I have made so many mistakes that I essentially lost somewhere in the vicinity of $900k-1.1m about 3-4 years ago. My biggest mistake was following some egotistical douchebag from New Zealand who thought he knew his stuff. Anyway, all I had left was about 50-60k in MBN that I was trading to try and build up my holdings again. I started with about $100k originally so I figured I could do it again. Unfortunately, just before I could dump MBN and move to another stock I got caught in all the legal bullshit. Some days I feel very distressed and other days I am reconciled to the fact that I came from nothing in the first place and will probably go out with nothing.
Did I make a mistake? Probably but its debatable. I wasn't intending to buy and hold, I was just passing through and got shot by a stray bullet.
C'est la vie. In the words of the immortal Danny Devito in 'Other People's Money': "Don't you understand? It is the person who dies with the most who wins!" Think about that for a while, I often do.