John Balkam

I lean into my weirdness. I let my freak flag fly.

In 2022, I was ranting and raving to my girlfriend at the time about #Bitcoin. She said, "I think you're spending too much time in niche communities on the internet." I was deep down the rabbit hole, to be fair. I probably seemed a bit crazy. It was also a bear market, FTX collapse, etc. Well, now she's my ex and Bitcoin is up over 660% in 3 years. As they say, "the riches are in the niches." Thanks, Bitcoin Twitter & Nostr 😂😂😂

There is something deeply troubling about the trend towards "artificial everything." Artificial intelligence Artificial food Artificial relationships Artificial (augmented) reality Remember that a synonym for artificial is fake. A society wide push to implement the artificial implies that there is something wrong with the natural. Who says there is anything wrong with the natural? Are we so dissatisfied with the natural that we have to build a fake reality for our consciousness to live in? I predict that there will be a massive, global backlash against "artificial everything." As it turns out, humanity will be okay with the flaws inherent its nature. It will recognize the majesty of the natural and it will reject the artificial writ large. Or maybe I'm completely wrong and we'll be living in a world that looks like a combination of "Her," "I, Robot," and "Black Mirror." 😅

Hello, friends. I will be making my #Bitcoin conference speaking debut at BTC in D.C. on September 30th - October 1st. Will be moderating a panel called "Bitcoin: The New American Dream." The event venue is The John F. Kennedy Center for The Arts. How appropriate that we'll be in that building talking about freedom tech and the future we want to build in the USA. Wish me luck, and come hang out if you want. Code "SOVEREIGN" for 10% off tickets. 🫡🇺🇸 btcindc.com

- Separate money from the State. - Disempower the State, and the private interests that puppeteer the State to their own benefit (Death Economy). - Remove the State's power to commit crimes against humanity with zero consequences. - Build a Life Economy based on voluntary association, freedom, and autonomy. This is the vision. #Bitcoin

We are living at a time where it is possible to safeguard one's own wealth in an invisible, impenetrable, treasure chest in cyberspace. Without having to trust anyone else. Incredibly grateful to be experiencing this with you all. Truly a blessing. #Bitcoin

Sick of the Left? Buy Bitcoin. Sick of the Right? Buy Bitcoin. Sick of the wars overseas? Buy Bitcoin. Sick of the central banks? Buy Bitcoin. Sick of Wall Street? Buy Bitcoin. Sick of the Epstein coverup? Buy Bitcoin. You don't win by trying to reform the old system from within that system. You win by playing an entirely new game outside of the system. You win by taking your economic power into your own hands and starving the parasites in the old system. #Bitcoin

This may be one of the best passages I've ever read: "Happiness never comes from outside of us. He was happy because of the love coming out of him; she was happy because of the love coming out of her. But as soon as he made her responsible for his happiness, she broke the star because she could not be responsible for his happiness. If you take your happiness and put it in someone's hands, sooner or later, she is going to break it. If you give your happiness to someone else, she can always take it away. Then if happiness can only come from inside of you and is the result of your love, you are responsible for your happiness. Your whole life is nothing but a dream. You live in a fantasy where everything you know about yourself is only true for you. Your truth is not the truth for anyone else, and that includes your own children or your own parents. Every human being has a personal dream of life, and that dream is completely different from anyone else's dream. In a relationship, we can pretend to be the same, to think the same, to feel the same, to dream the same, but there is no way that can happen. There are two dreamers with two dreams. Every dreamer is going to dream in his own way. That is why we need to accept the differences that exist between two dreamers; we need to respect each other's dream. Every relationship is between two persons and no more than two. According to the way the two people dream, they create the direction of that dream we call relationship. Every relationship becomes a living being made by two dreamers. Just as your body is made by cells, your dreams are made by emotions. There are two main sources of these emotions: One is fear, and all the emotions that come from fear; the other is love, and all the emotions that come from love. We experience both emotions, but the one that predominates in everyday people is fear. The Track of Love & The Track of Fear Love has no obligations. Fear is full of obligations. Love has no expectations. Fear is full of expectations. Love is based on respect. Fear doesn't respect anything, including itself. Love is ruthless, it doesn't feel sorry for anyone but it does have compassion. Fear is full of pity; it feels sorry for everyone. Love is completely responsible. Fear avoids responsibility. Love is always kind. Fear is always unkind. Anger is nothing but fear with a mask. Sadness is fear with a mask. Jealousy is fear with a mask. With all these emotions that come from fear and create suffering, we can only pretend to be kind. We are not kind because we don't feel good, we are not happy. If you are in the track of love, you have no obligations, no expectations. You don't feel sorry for yourself or for your partner. Everything is going well for you, and that is why that smile is always on your face. Love is generous. Fear is selfish; it is only about me. Love is unconditional. Fear is full of conditions. Most people live their entire lives in the track of fear. In every relationship there are two halves of that relationship. One half is you, and the other half is your son, your daughter, your father, your mother, your friends, your partner. Of those halves, you are only responsible for your half; you are not responsible for the other half. We try to be responsible for the other half, and that is why relationships in hell are based on fear, drama, and the war of control. If we are in the war of control, it is because we have no respect. The truth is we don't love. It is selfishness, not love; it is just to have little doses that make us feel good. With the other half we can share, we can enjoy, we can create the most wonderful dream together. But the other half always has its own dream, its own will, and we can never control that dream no matter how hard we try. Then we have a choice: We can create a conflict and a war of control, or we can become a playmate and a team player. Playmates and teammates play together, but not against each other. In a relationship, as in a game, it's not about winning or losing. You are playing because you want to have fun. In the track of love, you are giving more than you are taking. Selfishness, control, and fear will break almost any relationship. Generosity, freedom, and love will create the most beautiful relationship: an ongoing romance. To master a relationship is all about you. If we respect the other half, there is always going to be peace in that relationship. The quality of your communication depends upon the choices you make in each moment, whether you tune your emotional body to love or to fear. If you catch yourself in the track of fear, just by having that awareness, you can shift your attention into the track of love. Just by seeing where you are, just by changing your attention, everything around you will change. Finally, if you are aware that no one else can make you happy, and that happiness is the result of love coming out of you, this becomes the greatest mastery of the Toltecs, the Mastery of Love. Love is not about concepts; love is about action. Love in action can only produce happiness. Fear in action can only produce suffering. The only way to master love is to practice love. Your reactions are the key to having a wonderful life. If you can learn to control your own reactions, then you can change your routines, and you can change your life. Your life is the manifestation of your personal dream. If you can transform the program of your personal dream, you can become a dream master. A dream master creates a masterpiece of life. You didn't come here with a great mission to save the world, to change society, but surely you come with a big mission, an important mission. The real mission you have in life is to make yourself happy, and in order to be happy, you have to look at what you believe, the way you judge yourself, the way you victimize yourself. We need to give the body freedom from the tyrant that is the mind. These are the needs of the body; these are the needs of the mind. You find out that what you are is a force--a force that makes it possible for your body to live, a force that makes it possible for your whole mind to dream. What you really are is that force that is Life. All of us are hunters, and all of us are prey. What is it that we hunt? We hunt to fulfill our needs. Humans hunt for love. We feel that we need that love because we believe we don't have love, because we don't love ourselves. We hunt for love in other humans just like us, expecting to get love from them when these humans are in the same condition as we are. They don't love themselves either, so how much love can we get from them? We merely create a bigger need that isn't real; we keep hunting and hunting, but in the wrong place, because other humans don't have the love we need. When Artemis became aware of her fall, she went back to herself, because everything she needed was inside herself. It is the same for all of us, because all of us are like Artemis after she fell and before her redemption. We are hunting for love. We are hunting for justice and happiness. We are hunting for God, but God is inside of us. The hunting of the magical deer teaches you that you have to hunt inside yourself. If you remember the story of Artemis, you will always find the love inside you. To hunt inside yourself, you start by hunting every reaction you have. You are going to change one routine at a time. It is a war for freedom from the Dream that controls your life. It is a war between you and the predator with the Truth in the middle. You are what you believe you are. You can only perceive the beauty that lives outside you when you feel the beauty that lives inside you. When you make it your goal to create the perfect relationship between you and your body, you are learning to have a perfect relationship with anyone you are with, including your mother, your friends, your lover, your children, your dog. When you have the perfect relationship between you and your body, in that moment your half of any relationship outside you is completely fulfilled. You no longer depend upon the success of a relationship from the outside. God is everywhere. Life is everywhere. If you have the eyes of love, you just see love wherever you go. Inside every human is the Promised Land that Moses promised his people. That Promised Land is in the realm of the human mind, but only the mind that is fertile for Love, because that is where God lives. If you see the ordinary human mind, it is also fertile land, but for the Parasite that grows the seeds of envy, anger, jealousy, and fear. You can have a relationship that fulfills your dream of Heaven; you can create a Paradise, but you have to begin with you. Begin with complete acceptance of your body. Hunt the Parasite, and make it surrender. Then the mind will love your body and will no longer sabotage your love. It's up to you; it's not up to anyone else. The awakening is when you have the awareness that you are Life. When you are aware that you are the force of Life, anything is possible. You are alive because of the power of God, which is the power of Life. You are the force that is Life, but because you are able to think at the level of the mind, you forget what you really are. When you love with no conditions, you the human, and you the God, align with the Spirit of Life moving through you. Your life becomes the expression of the beauty of the Spirit. Life is nothing but a dream, and if you create your life with Love, your dream becomes a masterpiece of art." Source:

I believe what we see in society today is that everyone, and I mean everyone, is walking around with deep psychological and spiritual wounds from the sick fiat money death economy society we're living in. Living life through 9/11, the wars in the Middle East, the Global Financial Crisis, the COVID Plandemic, 10/7, Ukraine, the Israel Genocide... It is an assault on the human spirit. We have been under attack for almost 25 years. Everyone feels the weight of these crimes against humanity, almost no one understands what's happening, and even fewer people have some answers for how to heal and get out of this mess. May divine Providence have mercy on us all. We are hurting, and we need some help.

Studying #Bitcoin and Austrian economics changed my life so profoundly for the better, it is hard to describe. I am a new person, a better version of myself. It was a huge turning point in my life, and I am so grateful that I took the time to educate myself on these topics. I want to thank many of the incredible writers, speakers, thinkers, and builders who guided me on the journey. Among them: nostr:nprofile1qqsyx708d0a8d2qt3ku75avjz8vshvlx0v3q97ygpnz0tllzqegxrtgpzpmhxue69uhkummnw3ezumt0d5hsvge3uc nostr:nprofile1qqs2xs05tluhtr6hpgsmqqxp04898gayjlyrjlexcrndv8j6el784xqppemhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mp0xumta0 nostr:nprofile1qqs2xpwv3yngvx7auhr3hwm06w2tkn82dm6lt7ryq2eynlzuavxwygqppemhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mp0m8x8vn nostr:nprofile1qqswmnfq2k830kvnylvyrezc97dsqce343qppqrwlgpqaux5qpuwdkspz4mhxue69uhkummnw3ezummcw3ezuer9wchs92v22z nostr:nprofile1qqsg86qcm7lve6jkkr64z4mt8lfe57jsu8vpty6r2qpk37sgtnxevjcpz4mhxue69uhkummnw3ex2mrfw3jhxtn0wfnsz9rhwden5te0wfjkccte9ehx7um5wghxyecpr3mhxue69uhkummnw3ezucnfw33k76twv4ezuum0vd5kzmqug4hxr nostr:nprofile1qqsf9g5gd6vxdkc5dsngzu0scdtwtlhc7nuscz8cxxs4qtpd3fch5rgpzfmhxue69uhhqatjwpkx2urpvuhx2ucpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgqgcwaehxw309aex2mrp0yezucnvdanhxarj9eshquq7jyh26 nostr:nprofile1qqszrpapnmjlj8zxsxy9q2rkdtpcpdxmyv59ttd4zvluhjkhq5wp4hqpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgqg5waehxw309aex2mrp0yhxgctdw4eju6t0qyt8wumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnwdaehgu3wvfskueqt95t0h nostr:nprofile1qqsvfz6uem26mf6dkpud76cqlfflcyfe6ualpmgkmce9653zqggah4gpz4mhxue69uhk2er9dchxummnw3ezumrpdejqzxrhwden5te0wfjkccte9eekummjwsh8xmmrd9skcqgswaehxw309ahx7um5wgh8w6twv5kadaf6 nostr:nprofile1qqsvf646uxlreajhhsv9tms9u6w7nuzeedaqty38z69cpwyhv89ufcqpzamhxue69uhhyetvv9ujucm4wfex2mn59en8j6gpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgqg5waehxw309aex2mrp0yhxgctdw4eju6t0t25cfd nostr:nprofile1qqsf9679spse0w32cmgdrz8j25mwrpqgmu982c4j4qldcz3fy3phqzqpz9mhxue69uhkummnw3ezuamfdejj7ldke8y nostr:nprofile1qqsypjyxzkns7qnxrylzsgh3h53e3sd86mq8auv24dr4mtkxdqlzjccpzfmhxue69uhhqatjwpkx2urpvuhx2ucpzdmhxue69uhhyetvv9ukzcnvv5hx7un8qy28wumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnwdaehgu3wwanqhaaz6w nostr:nprofile1qqsywt6ypu57lxtwj2scdwxnyrl3sry9typcstje65x7rw9a2e5nq8spz4mhxue69uhk2er9dchxummnw3ezumrpdejqzrthwden5te0dehhxtnvdakqzxrhwden5te0wfjkccte9eekummjwsh8xmmrd9skc2zw4kf nostr:nprofile1qqsqfjg4mth7uwp307nng3z2em3ep2pxnljczzezg8j7dhf58ha7ejgpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgqgcwaehxw309ac8yetdd96k6tnswf5k6ctv9ehx2aqpr9mhxue69uhhxetwv35hgtnwdaekvmrpwfjjucm0d54df670 And many others. I promise to pay it forward and add my perspective to the community. While HODLing long-term of course! 🫡

WE'RE REWRITING THE RULEBOOK. FUCK THE SUITS. THANK YOU. GN. AND GFY. #Bitcoin

Faces are getting ripped off rn. And the tradfi market isn't even open. #Bitcoin

It's truly amazing frens, we are going to shit post and meme on the internet for years and destroy the entire fucking fake ass fiat empire.

It IS a fucking Tuesday.

What a wild fucking ride 2016 - 2025 has been. My God.

How's your Fourth Turning going?

The US Government is irredeemable. Rotten and corrupt to the core. The same goes for the EU and the UK Governments. The West has completely lost any moral high ground it may have had, or at least claimed to have. The Epstein case being closed is the nail in the coffin. We know that we are ruled by criminals, and now they know that we know. And they're lying to us about it anyways. Probably best to just completely ignore the political theater, stack sats, and stay out of harm's way.

One thing that really sucks about American culture recently is what I call "glorified dumbass culture." Embodied by Barstool Sports personalities, among others, it's the trend towards putting values like ignorance, buffoonery, and degeneracy on a pedestal as if they were admirable qualities for men. I enjoy comedy and love to fuck around with my buddies and be a dumbass from time to time. Barstool puts out some funny stuff, I'll admit. But the glorified dumbass never takes anything seriously. It's not worth it to grow up, bro. Just stay in the frat mentality your whole life, bro. Gambling, boozing, and loafing around all day are the primary habits of the glorified dumbass. No such thing as honor, ambition, or glory. Who gives a shit, bro! YOLO. It is such a depressing trend, and it makes men incompetent and immature. Up and down society. Sadly, if you are interested in self-improvement, knowledge, health, and wisdom, you have to seek like-minded men out on the internet. You are far less likely to just run into other ambitious, honorable men in your community. Online communities will only take you so far, men need in person connection just as much as women. God only knows where glorified dumbass culture will take us, but I don't like the trends I'm seeing. Weak men... You know the rest...

Being a Bitcoiner is bittersweet. As it's fiat price continues to rise, it means that my personal savings continue to rise. My future keeps getting brighter. At the same time, it means that almost all of my loved ones savings continue to deteriorate. Perhaps I haven't tried hard enough, but I can't seem to get anyone close to me to see the light about fiat money vs. BTC. There are certain walls that go up when the topic arises. Or the typical propaganda talking points have been effective enough to close their minds. What a strange experience, seeing your thesis play out over the years, exactly as you foresaw, and yet everyone you care about thinks you're crazy. Being right about Bitcoin early has its hidden costs, and one of them is being misunderstood and isolated. #Bitcoin

The people at the top of the power structure in this world only respond to two things: - Force - Economic Power For the individual and family, they will never be able to compete on force. So the only choice is to use your economic power, if you want to achieve some level of freedom and autonomy in this life. #Bitcoin