Bitcoin Magazine

The 2036 Issue: The Future Is Now, Words of Wisdom from Jeff Booth

SPOILER ALERT: Jeff Booth does not know what the world will look like in 2036.

I know, I know… You probably wanted to hear from Jeff — author of The Price of Tomorrow and someone with incredible foresight and vision — that all eight billion of us would be living in the type of abundance he often talks about on podcasts.

You likely wanted to read that Jeff foresees Bitcoin replacing fiat by 2036 and that we’ll all be able to just kick back and relax as we enjoy living in a deflationary system by then.

I, too, was slightly disappointed when he didn’t paint a picture of a Bitcoin-fueled utopia that will exist a decade from now.

That said, in true Jeff Booth fashion, he offered some perspective that was perhaps even more profound than expected:

“It can exist for them right this second,” said Jeff in regard to when people can begin to reap the benefits of existing in a Bitcoin-buoyed system. “The question is ‘Do people move their time and energy to this new system?’”

Leave it to Jeff, someone who I often refer to as the Eckhart Tolle (author of The Power of Now) of Bitcoin to remind us that we don’t have wait for a day in the far off future when Bitcoin has transformed the world, we can begin to use right now it to transform our own personal world and the worlds of those with whom we engage.

“We are the change,” said Jeff. “We always have been.”

There’s just one caveat to Jeff’s message, though…

To fully experience the benefits that Bitcoin offers, we cannot simply view it as another asset within a broken system, we have to see it for what it actually is: a protocol.

Bitcoin As A Protocol 

According to Jeff, seeing Bitcoin as anything but a protocol will not only result in our not fully benefitting from it, but ultimately in the failure of the protocol itself.

That’s a lot, I know.

Let’s unpack it.

When Jeff looks out at the world, he sees a spectrum of Bitcoin enthusiasts — and, of course, those who will continue to simply dismiss Bitcoin.

The latter will resume focusing their efforts on trying to reform the broken and insolvent system that continues to steal their time and wealth while consistently blaming the powers that be for their lot in life, further handing over their power to those actors in the process.

If you’re reading this article, you’re likely not one of those types. You, instead, exist somewhere on a spectrum of Bitcoin understanding that Jeff has conceptualized.

On one side of that spectrum are those who take risky bets with bitcoin or even with other crypto assets in efforts to get rich quickly. This type lends much of their energy to searching for the next scheme to trade. Very few in this world win big and almost all lose over a longer time horizon.

One level up from that are those who see bitcoin as a store of value. The problem with this perspective is that the asset is trapped within the broken monetary and financial systems instead of replacing them. If bitcoin only remains a store of value, its ownership will continue to centralize over time, leading to a Bitcoin elite, a new breed of kings, as opposed to a world in which all human beings benefit from bitcoin. This scenario will also lead to continued issues with Bitcoin custodians.

“If we continue to have a debt-based system on top of bitcoin, bitcoin will continue to be held by custodians who will get liquidated time and time again as they take risks with their customers’ bitcoin,” said Jeff. “It’ll look like Celsius and BlockFi over and over and over again.”

Finally, there are those who see Bitcoin as a protocol.

They understand that Bitcoin emerges in layers, each of them enabling it to be used more easily and privately as money. It’s those for whom Bitcoin will serve as a true catalyst.

“It’s only if you view Bitcoin through the protocol lens that the world will change for you,” said Jeff.

“Every single other one of those perspectives relies on ‘It’s somebody else, not me.’ But the last one says ‘I create the future from my intention,’” he added.

“So, when we think about 2036, the real question is ‘How many people realize that they have the agency to change the world?’”

While this may seem like a relatively easy question to answer for oneself, it becomes more challenging when considering that we exist in a world that is constantly trying to distract us from what Bitcoin truly is.

Don’t Get Caught

From flavor of the month FUD to hero worship, it’s easy to give up your power.

“People often give their agency away to the likes of those who spread fear around quantum computing breaking Bitcoin or to those talking about how Jeffrey Epstein tried to infiltrate Bitcoin Core,” said Jeff.

Much of the Core vs. Knots debate was also driven by fear, which also siphoned people’s power, according to Jeff. With regard to this particular issue, Jeff noticed the name calling and ad hominem attacks, but opted not to contribute to the drama. Instead, he simply saw it as a signal that the issue was worth investigating. He believes that the debate offered people an important opportunity to fight for what they want Bitcoin to be.

“We’re used to seeing only a small part of consensus and not seeing views that are outside of it,” said Jeff. “The consensus mechanism and the agency of all participants fighting for what they see bitcoin as allows each person to see the entire debate and make their choice of what bitcoin is to them.”

Jeff went on to say that instead of being driven by fear and blindly digging in with one side or the other in such debates, it’s important to look inward at these times. Both doing so and advocating for what you want Bitcoin to be is ultimately how the protocol stays safe in his eyes.

“If there are enough hypervigilant people focused on the issues, Bitcoin stays secure,” said Jeff. “If there are enough people building on this and they are all hypervigilant as they build, it stays decentralized.”

Bitcoin enthusiasts also give away their agency to figures in the Bitcoin space who convince them that bitcoin is nothing more than a store of value — digital capital, if you will — according to Jeff.

“If you talk about digital capital and digital assets or building a debt-based system on top of Bitcoin, you aren’t viewing Bitcoin as a protocol,” explained Jeff. “Building a debt-based system on top of Bitcoin is centralizing, which isn’t good for Bitcoin. If you’re trying to concentrate bitcoin and become a new king, then both Bitcoin and the game you’re playing will ultimately fail.”

Jeff attributes the fact that some aren’t able to see how building a system that resembles the system Bitcoin was designed to replace is ultimately doomed to the notion that many are trapped in old mental models. In other words, we often bring our baggage from the old system into this new one. Those who see Bitcoin as a protocol, those using it as money in Bitcoin circular economies on a day-to-day basis, fundamentally understand Bitcoin through a different lens. They intuitively know that every choice, want, and need is a choice to distribute value or give value. And as bitcoin becomes more ubiquitous as money, then those playing financial games with bitcoin will ultimately be forced to give up their coins.

“You can try to create debt on top of bitcoin, but, eventually, as Bitcoin adoption increases, prices will begin falling so fast that those trying to centralize Bitcoin will have to figure out a way to deliver value to society in excess of what they’re spending to pay back and service their debt, which they won’t be able to do, forcing them to distribute their bitcoin,” said Jeff.

In short, Bitcoin inevitably liquidates those playing a zero-sum game; therefore, according to Jeff, it’s best to focus on what you’re doing to provide value to the world rather than focusing on how prominent figures in the Bitcoin space are rebuilding the same type of debt-based system that we’re trying to escape on top of bitcoin.

Why Bitcoin Remains Decentralized and Secure

For this issue, the editorial staff and writers involved have presupposed that Bitcoin is still sufficiently decentralized and secure come 2036. The truth is, though, as Jeff points out, if we all don’t claim our own power and embrace Bitcoin as a protocol, then it centralizes and fails.

Put another way, Bitcoin is not inevitable.

Yet, at the same time, Jeff is all but 100% convinced that Bitcoin does, in fact, succeed.

Why is that? you might ask.

Well, to use Jeff’s own words, he believes that Bitcoin will win because he “believes in us.”

Now, I know what you might be thinking: How could Jeff believe in us?… I mean, has he seen all the pleb slop out there? Has he seen how quickly many have been to abandon their Bitcoin vision and morals in pursuit of fiat gains? And does he think we’re all as good at thinking for ourselves as he is?

While I didn’t ask Jeff those questions, I’d imagine his answers to the second and third ones are “yes” and that he’s too humble to even respond to the final one. And as for the first question, he answered it without my posing it to him directly.

“As time goes on, more and more people discover what Bitcoin truly is, and each of them begins to move their agency into this space,” he explained. “In the process, people discover that their agency matters and that they can bend reality to their will. And when we share different thoughts about Bitcoin with others, it opens people’s minds, further causing them to shift their time and energy. I’m so positive that Bitcoin succeeds because I believe in the best in us, and I’ve already seen so many people move their time into this space and how that has had such a positive impact on them.”

Still, Jeff, c’mon! Most of us are still simply trying to convince our friends and family members that Bitcoin isn’t a scam, much less something that they should be moving their time and energy into. Even the idea of moving one’s time and energy into Bitcoin seems like an abstract and foreign concept to most people today.

Jeff gets that, too. And so he offered a caveat:

“Not everybody has to move their time — only a small fraction do.”

Now, given that my intention in writing this piece isn’t simply to help share Jeff’s perspective but to encourage you to embrace your own agency and power, I’m not going to share how much that small fraction is composed of in Jeff’s mind. Doing so might put you back into the mindset you may have had before you started reading this piece, the “Bitcoin is inevitable, and my efforts mean nothing in regard to its success or failure” mindset. Since that’s neither productive nor empowering, let’s not go there. The point is that Jeff believes that there are enough of us out there who will “hold the line and fight for freedom” as we work to maintain what he terms “the honest chain.”

“__% of people will cheat and go back to the dishonest chain,” said Jeff. “They’ll tell themselves ‘I needed to do it for my family.’ Deep down, they won’t have wanted to move to the dishonest chain, but they will feel that the consequences of not doing so were just too great. So, they’ll take the bribe. They’ll tell themselves ‘If not me, somebody else will do it, and I have to do it, too.”

Though that remaining percentage of people who support the honest chain may be small, it will be more than enough to have the balance of most people eventually move with them, according to Jeff.

“That small group forces a foundation from which others can benefit,” said Jeff.

Источник: BitcoinMagazine