I feel your pain. I have a fun money account to invest in distressed stocks that are too big to fail. It's done really well, until thinking GE was going to be a jewel in the rough. Even with a CEO change, dumping non paying assets, it still sucks. Thought I bought in at the bottom, but that was a fail. It's dropped since, so that fund will just sit there until it recovers. The dreams of quick money didn't happen.I enjoy picking individual stocks but have learned a few lessons the hard way. I have invested in too many companies without understanding them at all, mainly biotech stuff. I bought into bitcoin on pure emotion/excitement thinking it could go to the moon (lost my @$$ bad on that one), then on top of all that I wouldn't set a stop loss and would refuse to sell from pride or hope or whatever so my losses would drop to the point of no return. I have spent a lot of time researching the basic principles to successful trading and a few things that stand out to me are the importance of entry price, cutting losses short, letting profits run. I have always loved buying and selling (vehicles, guns, ammo, etc...) and trading equity is no different. The more familiar you are with what you are buying the better your odds are for a successful sell.
Lately I have taken Andrew Carnegie's advice to heart: "Put all of your egg in one basket, then watch that basket". I will focus on just a handful of companies that I am familiar with and watch them closely.