Here's a good - well written first hand experience about a "life change" experience in the stock market.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/4632...g_income&ifp=0
I lived thru the "dot bomb" bubble -- and traded a couple million dollars daily. I'd buy half million dollars worth of Dell - Microsoft - Intel - and a couple others almost every day -- if they went up .50 I'd sell and go play golf... if they went down - I MIGHT hold them over night. I made HUGE money - and paid HUGE (40%) taxes... and had I not taken out the money in 1999 (from my trading account) to pay cash for a house and then spent a year gutting and remodeling it... I'd have lost most of that account (3MM). I now look back and think what I COULDA WOULDA SHOULA done with that money... but it was mostly a lesson (by watching on the sidelines) that saved my bacon and made me a different INVESTOR... I thought at the time that I was sooooooo smart. Now I know I was very very lucky and it was all very easy while going straight UP....
