2020 was unforgettable, especially for Bitcoin. To help commemorate our readers this year, we asked our network of contributors to reflect on Bitcoin price action, technological advancement, community growth and more in 2020, and reflect on what this could all mean for 2021. The writers responded this with a collection of thought provoking articles. Click here to read all the stories from our End of Year Series 2020.
Boy, it’s been a year.
It’s hard to find the words to tackle 2020. I’ve wrestled with mixed emotions all this year, and I suspect many of you have too. Anger and frustration, yes, but validation and excitement as well. So many of the things we’ve been talking about for so long, all the trends we’ve been tracking and the predictions we’ve been making, seem to be more and more accurate.
I have found that the apparent acceleration of this year’s events is quite sobering, and has certainly stimulated more serious preparation for whatever lies ahead.
I can’t imagine having to face the challenges of today’s world without Bitcoin. The fact that it exists gives me a profound sense of peace. I sometimes refer to it as a heartbeat of existential comfort (beating roughly once every 10 minutes). As long as it continues to beat, I have hope for the future.
Accompanying this hope is tremendous gratitude, inexhaustible enthusiasm and a palpable energy that comes directly from Bitcoin. I know many of you feel it too. It’s amazing isn’t it? No matter how crazy the world gets, the hope that Bitcoin inspires is so incredibly powerful that it throws despair away and focuses your will towards building a better future. It’s like a drug that wakes up the best aspects of yourself, and forces you to refine and express them.
Yet, with such hyperbolic enthusiasm, one cannot help but wonder: Do I really see this clearly? Do I want this to be something so bad that I disqualify myself?
These are very important questions to ask, especially when dealing with something that may be confusing with the movement of an unprecedented paradigm at the very foundation of society: money. Such a change could turn the world on its head, so it is only natural – in fact, necessary – to question yourself about it, and maintain a critical perspective.
Of course, it helps to assuage those fears when some of the brightest and most successful people on the planet begin to reach the same conclusion as you did, which has been an exciting development this year. As it happens, when they put bitcoin through their own critical lens, some of these people come to similar conclusions as many of us have. What’s more, these people from the traditional corporate and financial world not only agree with us, but they actually look to us for insight and guidance.
Like the legendary investor Paul Tudor Jones he said recently, explaining why it is even more bullish on bitcoin, “[There is] a huge contingent of really smart people, who believe in it. ”
So, not only does it seem less and less likely that we are crazy, but as fate would have it, we may well be the group of dissident visionaries carrying the a torch at the forefront of perhaps the greatest technological revolution in human history. That’s pretty fucking cheap.
And this really brings me to the thing that I have been most inspired by this year, most excited about, most eager to expand on and very grateful to engage with – BITCOINERS !!
Between the chaotic world around us, the memes, “number go up,” citadel and grape n’shit dreams, it’s easy to lose sight of this real story: you.
In my opinion, we are not looking out at the world waiting for this to happen, WE ARE WHAT HAPPENS. We are what happens when humans interact with something with the unique characteristics of Bitcoin, and we are the ones through which the new world is beginning to emerge.
After all, Bitcoin is only a tool, and it is only revolutionary insofar as its unique attributes generate new possibilities for action – that is, new behaviors.
And what are those possibilities? We are only at the beginning of counting that, and as many in this space as exploring and expressing some of them, their most true reflection is in the changes that inspired us all.
I often wonder, why these particular people? Why such similar and constant changes among such a different group of people?
Sure, the narrative surrounding Bitcoin at any one time can have a self-selecting effect for some types of people, but there is clearly more to it than that. As strange as it may sound to some, it seems almost irrecoverable at this point that those new possibilities that Bitcoin presents, and perhaps even something more fundamental about its exact nature, are actually having an effect transformational on many who engage with it.
But how? Why? Do we just “comply” with the parameters of the network, to be more “fit” to take advantage of the opportunities it offers? Are we somehow impressed and transformed by its immutable, unpolluted nature? Is it a matter of the power of aligned incentives that applies equally to everyone? Just a “time pick” thing? Twitter Influence? Some kind of alchemical transformation? Probably all this and more.
No matter how, here’s what I’ve noticed across almost all the Bitcoiners I’ve had the good fortune of contacting – bitcoin is changing you, and that’s the essence of this.
In fact, that’s the essence of every revolution, changing our behavior, changing how we act and interact.
It’s such a wonderful thing. Does this network that lives on the internet fundamentally redirect people’s perspectives? How do they see the world? How do they see themselves?
That seems to be the case.
I know many of you feel this. You can’t help but see things differently, as if a cover has been lifted, and it’s increasingly difficult to identify with the person you were before Bitcoin.
Whatever process is in place, perhaps nothing is more powerful than this: Bitcoin is brimming with hope and, in my opinion, many of these changes are a reflection of how powerful that can be.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not talking about “everyone who owns bitcoin” here. I’m talking about capital “B” Bitcoiners. If you know, you know. If not, continue digging down the rabbit hole.
But is all this change good? I think the vast majority of it is.
At the risk of generalization, I have seen Bitcoiners humble, intelligent, kind, rebellious, principled, direct, ambitious, hopeful and dedicated to the pursuit of truth. They are the unlikely heroes of this story, and if you have a genuine desire to learn, your ego in check, with good intentions and openness to wherever that road takes you, you will see a “community” bursting with support, respect, friendship and, well, love.
I often grapple with the absurdity of the fact that what seems like a bunch of hooligans lurking on the internet, shaming people to buy bitcoin, is the driving force behind the most positive it happens in the world today.
Bitcoiners are the curious and courageous, opening their hearts and minds to the truth of this thing, and allowing them to be transformed in the process.
As time pushes forward, it is inevitable that bitcoin will be judged on the basis of the people, communities and societies it nurtures. For me, Bitcoiners offer a window into the future and, even now, even while we’re all so early in this process, I can see a glimmer of it, and it’s fucking shocking.
My biggest highlight of 2020?
BULLYING ON BITCOINERS!
It’s an honor to be among you freaks.
Come and GOOOOO!
This is a guest post by John Vallis. They are solely their own opinion and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.