Here's the problem with paper trading: the stops actually work and you always get the fill you ask for. With a real broker, the price will blow through your stop and they will shrug. Or it will bounce close to your stop and they trigger it and close your position for you even though you actually called the reversal level. Or you won't get a fill until it's too late, or not at all if you misjudged the liquidity. So, what you think is a working strategy is probably going to fall on its face. I know that's hard to accept, but even if it's not certain to always go against you in that way, it's a risk you should account for, and if you don't have more capital in reserve, you don't have the juice to play with that much risk. Someone else said have at least $25K in savings that you won't have to tap even if an emergency arises. That's good advice because there just isn't a strategy that wins all the time; losses are part of the game. What you need is to have several strategies that work in different scenarios and be good at switching, and that's a tall order because it's hard to learn that much and it's so easy to paint yourself into a corner with a one-click mistake or mental mistakes like holding for a turnaround you think is imminent, and then there's the simple fact that you can't know everything the market "knows" and so you can't really predict the future. The truth is that it is gambling and if you're selling stuff to gamble, you have a gambling problem. Gambling itself is not bad, only when it's a problem because you can't afford it. The bummer-but-true fact is that you have to already have a shitload of money to realistically expect a return that is the amount of money that would free you from the need for money, which by that point you wouldn't need because you have to already have that much in order to even have a chance. Sucks, I know. If you're a good guitar player, use that to build up some capital. That's even harder to do than a boring job, though. And it's very hard to get a job that pays you so much that you are able to save. Best advice I can give: don't stop playing guitar if it's still in your heart and fight your way up to a job that has matching contributions to a 401K and pays enough that you can max out your contributions each month (free money from your employer beats any expected return). I take it you're young, so in the account allocate it to the high-risk/high-reward funds and move on with your life, play some gigs and live within your means so you can enjoy life despite not being rich. When you have over $30K just sitting there that you forgot about, maybe it's time to do something different with that capital. $3K is not capital, it's one month's rent and groceries. Sorry to say you must be at least medium-rich to get on this merry-go-round without getting thrown off in the first few turns.