Much digital ink has recently been shed debating hodl vs spend. If I can succeed at anything, I hope to build a few mental bridges in this tension.

Back Story

I stumbled across these Bitcoin circular economy concepts organically. I was not present on the battlefield during the fork wars. My coins were on Coinbase, and I was watching Tone Vays and Jimmy Song on YouTube. I don’t have the baggage of feeling torn between big blocks or small blocks, I just like Bitcoin and it felt natural that if for some technical reason someone was going to give me some B-Cash, I should dump it for more Bitcoin.

I did exactly that, followed by dumping all my other altcoins after learning better, and I’ve been a happy number-go-up-camper ever since.

Number go up worked for me to red pill a lot of my friends. I am that Bitcoin guy to my circle of influence, as I’m sure most of you are as well.

One day I was giving my normal onboarding speech, and was stopped dead in my tracks with a question I hadn’t been hit with before.

“How does it help me now?” my friend asked.

I don’t know what made me do it, but instead of getting out my “it helps you have low time preference” card, I just sat there in silence and let us both think about it for a minute.

“How does it help us now?”, we both sat there wondering.

The Coronavirus lockdowns were just ramping up at the time, and for some reason I just said, “It fixes Coronavirus and makes it so we don’t have to be locked down”.

That’s why it matters. That’s why a Bitcoin Circular Economy matters. It helps people exit the system; it helps people that feel trapped by the weight of the ruling class, constantly making life more difficult.

Normies are broke.

Regular people are broke. Regular people feel crushed, they don’t know why they feel crushed, and they don’t know who is doing it to them. They march in the streets for different reasons, and they don’t have hope like we do.

A Bitcoin circular economy helps them right now in the present. People don’t need freedom in the future, they need freedom in the present.

Bitcoin fixes this.

Defining a Bitcoin Circular Economy

A circular economy is a closed loop system that eliminates waste and pollution. In the case of a Bitcoin circular economy, the waste and pollution that we are designing out is the United States Dollar, and all the baggage that comes along with it.

You don’t need me to recount all the baggage that comes along with the United States Dollar. This has been covered extensively. We can all give this speech.

A Bitcoin circular economy allows Bitcoin entrepreneurs to exit in place. The tools are available for us to start working for Bitcoin today, and stop working for Dollars. The closed loop needs Earning, Saving, and Spending.

I realized in that moment of my friend asking, “How does it help me now?” that Bitcoin does so much more than Number Go Up. All the tools were available in that moment to leave the Dollar behind, and it would just take work to put them together.

The Available Tools

Strike App

The Strike app is a game changer for the Bitcoin circular economy, because the main game theory argument of spend your weak money and save your hard money, can now be worked into the economy building. And as double bonus points, it allows normie clients to pay with their debit cards as well, all while the Bitcoin freelancer is receiving Bitcoin.

BTCPay Server

The one click LunaNode install of BTCPay Server is a gem that I recently discovered, and in my opinion very underrated and not talked about enough. Stop reading and google right now, one click LunaNode BTCPay Server. You can now get up and running on BTC Pay Server with no command line experience, all through a graphical user interface. Lightning channel management is now the current learning curve I’m on.

Meetups

It takes more than one person to have a vibrant Bitcoin circular economy, and I’m really thankful for the Orange County Bitcoin Network that I’m a part of. Local meetups and meeting with Bitcoiners in person has helped me a ton to progress on my Bitcoin journey.

Moral High Ground

We all know this. Bitcoin has the moral high ground. It literally fixes everything. We shouldn’t be afraid to lean into the earning and spending side of Bitcoin. The rabbit hole is so deep, and I’m really enjoying learning about how to earn Bitcoin, then buying food with it from other local Bitcoin entrepreneurs. It’s the equivalent of buying and drinking fair trade coffee. There is no blood on my money, no slavery on the supply chain of my dinner table.

Conclusion

Bitcoin is not happening in the future; Bitcoin is happening right now. Today. The citadels are at hand. The citadels are here for us to start building today.

The number will go up.

The payments will go round.

And the middlemen won’t be paid.