I knew better. I still sold near the bottom.

When FTX collapsed, I genuinely thought Bitcoin might be finished. Not just another bear market. I mean finished. Regulation, contagion, trust destroyed. I sold most of my position somewhere around $16k telling myself I was being rational. Six months later I was buying back above $25k.

The thing that bothers me most isn't the money. It's that I'd already lived through 2018. I knew what capitulation felt like. I'd read everything about not timing the market, about conviction, about long-term thinking. And when the moment came, none of it mattered. The fear was louder. What I've accepted since then is that understanding Bitcoin intellectually and actually holding through chaos are two completely different skills. One you develop reading. The other you only develop by getting it wrong a few times. I'm not sure conviction is something you build in advance. I think you find out if you have it when the moment is bad enough.Anyone else discover that knowing what to do and actually doing it are completely different things? Did the second cycle feel any easier?