That post was written when BTC was down by more than 60% from USD 1180,-. Right now we're down by maybe 25%.
In the bear market as a whole, the value dropped from $1180 to below $200. $1180 to $200 is a reduction of roughly 83%, so you would be losing more than four fifths of your coins' value if you held throughout that period. In some BTC bear markets it's been even worse.
The trick is putting your coins (the ones that you're not using regularly) in cold storage somewhere that it would take a while to access them, so it takes a lot of thought to dump them and it's not subject to short-term emotions from price movements.
If you have enough savings that you can still live comfortably if you lose all the coins, HODLing shouldn't be too difficult.
Good lord that drop. I wasn't into bitcoin or cryptocurrencies in general at those times, but looking at those charts right now.. if I remember correctly bitcoin stayed at around the $200 mark for around a year or so? If I was a beginner at that time I would have probably said "fuck it" and sold at $200 because I would probably think it wouldn't rise back up, knowing it has stayed in that price range for so long.
I also agree on your second statement, holding bitcoin somewhere less accessible. But damn that's definitely easier said than done.
I was also around when bitcoin was at 200-300 for like a good year. I was actually thinking about cashing out, but I kept seeing the fluctuations and thought I might as well HODL for the hell of it. My holdings just exploded, and I genuinely have no regrets with holding. Even though it's dropping now, I'm still in a profit.