As a newbie mom and pop retail, i tell you the hard lessons I learned since 2013:
1. There is no free lunch in this business. Folks you trade against are usually market makers and they are professionals. They need your money to feed their family, not the other way around.
2. If you have no idea whether the underlying is going up or down, trading directional, simple or multiple (calendar, spreads..) will net you very little in the long run after commissions and slippages.
3. Your broker will love you when you follow tastytrade: trade small and trade often.
4. If you short naked and leverage, sooner or later you will see a huge loss. If you don't leverage and covered, your net profit will be meager.
Go buy a book on options, read it from cover to cover until you understand how options are priced, etc.
If you can hang on and survive the first couple of years, you may find it rewarding to swim among the sharks.
Best wishes for the holiday.
