So, first off, you might be wondering, why sell now? "This cycle still has months to go! ETH will hit $10k! BTC will hit $100k" - well, maybe you're right (now that I've sold, you're probably right!), I actually do believe that the market still has a few months left in it, after all, we bounced back pretty well after this recent dip, but, I had a goal and I have to stick to that goal.

For me, the goal when I bought in at 2017/2018 was paying off my mortgage.

I know that most users here have only like $500 invested, so, it's easy to scream "HODL!" but, believe me, once you get close to your goal, those dips become scary. For me, the weekend "dip" wiped off $40k in value. That $40k meant not paying off the loan, "damn, i was so close," I thought.

And here's the thing, I've been just above the goal for a week or so, but I held because I got greedy - I bought into the hype. That 'dip' was a nice little reminder, "don't get greedy, stick to your goal and sell", so I waited for the dip to rise as best as I could and for the goal figure to be reached again (luckily this happened) and I sold.

Some history and lessons learned along the way

I've been interested in crypto for many years, so I'd like to reflect on that time and put the lessons learned from each phase into a simple table here for y'all:

Year What happened Lesson learned Somewhere around 2010-2011 I remember talking to friends about BTC hitting $1 USD. They were skeptical and I didn't look into it further. Learn and read more, don't listen to others. 2012 I looked into buying on Mt Gox but decided against it because it would mean sending personal information to Japan - I decided this was too risky. Sometimes, you have to take a risk. Back then BTC was worth hardly anything, but my concern was a shady company in another part of the world having my passport details. 2013-2014 After some time away from PCs, I built a machine and decided to try some mining. I joined mining pools (like Nicehash) that later exit scammed and lost funds. Not your keys, not your crypto. I kept my mining rewards on the pools website and also moved some to a dodgy trading platform that disappeared (Cryptsy) 2014-2015 I heard about the ETH ICO and had brief look into it but was too distracted with other financial matters so again did not buy. This time there were no friends dissuading me, in fact, it was someone who I cannot remember messaging me and suggesting I look at ETH. I wasn't paying enough attention and didn't explore further. 2015-2016 Somewhere around here BTC was at like $1k USD. I remember thinking it was way overpriced. Don't assume you know the right price of anything. 2017 Mania and hype. I had stopped paying attention to BTC. A friend mentioned that it had hit $10k USD. I fired up some of my old mining wallets and transferred them to exchanges and got serious. The best time to invest was yesterday, the next best time is today. I had missed out enough, it was time to take the plunge. I had also been wrong about BTC (see above), so I wouldn't take the risk again that "$10k is too high" like some friends said at the time. 2018 The crash. I had invested in but seems it was too late, everything cratered. HODL. I had read enough to know and understand that there might be another market cycle, there SHOULD be another cycle. I held onto basically coins that went -90%. I also learned that BTC is king, there would be no new bull market until BTC lead that charge, so I moved most of my value to BTC and told myself I'd wait. 2019-2020 Buying here and there. Unfortunately I missed the 2020 low because I needed money for other things, but toward the end of the year I got very interested in ETH 2.0 and decided I wanted to have a validator node (32 ETH). I used savings and my tax return to buy in. Buy in a bear market, sell in a bull market. Buy in what you believe in and do the research. After being lax about learning I dove headfirst into ETH. I tested staking on the testnet, I played with DeFI. 2021 Our current bull cycle and hitting a personal goal. From the beginning, I knew that I didn't care if I'd get rich and become a millionaire, my main goal was to pay off my house, if I could do that, that would be enough. Well, I hit that goal, went above it actually, and as you read in my intro, got greedy waiting for more gains since this "is just the beginning". A major dip shattered that greed and helped me realise that I should stick to the plan. I sold. Don't be greedy.

There you have it, many lessons learned throughout the years, but if I had to distill it into the most important ones:

1. Actually use the things you're buying, test them for yourself. Make sure you really believe in what you hold, and not just because people are saying it will moon.
2. Buy in a bear market. And yes, there will be a bear market, of course, maybe not now, maybe in 6 months, but there will be one. Be ready. That is where I made my biggest gains. I know, this part is hard, when things are really bad (remember when BTC hit $4k in the "dip"), everyone loses faith and thinks, "it's going to $1k" - but that is just greed. DCA your way in for best results if you have to.
3. Stick to your goals. Don't be like me and get greedy, only to then get spooked. Thankfully, everything bounced back, but what if it didn't? I would've missed paying off my house because I got greedy waiting for ETH to rise even further.

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Truthfully, I will never completely move away from crypto. I believe in it long term. Hell, I had less anxiety about moving BTC and ETH around than I did about requesting my exchange to withdraw to fiat.

Who knows, everyone here is still super positive, the sub keeps getting new members (or maybe it's just people creating alt accounts?) the run keeps going, BTC hits $100k, ETH hits $10k and I will look at it like, "damn, maybe I should've held," but that's OK, it's very hard to time the market and hit the top just like you can pretty much never buy the bottom.

I'll live with that because I'll have achieved at least one major goal.

I hope you guys can do the same, and I hope you have the fortitude to 'hodl' when you need to, and sell when you need to, when it's your choice.

EDIT: Thanks for all the replies guys. To answer some of the recurring comments and questions; yes, I sold out in phases, yes I still hold a small amount compared to what I sold (I won't shill projects here) including moons (this is an alt account). I will continue to post here and continue to post on this alt account. I've been posting here since 2017. Yes, I will continue to invest in Crypto.