3am. Red portfolio. Liquidated. One tab open. I learned everything that night after watching $5,400 vanish into the ether of an exchange order book. The myth that everyone parrots is: "Crypto always recovers, so just hold through the dip." People treat this like a law of nature, but it is a death sentence for anyone using leverage. You see the chart for $BTC or $INJ, you see a massive wick down, and you tell yourself that as long as you don't sell, you haven't lost. That is where you are wrong.

When you are isolated or cross-margined on a 20x or 50x position, you aren't trading the market; you are trading against a clock that is ticking against your wallet. Let’s look at the math. If you long $BTC with 20x leverage,...