Time Travel
February, 2023
Early on in my study of Bitcoin, I admitted I was stupid. I knew practically nothing about the subject. I couldn’t explain Bitcoin to myself, much less someone else. But… I knew I wanted to learn more about Bitcoin.
It was my admittance of being stupid that opened my mind up to the possibility of Bitcoin. Once I laid down the guard of any previous “knowledge,” the slate for learning was blank and clear.
Soon after, I created a Google Doc titled “Bitcoin questions.” I threw down as many questions as my mind and research could think of, all based around the curiosity of, “What’s really going on with Bitcoin?”
I approached Bitcoin with curiosity, not presupposed understandings. This is the key to any true study towards any subject matter. Once you know nothing, you can know everything. It’s the same thing spiritually — once you become nothing, you can become everything.
I want to share my list of questions with you today, to show you where I was at just a few years ago. Google Docs tells me the document was created in February of 2023, although I had always remembered it being created in 2022. Weird. Nonetheless, this list of questions will show you my level of understanding, and how curious I was, just a short time ago. I particularly love the first question.
-What makes you so bullish?
-Is bitcoin backed by anything?
-What is proof-of-work?
-Can Bitcoin be hacked?
-How is bitcoin the best store of value?
-Closed system vs open system… Why is bitcoin a black hole for all monetary premium?
-What do you mean by bitcoin mining?
-How is the use of cheap electricity beneficial for the earth and bitcoin?
-Isn’t bitcoin bad for the environment?
-What is the bitcoin blockchain?
-What do you mean by double spending and how does bitcoin solve this?
-How is bitcoin’s supply fixed?
-What is the halving event?
-What is a bitcoin node?
-How is bitcoin purchased?
-Can the bitcoin network go down? What if the power goes out?
-Why is bitcoin better than the current monetary system?
-How do organizations such as the IMF hurt nation economies?
-Is bitcoin anonymous?
-Aren’t there a lot of illegal and illicit transactions that people do with bitcoin?
-How is the bitcoin network upgraded? Can it be changed?
-Why is the price of bitcoin so volatile?
-What is proof of stake vs proof of work?
-Why is ethereum a scam?
-What do you mean by Bitcoin, not crypto?
-How do bitcoin transactions work?
-Why is an irreversible transaction good? What happens if I send my money to the wrong person?
-Why is deflation good?
-What is nfc and does it apply to bitcoin?
-Isn’t bitcoin just for speculation?
-What is sound money? How is bitcoin sound money?
-What is cryptography?
-Either bitcoin is trending towards zero or everything else is, there’s no third option. How?
-How is bitcoin designed to force asset prices to zero?
-What’s to prevent someone from creating another Bitcoin like Network and another and another and another, thereby bringing bitcoin’s value down to zero?
This list is so fascinating to me, for many reasons. For one, it’s quite diverse. You can see a challenging of mainstream narratives with questions like, “Why is deflation good?” and “How do organizations such as the IMF hurt nation economies?” You see some of the most basic of questions around Bitcoin like, “What is cryptography?” and “What is proof-of-work?” and even “How is Bitcoin purchased?” And then you can see questions that run alongside the supposed Bitcoin thesis, things that I had heard many times in my short time listening to Bitcoiners, with questions like, “What do you mean by Bitcoin, not crypto?” and “How is Bitcoin the best store of value?”
It was such a different time for me. It makes me laugh. I vividly remember not only admitting that I was stupid, but feeling stupid. But that’s what it took, and that’s what it takes. I see way too often a newcomer into the Bitcoin rabbit hole plugging Bitcoin into their previously-formed mental models. That’s now how it works. Bitcoin is an entirely new model. It is like no other. You cannot accurately judge a system from within a different system. It’s like trying to figure out the game of baseball by thinking from the lens of basketball. That’s not how it works. You must judge a system on its own merit, eliminating biases and preconceived notions. At some point, sure, you can insert your previously accumulated knowledge to aid you in your thinking, but only after you’ve wiped the slate clean.
People talk about “limited beliefs” all the time, especially spiritually. They say to expand into your true state, you must drop your limited beliefs. That is the equivalent of “wiping the slate clean.” Yet how many enter the study of Bitcoin with already-held beliefs, limiting them from beginning their exploration with a blank slate of possibility?
That is what it takes to understand Bitcoin at a true level. That is what it takes to understand anything at a true level. You don’t know anything. Now you may begin.
I can confidently say that I can answer of all those Bitcoin questions now. But I still am not holding onto any answer. My mind remains open. I cannot box in the infinite range of possibilities, that would be a great crime! It’s possible Bitcoin doesn’t work out. I may not believe that Bitcoin won’t work if I had to give it to you one way or the other, but I do feel it is my duty to the beauty of infinity to keep my mind open to all possibilities.
My only barometer is towards what resonates as truth. A protocol grounded in “proof-of-work” aka, “energetic truth,” is as good a bet as any to resonate as truthful. Being that Bitcoin is the ultimate system of proof-of-work (other than nature itself, which should give you a significant hint… (Bitcoin is nature)), well damn! We might be onto something.