Seven years ago today, I quit drinking alcohol.
A week after, someone described to me what #bitcoin was at a bar. Had I been drinking that night, I probably would have made fun of them for getting fooled into speculating on the price of magic internet money before largely dismissing what they had to say.
Instead, though, I listened intently that night and spent the following three years quietly studying #Bitcoin. Come January of 2021, I published the first edition of my Substack newsletter on #Bitcoin, and to be blunt, I was fucking petrified.
“I don’t know enough about #Bitcoin to write about it,” I first thought to myself. I went to bed that night after publishing feeling like I was having a panic attack.
Within a year, I started getting job offers to write about #Bitcoin and I turned some of the initial ones down, because again I thought to myself “I don’t know enough about #Bitcoin to write about it professionally.”
I eventually took a job offer, though, and while I’ve grown more comfortable doing what I do, there are days that it still scares the shit out of me.
I share all of this because #Bitcoin has come to mean more to me than just it being pristine collateral or a currency we can use permissionlessly. Instead, it’s been a catalyst in my life, spurring change within me that I never thought possible.
While I’ll never fully be able to put into words how #Bitcoin has changed my life - or should I say how it’s catalyzed change in my life - I can thank everyone who’s supported me in my journey, including many of you on this platform.
And if you take anything away from this post, it would be to lean into the discomfort in 2025. Accept challenges in amounts that are digestible to you and speak your truth in the process.
As
@Jeff Booth (one of my greatest teachers over the past seven years) says, WE ARE BITCOIN, and #Bitcoin only continues to be #Bitcoin if we defend it.
You don’t need to be a technical mastermind to write or speak about #Bitcoin; you only need to intuitively understand the force that it is in the world and have a desire for other people to experience the benefits of it.
Happy New Year and much love to everyone 🧡
Replies (59)
Happy Sobriety Birthday!!! 👏🏻
Thank you for sharing, sir. Hat tip back at you!
Thank you!
Lol Back at you, my friend!
I was at a friend’s birthday party
Love it thank you for sharing
The pleasure is all mine, sir. Best of luck in your journey. And when you feel that you have a piece you might want to share via
@Bitcoin Magazine, please DM me.
The pleasure is all mine. Thank you for taking the time to read and comment.
Amazing! Congratulations!
Don’t be so hard on yourself. Please share a piece that incorporates your unique perspective when you’re ready. While I can’t promise the magazine will publish it, I will offer you some feedback on it regardless.
My pleasure. Thank you for reading and taking the time to comment. All the best to you in 2025!
🤝
Wow
Happy New Year Frank!
Well said. Happy new year to you too
Same to you, Jeff!
Thanks for sharing Frank. Happy New Year!
The pleasure is all mine. Thank you for reading and Happy New Year to you!
My pleasure.
Agreed 100%. Luminary is the perfect word for Jeff.
Thank you and thank you for taking the time to comment. All the best to you in the new year!
Thank you and happy new year! 🫡
Cheers! 5 years here 😉 🙏
Nice share, thanks! Hoping Bitcoin and Nostr produces something similar in my life! I think it’s already begun!
Very glad to hear that, my friend, and we’re happy to have you here with us.
Amazing! Congratulations!
My pleasure and same to you!
Excellent note, Frank and thank you. I’d zap but my zapper’s busted.
Thanks!
Congratulations on seven years sober! Outstanding write-up! Thank you!
Very encouraging Frank. I’m motivated to re-examine a few pieces I started to write and then pulled back thinking “What do I know about Bitcoin…?”
Thank you for these encouraging words! I feel caught in the description of the feelings. I'm full of drive but it's like I'm on the gas and the brakes at the same time. But if you think back to the time when you didn't know anything about Bitcoin, you can also trust that there will be special, remarkable and groundbreaking days among the 365 days in the new year. The more you learn, the more you earn, and I don't just mean money
Thank you for sharing. I will lean into the discomfort of "not knowing enough".
Massive… may 2025 be good to us all!
Thank you! No worries at all!
Thank you
@Gigi for the very generous zap on Nunya’s behalf.
Congrats. I passed 6 years although I don’t have a quit label on it.
🤙
Happy new year Frank. Joining you for a dry 2025
Zap zap zap as soon as I learn how! I’m getting there. I’ve been sober 22 years and Bitcoin flowed into my life spiritually in 2024. I took my first uber a couple of weeks ago and spent the entire 20min ride talking to the driver about bitcoin. I too was surprised because I also would have said I don’t know enough. I’m realizing it’s a passion that has just been waiting for me to reach the right frequency.
It surely has a bonding effect
Nice. Think of your first #bitcoin buys as your tuition for the #Bitcoin school and then get started with your research.
Happy New Year! Awesome! I hope you not only stick with giving up alcohol but find some new, positive habits in the process!
Thank you! Amazing! Keep at it!
I believe so, as well. All the best to you!
It is something greater than all of us. It gives us the ability to co-operate together with less friction and with more confidence in both the physical world and in the digital world.
My pleasure, and I’m glad to hear that! Best of luck to you!
Beautiful response. I know that “gas and brakes at the same time” feeling well.
There will surely be remarkable days in your journey. Savor them and try not to shift the goalposts when they happen.
I’m glad to hear you found encouragement in the post and not only do I wish you the best in re-examining those pieces, I hope you post at least one or two via @highlighter or another #nostr app that enables long-form posts. I think you’ll find getting your ideas out there very liberating.
Thank you! The pleasure is all mine! Thanks for taking the time to read and comment 🙏
I’m gonna take your advice and lean into the discomfort of 2025. I’m not technical and I work in the normie world to pay my way. I love the freedom tech of bitcoin so I have a huge hurdle to overcome. Working in the normie world eats my time so some kinda transition needs to happen for me to connect with the tech and bitcoiners with meaningful effect. Here’s to passing through the prism in 2025
I’m glad to hear that. I worked in the normie world for the first few years I was into Bitcoin. Try to maybe set aside an hour or two a week to start for producing some content around something you’ve learned about Bitcoin that week. Think about teaching a version of yourself that had the level of understanding you did about Bitcoin two years ago.
And last piece of unsolicited advice: make the content authentic and attach it to a story from your life. We don’t want to be placards of ourselves as we cheerlead for Bitcoin. Instead, we want to share our human experience and touch on how Bitcoin has improved it.
Wow… sound as a self custody sat. Thank you and will do
“Sound as a self custody sat”
You were born to do this writing thing ;)
Glad to hear it! What book are you reading?!
We’re all constantly in the process of learning more about Bitcoin. It doesn’t make our experience with the protocol any less valid, though, which is something we can include in our writing.
My pleasure! Thanks for reading and taking the time to comment!
I’m still working on the title. I drew a lot of the inspiration from Lords of easy money, the creature from jekyll island: a second look at the federal reserve, the bitcoin standard, and my own experience with discovering bitcoin and decentralization in a fiat world. Currently have 11 chapters. Almost finished, but not 100% there yet. The hard part like you said is fighting the imposter syndrome. But like you said our experience is just as valid.
keep rocking out man! I’m rooting you!
Thanks Frank.
My pleasure!
Amazing! That’s awesome. I hope you publish it one way or another, even if you do it on your own. Please ping me when it’s out.
Thank you and likewise!
Beautiful... Funny that Bitcoin isn't money 🤫Just a borderless way to finally start to come to consensus, something that humanity has been trying to do for such a long time, but let leaders try it first... and here we are now with enough technology to do it on our own. Our first application in it? Money. Makes sense. How we use it will not only change our personal lives, but the whole world.
Beautifully put. Thank you for the kind words, my friend.
