When I was around 6 or 7 years old, as the story goes, I told my parents after another argument hinged on their dubious finances, “You guys should save a little money every week, or month, and then… you will have money.”

Problem solved. Thanks precocious baby.

One might imply a couple of things from this story: 1) My parents weren’t good with money. For a six-year-old to be giving financial advice to two grownups, shit’s gotta be a little off with the family finances. 

That second thing you might think is that this six-year-old, considering the story, probably grew up to a financially responsible adult. Surely, with that attitude, this feisty lil fellow’s a freakin’ millionaire by now.

Well, unfortunately, that never happened.

Despite my precociousness as a youngin,’ by the time I was in college (the first time in my life when I really should have been savvy about money), I was on to other topics. I wanted to be a writer, a beat poet—to travel and seek experience, to party and try new things (and drugs), to meet new and interesting people; to expand not my bank account, but my culture.

I was a leftist anti-war, anti-corporation, anti-empire loudmouth moralizer. And I wanted little to do with the 9-5 suburban lifestyle that to me, seemed like a cliché of the American dream.

For years I lived this way. Choosing to travel and write books instead of being financially responsible. And college, the way American colleges so slyly do, fed me loan after loan to pay for my studies. Loans with interest. Loans that took my time X energy (ie: money) as I slept. Loans that when one day I woke up from the daze in my mid 30s and thought—holy shit, I done fucked up big time.

 ***

So, what was the diaper-ridden financial advisor even talking about?

Interestingly, I was essentially telling my parents that they should dollar cost average (DCA) into a savings account, and then over time, maybe they’d stop bouncing checks at the grocery store or being late on the light bill.

Compared to the way my parents spent money—it usually didn’t last to the next paycheck-- my idea was pretty solid. But what I didn’t know at the time, and if I had known I woulda been a freaking baby genius, was that the dollar, like all fiat currencies, is a depreciating asset: meaning, it loses its value over time.

My dollar-cost-average idea was correct. Putting money aside was correct. Thinking long term was correct. Thes are all things that my parents should have done. However, the asset that I suggested they should invest in was all wrong—the U.S. dollar.

Remember when a slice of pizza and a soda was around 2 bucks?

I do.

Not anymore—now a slice and a soda is looking at $6 if you’re at a good New Jersey pizza joint that doesn’t upcharge the shit outta you.

So wtf happened to the dollar?

Well, nothing out of the ordinary.

As U.S. dollars are printed and released into the wild, the value of the dollar goes down. Just the way if suddenly the biggest oil field in the world was discovered, the price of oil would drop. As things become less rare, less scarce—they also become more valuable.

 ***

So, if I had to talk to baby me, I’d say something like this: Hey baby, good idea. You should be saving or putting aside money every month—but don’t do it in fiat currency! That’s a sure way to lose money over time.

What you need to do is to find an asset that appreciates over time and DCA into that. Maybe gold? Maybe silver? Maybe a bundle of carefully chosen stocks?

But if you save money in dollars, lil baby, well than you’re sure to get f*cked in the end.

 Why do I tell this story?

I suppose because I have been haunted by money–mainly by not having enough of it—my whole life. Going to college to be a poet and ignoring finances exacerbated my situation profoundly, and at a time when I could’ve been saving myself and setting myself up for an abundant future.

College helped change me from a lower middle-class kid from NJ to a poor, debt-ridden kid from NJ. And I know I’m not the only one.

If you don’t believe me, go to your local bar and I’m sure if you chat with enough people you’ll come across some sad-eyed millennial staring into his beer talking about how they’ll never buy a house, have a family, settle down—because Sallie Mae and Navient and Mohala and all the other soul-sucking student loan collectors are breathing down their neck.

Well, I feel you, lonely sad millennial in the bar. I’m in the same boat, as they say.

I’ve been saying fuck those overpriced colleges and snake-eyed debt collectors for years. And I’ll say it again: fuck ‘em.

But also, what the fuck are we gonna do about it?

If you’re anything like me, then there’s something not right about hoping Uncle Sam comes in and saves the day. After all, 95% of my student loans are backed by Uncle Sam—so that fellow’s been in the bed with the banks fking me for years. Hoping he’s got my back is like turning your back on Satan in the sauna—no bueno.

So is there any other way for us? Any hope for the true Lost generation who’ve fallen victim to the predatory nature of the US education system.

I don’t know—but if there is, I aim to find it.

I suggest that lil me lecturing my parents on money was actually correct. But that the name of the asset I should’ve been talking about hadn’t been invented yet.

The name is bitcoin.

The goal is to acquire more of it, patiently, over time—and in the process rid myself of these thorny, scummy, soul-sucking debt collectors—and to, for once, feel financially FREE.

This is The Human Bitcoin Standard (working title).

A personal deep-dive into what could happen if one were to not just stack bitcoin standard to the best of their ability, but to also try to incorporate the characteristics of bitcoin in to their day-to-day lives.

Could bitcoin, and a bitcoin mentality, change my life?

In this book, I aim to find out.

• I use paragraph as a notebook of sorts, and a place to get feedback as I work on this book. My first book, The Renaissance Man Project, is available here. https://a.co/d/aO0PmAW

When I was around 6 or 7 years old, as the story goes, I told my parents after another argument hinged on their dubious finances, “You guys should save a little money every week, or month, and then… you will have money.”

Problem solved. Thanks precocious baby.

One might imply a couple of things from this story: 1) My parents weren’t good with money. For a six-year-old to be giving financial advice to two grownups, shit’s gotta be a little off with the family finances. 

That second thing you might think is that this six-year-old, considering the story, probably grew up to a financially responsible adult. Surely, with that attitude, this feisty lil fellow’s a freakin’ millionaire by now.

Well, unfortunately, that never happened.

Despite my precociousness as a youngin,’ by the time I was in college (the first time in my life when I really should have been savvy about money), I was on to other topics. I wanted to be a writer, a beat poet—to travel and seek experience, to party and try new things (and drugs), to meet new and interesting people; to expand not my bank account, but my culture.

I was a leftist anti-war, anti-corporation, anti-empire loudmouth moralizer. And I wanted little to do with the 9-5 suburban lifestyle that to me, seemed like a cliché of the American dream.

For years I lived this way. Choosing to travel and write books instead of being financially responsible. And college, the way American colleges so slyly do, fed me loan after loan to pay for my studies. Loans with interest. Loans that took my time X energy (ie: money) as I slept. Loans that when one day I woke up from the daze in my mid 30s and thought—holy shit, I done fucked up big time.

 ***

So, what was the diaper-ridden financial advisor even talking about?

Interestingly, I was essentially telling my parents that they should dollar cost average (DCA) into a savings account, and then over time, maybe they’d stop bouncing checks at the grocery store or being late on the light bill.

Compared to the way my parents spent money—it usually didn’t last to the next paycheck-- my idea was pretty solid. But what I didn’t know at the time, and if I had known I woulda been a freaking baby genius, was that the dollar, like all fiat currencies, is a depreciating asset: meaning, it loses its value over time.

My dollar-cost-average idea was correct. Putting money aside was correct. Thinking long term was correct. Thes are all things that my parents should have done. However, the asset that I suggested they should invest in was all wrong—the U.S. dollar.

Remember when a slice of pizza and a soda was around 2 bucks?

I do.

Not anymore—now a slice and a soda is looking at $6 if you’re at a good New Jersey pizza joint that doesn’t upcharge the shit outta you.

So wtf happened to the dollar?

Well, nothing out of the ordinary.

As U.S. dollars are printed and released into the wild, the value of the dollar goes down. Just the way if suddenly the biggest oil field in the world was discovered, the price of oil would drop. As things become less rare, less scarce—they also become more valuable.

 ***

So, if I had to talk to baby me, I’d say something like this: Hey baby, good idea. You should be saving or putting aside money every month—but don’t do it in fiat currency! That’s a sure way to lose money over time.

What you need to do is to find an asset that appreciates over time and DCA into that. Maybe gold? Maybe silver? Maybe a bundle of carefully chosen stocks?

But if you save money in dollars, lil baby, well than you’re sure to get f*cked in the end.

 Why do I tell this story?

I suppose because I have been haunted by money–mainly by not having enough of it—my whole life. Going to college to be a poet and ignoring finances exacerbated my situation profoundly, and at a time when I could’ve been saving myself and setting myself up for an abundant future.

College helped change me from a lower middle-class kid from NJ to a poor, debt-ridden kid from NJ. And I know I’m not the only one.

If you don’t believe me, go to your local bar and I’m sure if you chat with enough people you’ll come across some sad-eyed millennial staring into his beer talking about how they’ll never buy a house, have a family, settle down—because Sallie Mae and Navient and Mohala and all the other soul-sucking student loan collectors are breathing down their neck.

Well, I feel you, lonely sad millennial in the bar. I’m in the same boat, as they say.

I’ve been saying fuck those overpriced colleges and snake-eyed debt collectors for years. And I’ll say it again: fuck ‘em.

But also, what the fuck are we gonna do about it?

If you’re anything like me, then there’s something not right about hoping Uncle Sam comes in and saves the day. After all, 95% of my student loans are backed by Uncle Sam—so that fellow’s been in the bed with the banks fking me for years. Hoping he’s got my back is like turning your back on Satan in the sauna—no bueno.

So is there any other way for us? Any hope for the true Lost generation who’ve fallen victim to the predatory nature of the US education system.

I don’t know—but if there is, I aim to find it.

I suggest that lil me lecturing my parents on money was actually correct. But that the name of the asset I should’ve been talking about hadn’t been invented yet.

The name is bitcoin.

The goal is to acquire more of it, patiently, over time—and in the process rid myself of these thorny, scummy, soul-sucking debt collectors—and to, for once, feel financially FREE.

This is The Human Bitcoin Standard (working title).

A personal deep-dive into what could happen if one were to not just stack bitcoin standard to the best of their ability, but to also try to incorporate the characteristics of bitcoin in to their day-to-day lives.

Could bitcoin, and a bitcoin mentality, change my life?

In this book, I aim to find out.

• I use paragraph as a notebook of sorts, and a place to get feedback as I work on this book. My first book, The Renaissance Man Project, is available here. https://a.co/d/aO0PmAW