I’ve been investing in stocks for six years.
During that time, I’ve lived through bear markets, short bull markets, and, more often than either, long stretches of sideways movement and waiting.
There have been moments of excitement and moments of anxiety. I’ve made good calls, and I’ve made plenty of mistakes.
I used to think the most important thing in investing was finding a good stock.
Now, I’m increasingly convinced that the harder question isn’t which stock to buy, but:
Have I really thought things through before I act?
During China’s National Day holiday, with the market temporarily quiet, I decided to step back and look at what these six years have taught me.
I don’t think I could have written this a year ago.
It’s not because I wasn’t learning.
Quite the opposite. I’ve spent these years watching the market, researching companies, experiencing rises and falls, and constantly asking myself what I could have done better.
But back then, a lot of what I knew was still scattered.
- I had certain feelings about investing, but I couldn’t quite put them into words.
- I knew some principles, but they hadn’t really become my own yet.
Now, I feel like I’m finally starting to see the thread.
I know what questions I want to ask myself before I buy a stock.
This isn’t a mature investment system.
It’s simply a set of reminders I’ve collected along the way—after making mistakes, paying tuition, and slowly figuring out what matters to me.
And I want to remember what I’ve learned the next time I face the market.
Before I Make a Move, I Want to Ask Myself These Questions
If I were about to buy a stock today, these are the questions I would want to answer first.
1、What kind of market are we in?
Are we in a clear uptrend, or has the market already gone through a major run?
Are opportunities genuinely increasing, or is the market becoming crowded?
I can’t look at the stock in isolation.
I also need to understand where the broader market is.
2. What does my current portfolio look like?
Is any position too large?
Has something gone up enough that it makes sense to trim it?
Is something pulling back even though the underlying thesis remains intact?
Is there a position that simply isn’t worth tying up my capital anymore?
I need to know where my money is before I can decide where it should go next.
3. Why do I want to buy another stock?
Have I genuinely found an opportunity worth owning?
Or has the market been going up and I’m simply afraid of missing out?
I need to distinguish between:
a real opportunity and the fear of missing one.
4. If I buy, where will the money come from?
Will I free up capital from an existing position?
Or am I opening a new position?
If I open a new position, do I have enough capital to handle the volatility?
If most of my money is already invested, will I still have the ability to act when a genuinely good opportunity appears?
5. Is this actually a good price to enter?
I want to be patient enough to wait for an entry point where the risk-reward feels more comfortable.
There are few things more frustrating than buying a stock and watching it fall from the moment you enter.
The frustration isn’t just about the paper loss.
It’s also about having capital tied up for an unknown amount of time—and the opportunity cost that comes with it.
So I want to be patient enough to wait for a better entry.
These questions sound simple.
But I’m realizing that being able to answer them before placing an order takes years of experience.
From the 50 Crashes of an 88-Year-Old Master, I Understood Investment and Life
Why Do I Care So Much About These Questions Now?
Over these six years, I’ve gradually realized that there are several mistakes I don’t want to make again.
1、Buying the Wrong Stock Costs More Than I Used to Think
In the past, I might see a stock with a strong chart, a good trend, or a position in a hot sector and immediately think:
Maybe I should get in.
Now I’m much more cautious.
Because I’ve learned that:
Truly understanding a company is much harder than it looks.
You need to understand its technology roadmap, business model, profitability, sources of growth, industry environment, competitive landscape, management team, and the problems it may face in the future.
And the more you learn, the more you realize:
there is still so much you don’t know.
So now, before I buy a stock, I want to be able to answer one question clearly:
Why do I actually want to own it?
And if it falls after I buy it, can I still explain why I’m willing to hold it?
I used to hear Warren Buffett’s famous line:
“If you aren't willing to own a stock for ten years, don't even think about owning it for ten minutes.”
It reminds me that:
Don’t buy something you haven’t thought through enough to know why it is worth owning for the long term.
2. Why Am I Afraid When a Stock Falls?
is something I’ve been thinking about for years.
If I truly understand a company and genuinely believe in its long-term story, then a decline caused by short-term sentiment or temporary factors should, in theory, make me think:
It’s cheaper now.
I might even see it as the market giving me a better price.
But in reality, when a stock falls, why do I sometimes panic?
Eventually, I realized:
I may not understand the company deeply enough.
Or maybe I still believe in the company, but my position has simply become too large.
Or perhaps I’ve invested almost all of my available capital and have no cash left to deploy.
At that point, a decline stops feeling like an opportunity.
It becomes pressure.
That’s why I increasingly believe:
Real confidence isn’t how certain you feel when a stock is going up. It’s knowing why you still own it when the stock is going down.
And that changed the way I think about position sizing.
3. The Real Purpose of Position Management Is Preserving Choice
I used to think of position sizing as a simple matter of percentages.
How much of the portfolio should go into each stock?
Now I increasingly think position management is about something else.
It’s about whether:
my capital still gives me choices.
Suppose I own five stocks.
Some have risen a lot. Some are pulling back. Some may no longer deserve a place in the portfolio.
The question isn’t whether they should always remain at fixed percentages.
The questions are:
- Should I trim something that has already risen significantly?
- Does a stock that has pulled back still deserve more capital?
- Is there a position that no longer deserves to tie up my money?
And if a genuinely attractive opportunity appears, where will the money come from?
Will I still be able to act?
I want my capital to be able to move between opportunities.
And I want to keep some capital available.
There is one situation I increasingly don’t want to find myself in again:
Being fully invested.
The market falls.
My account shrinks.
I don’t want to sell because I’m waiting to get back to break-even.
But deep down, I’m not even confident enough in what I own to know whether I should keep holding it.
Meanwhile, a stock I genuinely like appears at an attractive price—and I have no money left.
That’s when I realize:
What hurts most isn’t the loss. It’s losing the ability to choose.
So I increasingly think:
I’m not managing a collection of stocks. I’m managing my capital.
4. I’m Increasingly Convinced That Market Opportunities Come in Waves
A market opportunity doesn’t last forever.
Especially in China’s A-share market.
Sometimes a powerful theme takes off—technology, semiconductors, optical modules—and suddenly the entire market seems full of opportunities.
You start thinking:
How are there good stocks everywhere?
But once the trend is over, the market quiets down again.
Even good companies can pull back.
What I want to do is simple:
- When the opportunity is there, don’t get out just because of every small fluctuation.
- When the market is quiet, be patient.
Real patience doesn’t mean doing nothing.
It means you’ve done your homework and you know what you’re waiting for.
Waiting isn’t empty time.
While I wait, I can still learn, research, and observe.
Or I can work on something else entirely.
Six Years Gave Me More Than Investment Experience
Six years of investing didn’t make me feel like I was improving every day.
They slowly became my judgment, my awareness, my questions, and the mistakes I no longer want to repeat.
And during this National Day holiday, I suddenly realized:
I can finally connect some of those pieces.
They taught me something more important than individual stock picks:
how I want to think the next time I face a similar situation.
It reminds me of running.
I’ve been running on and off for more than eight years.
I started with running and walking in intervals. This year, I finally reached the point where I could run 5 kilometers continuously.
I used to need around 40 minutes to finish 5K. This year, I got that down to around 35 minutes.
I didn’t feel myself improving every single day.
But looking back, those eight-plus years of accumulated effort had taken me somewhere I hadn’t been before.
Investing is similar.
Six years in the stock market doesn’t mean I’ve figured everything out.
It simply means that, after all these experiences, I can finally begin to turn them into my own way of thinking.
These are reminders shaped by my own experience, personality, financial situation, and understanding.
They are not a set of “correct answers.”
And they may eventually be revised—or even overturned—by me.
Everyone’s situation is different. Everyone needs to build their own system.
This Is Where My Thinking Stands Today
Six years isn’t that long.
In fact, the longer I invest, the more I think investing may be something that takes a very long time to understand.
So I don’t want to believe that I’ve “figured it out” simply because I’ve managed to summarize these ideas today.
I just know more than I did six years ago about what I don’t know.
And I know more clearly which mistakes I don’t want to repeat.
I’ll keep observing.
If the market goes through another full cycle, I may come away with a completely different understanding.
- If I discover that one of today’s conclusions is incomplete, I’ll revise it.
- If I notice an important variable I had previously overlooked, I’ll add it to my system.
This isn’t an answer that can be completed once. It’s a process of continuous iteration.
So perhaps this article is less an investment summary than a reminder I’m leaving for my future self during this National Day holiday.
Before I make a move, I want to remember:
Look at the market.
Then look at my positions.
Then look at my available capital.
Then look at the opportunity.
Then look at whether this is actually a good place to enter.
I don’t need to guarantee that I’ll always be right.
I just want:
not to fall into the same hole twice.
And I don’t want the tuition I’ve already paid to be wasted.
I want it to become part of my judgment.
Waiting for the Market Doesn’t Mean Putting Life on Hold
Once you choose a stock and build a position, a lot of what comes next is waiting.
- Waiting to see how the market responds.
- Waiting to see whether your thesis holds.
That’s why I’m increasingly convinced that much of the real work happens outside the moment of buying: learning, researching, thinking, and doing the other things I care about.
I was reminded of Jesse C. Stine’s book, <Insider Buy Superstocks>. The book tells the story of how he turned $46,000 into $6.8 million in 28 months.
It made me think about something:
Some money comes from a particular market opportunity. Other things you build can become assets that last much longer.
That’s why I’m building my website, writing, and creating another asset that can compound over time.
This isn’t about escaping the stock market.
It’s about accepting that:
My life shouldn’t depend on a single asset.
Stocks can be one path.
Writing, content, and my website can be another.
When the market offers an opportunity, I’ll participate seriously.
When it doesn’t, I’ll keep living seriously—and keep building another path.
That way, I don’t have to hand my emotional state over to my brokerage account every day.
And writing gives me a place to leave these ideas, even when they’re still unfinished.
Maybe a few years from now, I’ll look back at what I wrote today and find that some of it still holds true while some of it has changed.
That’s okay.
Because it means:
I’m still growing.
And so is my system.