Quote from accutrader:
If you spend 50 hours a week for a year, that would be approximately 2,500 hours a year. 10,000 hours would be 4 years. Based on my experience and that of other traders that I know, most people do not become consistently profitable in 4 years. Realistically, I think it takes 10 years.
Some people may be lucky and have an experienced person to learn from. Most people will never learn. Most people, who join chat rooms that have viable systems, never take the systems to heart. They try to add pieces of the systems to whatever they are already doing.
As you point out, it does take unusual financial circumstances to be able to go a long period without any income from trading.
This is disheartening but I wish that I knew this when I started. I would never have done this. My advice to anyone starting to trade is to find something else to do. This post may get lots of flames about me being dumb or slow. I am neither as I stood first in my class in post graduate work. My only intent is for new traders to start with their eyes open.