever got.

It looks like we have the same experience the only difference is you enter the crypto world when it is only 200$ while I enter at the market at $700. Just like you, I also used to earn Bitcoin through faucets and I'd say you can really get a decent amount of it way back then. Because of lack of knowledge and wanting for profit I sold my Bitcoins at a cheap price for the reason of buying a gadget like a Laptop. If I've known that Bitcoin would be this much I will probably hold it for a longer time. I didn't quit on it though but as I've got my earnings I always spend it. We surely made a lot of mistakes but don't let it bother you instead learned from them. Besides no one really expect Bitcoin would grow this much so but now that we have the knowledge, things like this would never happen again.

Some have left for good though,,, and I remember in 2018 reading some posts from old guys who permanently left. Some even checked out at $10000. I envied them,,, and I hope it will be my turn to leave when I can check out at $1 million;)

But I guess once bitten you never go away permanently. Perhaps absent from forum but always a Bitcoin user!

Well, life is a continuous learning, If you haven't become successful in your first, second, and third try then there's always forth, fifth, and so on. Opportunities are unlimited, but the earlier you engage, the better the return is.
Lucky you, you have tried several forms of investment in cryptocurrency. Mining alts was popular back then and you did have tried and earned good income, though things went south , atleast you've learned something important that you could use this time.

Same here happen with me. I familiar with bitcoin when price between 200-300. I saw there some faucet offerings free btc satoshis. I worked there foe some days but leave it after some days. Also i made coinbase and xapo wallet account to store btc but not invested ever in btc.
After 2017 btc again forced me to trade online and niw i have full potential over Btc. I traded in good manner . and now owner of 1/3 btc.

Somehow, you're right that it won't stop but at least we get to minimize it and we know how to avoid it or else we know the consequences that await.

We keep making mistakes but we're also learning new things from those. Yeah, it's just balancing. New and old mistakes, still create new lessons that you can further apply in your future decision making.

You were not interested at that time when you're younger right? Bitcoin is a deflationary cryptocurrency and if it's quite expensive these days, we've expected it to rise but not that much. It just so happen that the unexpected happened.

Maybe, he just took a break from cryptocurrency and let himself analyze some thing that will help him earn more bitcoin.

Some people are also promoting Sats for a long term investment and I'm not yet knowledgeable about its existence in the market.

Also I think that no one will ever leave bitcoin unless he didn't handled his investment so well or he just underestimated the possible things that might occur in the market.

I also have the same experience as yours. I have known Bitcoin many years ago, actually earned from it, but after few years I stopped. I guess the fire and motivation to continue faded away, but then again, I am here joining in discussions because I am really missing out my life if I am not using the full potential cryptocurrencies have as of now. I believe that there's so much more in the next few years to see how Bitcoin will improve in terms of numbers of users and popularity.

I am really glad that I was born in this generation, because if not, there will be no chance of an encounter with such great innovation.

I also experienced this kind of situation. I've been in bitcoin wayback 2018, I experienced to earned and make a good profit out of it. I able to buy those things that I need, i want and sometimes I able to help my parents financially. Bitcoin is one of the best thing that happens to me that year, I earned my 1st 100k in just 9 to 10mos because of my hardwork and also because of that high time days of bitcoin. Then all things began to lose when I came in college, i have no time to earned bitcoin and I don't have any time to insert crypto in my sched. And then one day I realized that I was there at the middle of my life where I am earning yet I wasted it and not able to maintain my good and positive earnings. Here I am again, thinking and hoping that day will come back.

We're almost the same, I completely took my mind off of Bitcoin for about a year and a half, made a comeback this 2020 realizing how much I was actually losing, I could have made good profit, I honestly thought that year 2018 frustrated me hard on how low the price was not realizing how big of a pump it would made after 2 years, such a big waste but I guess it's better to be late than never.  8)

Yes, crypto is a good place to return to or even a place to start for those who are new to crypto.

I know many people had experienced that thing before, for sure they also encountered when the value of bitcoin is not that too much but didn't even bother of buying it or research about it, those who research about it maybe invest, and they are now blessed because of that, I ish I could encounter bitcoin before but I am thinking if I would do the same as yours or explore it more but it is still worth if you are already in the world of bitcoin for so many years because for sure by those years you have learned a lot about cryptocurrency.

Only the most hardcore believers in bitcoin would have kept all of their coins, there is nothing wrong with having sold your coins back then or to have use them to buy something you needed, we must remember that bitcoin is a form of money and in order for bitcoin to succeed it needs to be used as money as well and not only be a tool for speculation.

So while it would have been better for us to keep those coins it was better for bitcoin itself we used it and exchanged it for whatever we wanted and needed.

Do not think about the past. Nowadays BitCoin is the most trustable in digital marketing. We've gained from those and we're applying the correct procedure dependent on it.

You are completely right. After the pump bitcoin it has ceased to exist for many people. Now they are all back to talk only after the pump ! The same person that periodically support only FOMO projects like DOGE. Now we are all focused on BTC and his ATH, we hope he will never dump, again!

This is true, many people regrets of not taking chances before to acquire more or to stacks Satoshi when btc is not that expensive. In crypto industry there is always a new opportunity to earn and a lot of more great improvement will happen in the future. So we still have chances to stack or earn as others been saying price of bitcoin could even reach a new all time high.

This is very common but at the same time it is useless, we cannot change the past, we cannot change the fact that we did not invested in bitcoin when it was relatively cheap, what those people need to do is to simply accept the reality of it, forget about the past and formulate a plan about what to do to get profits out of bitcoin, and even if the price right now seems to be very high I have no doubt that in the next decade were going to see bitcoin reaching six figures.

So bitcoin is still going to be one of the best investments possible and the best part is that as it keeps growing it is going to become safer and safer to invest in it as speculation will go down once a significant portion of the population gets in it.

I didn’t go through the same thing that OP did, but I had major problems in making bitcoin trade at the beginning. I had a lot of losses and I gave up when I lost money and after a few days I went back to trade and again I lost money and gave up... I repeated this cycle over and over for over 1 year. it was very complicated, but today I got used to this highly volatile market. persistence is the key to not giving up

That's how amazing bitcoin could change every perspective in our lives, and even though the occurrence was long term it never failed us to provide a good outputs. Many people have been frustrated for many times, but here in cryptocurrency! Bitcoin showed proof that everything is possible to happen.
On the state of $30k-$40k per btc, it was just a speculations last 3 years and now we've experienced it's reality. So let's keep holding our asset, who knows $100k each is highly feasible in another 3-4 years and so on.

You and everyone else cannot avoid the lose of investing in bitcoin, even you are an expert to trade and have a lot of experiences as an investor. Bitcoin market is growing fastly, especially now when many people got interested to store their money into bitcoin because its price movement since 2019 ago.

I also like that, I tried to spend $100 as my first capital to trade in bitcoin and I choose future market. The first fool I did, I have no understanding how to trade and I don' know some strategies about. I just dare myself and guessed where the price will go and I was wrong. My capital was gone and I did deposite again for the second time and lost again and I repeated it until I realized that was a wrong way. I bought some trading books and learn how to trade well and until now I still stand.

Losing is the part of life, what we need to do is to move forward to fail forward everytime that we fail d by doing that it makes us stronger than yesterday but of course we need to be wiser too so that what we've experienced and we've gone through will never happen again. Continue to trade crypto but be wiser now learn the market and trade in that way you will not regret again in the future. Also, take profit when you're happy remind that thing.

I live that optimism since before but sometimes we have been drag by our emotions especially when we are hearing FUDs and force us to sell at loss. But for now, I realize that it was not the FUDs we have to believe nor we have to let our emotions controlling us, we need to think wisely first because every single mistake leads to nowhere and most of them are very regretting.

There's no point in regretting what happened, the most important thing is just focus on the future. I think it's not too late to start collecting Bitcoin
from now, because if you look at several institutions starting to invest in Bitcoin, it means that the potential of Bitcoin is very good. Indeed,
the price of Bitcoin is very expensive now, but try to imagine what will happen to Bitcoin in the next 5 years. I believe Bitcoin could cost even more
in the future. The conclusion is we should not repeat the same mistakes, so trying to collect as much Bitcoin as possible from now on is the thing to do.

Regret will not change what has happened, and I agree that what you say is the truth that should be instilled by everyone. Not to regret what happened, but to move quickly to walk again to improve and focus on the main goal, there is definitely a substitute if you stick with it.

Of course, in the case of bitcoin being priced high enough, there will be a dilemma that occurs if we force it to buy bitcoin and invest, because the funds needed are not small.
it is wiser to pay in installments or buy altcoins which are indeed on the rise and if that is enough, you can convert them to bitcoin. maybe that's more workable at this point.

maybe it will not be until five years there will be the development of bitcoin because the halving always occurs every 4 years and usually it will determine the direction of bitcoin. continue to try that there is enough time available, while the forecast is that this year there will continue to be changes from bitcoin and altcoin so that the opportunity can be done and there is no need to remember the past, as long as there is an intention to try it will definitely be achieved.