If you haven’t, it stands for:

Specific

Measurable

Achievable

Relevant

Time-bound

While these are fantastic metrics for setting goals, I think I disagree with one of them.

Let me tell you a story.

As you all know, I’m training for my first ever marathon. In this marathon I also hope and aim to hit a sub-3 hour marathon. This is so I can qualify for the Chicago guaranteed entry and potentially qualify for the Boston marathon.

See, I am following this SMART goals pattern pretty well.

• Specific: run in the Boston marathon

• Measurable: run a marathon in less than 3 hours

• Achievable: it’s not like I’m trying to compete with the elite and run a sub 2:10 marathon

• Relevant: running a sub 3-hour marathon is relevant to running

• Time-bound: do it in November

So where is the problem?

The problem comes when we fail.

See, one cool thing about goals is a lot of times we make sub-goals.

My goal is to run all 6 marathon majors.

I can break that down into sub goals:

• Run the Chicago marathon

• Run the Boston marathon

• Run the OBX marathon in sub 3-hours to qualify for Boston

• Train for the OBX marathon

• Run a specific hard workout at a specific pace

See how it all flows together?

So the other day I started my official marathon training block.

In it, I had my first long quality session which consisted of 15 total miles split between my easy pace and my threshold pace.

If you don’t know, an easy pace is one I can hold a conversation at, but my threshold pace is much faster.

There is a technical definition for “threshold” pace that has to do with blood lactate and stuff. But essentially it’s a pace that is a decent bit faster than a marathon pace.

It should be a pace you could run at for about 20 minutes before your muscles give up.

Well, everything going into this session was just off.

That week my calf was tight and causing pain even walking in the morning. I also decided to do my quality session in the evening instead of the morning or mid-day when I normally go.

Because of this I had a lot more food on my stomach than normal.

It was also scary to get out there to do it. To officially start the preparation for the marathon. What if I can’t hit my paces? I might fail at my goal!

But I get out there and do it…except…I failed.

I gave out around 9 miles and was able to push out one last mile at a pretty slow easy pace.

Totally missed the 15 by a long shot.

Furthermore, the run started with 2 easy miles, then 4 miles at threshold. I could only do 2 miles at threshold before I had to stop. Then I got 2 more in, but the pace was definitely slower than it needed to be.

My stomach was feeling off the whole time. My calf hurt. My joints were aching.

It felt like a failure. I felt like a failure.

But when the run was over and I had time to reflect, it made me realize a few things.

1. I wasn’t a failure. I still got out and ran and just the fact that I did that made it a successful run.

2. It’s ok to miss. Perhaps this training block will have lots of runs I can’t perfectly accomplish, but that’s ok. If I set my goals so low they are easily achieved then I’ll never improve.

And that is the realization I had.

The ‘A’ in SMART is a little misleading.

Yes, we should set goals that are achievable.

It is not physically possible for a human to run a marathon in say 1:40. That’ll never happen. But at the same time, if I set my goal of running the marathon in sub-6 hours, then I don’t need to train for that. That’s almost a walking speed.

Our goals should be optimally set so they are “achievable” but they feel just out of reach.

You might need to fail a couple of times as you reach your fingers up for that last cookie in the back of the pantry.

And you know what? During that run, I realized that’s exactly what I did. This is a goal that I might not achieve. I know I can, but I’m going to have to work really hard to get there. It’s not easy and the fear of failing is always right there pushing me along.

But it also means that when I do fail, it doesn’t mean I’m a failure. It means I actually set a good goal.

I don’t have a perfect ratio for how often you should fail vs succeed in our sub-goals, but whatever your goals in life are, if you never fail at them, then maybe you should consider setting higher goals.

Remember, if you collect this post, you could win a unique airdrop NFT for this post and earn your spot on my race jersey come November!

Hey everyone, it’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve written one of these.

We went on a vacation which led to a 2-week lull of no motivation. Almost like a 2-week long rainy day.

But the sun is out again and we’re ready to go!

And you know what? Sometimes taking a break from a busy schedule, constantly trying to grow and improve, and working on different things isn’t so bad.

It was much needed.

But now is the time…we are about 12 weeks out from the Outer Banks Marathon!

Now is when my training prep officially starts. Well…not now, but next Monday!

12 weeks of a strict training protocol to see if I can achieve the sub 3-hour marathon on my very first go.

People keep telling me that the marathon is a totally different beast compared to a half marathon. I don’t know why they do that. It’s certainly not very encouraging, haha!

I also don’t know what to do with that information. “They” all say that nutrition during the marathon is so much more important than in a half marathon. Without proper hydration and refueling the cramps, spasms, digestion issues, etc hit you like a train sometime around mile 20.

To make matters worse I recently found out that the only uphill on this race is of course the final mile, haha!

But that’s ok, we’re in it for the challenge. We’re in it to push ourselves, grow, see what happens, and most of all have fun.

*Man, that sounds cliche. *

Over these next 12 weeks, I plan to document everything I learn both here and on YouTube/TikTok, @TheMeyerPerspective.

I am learning a ton about training for a marathon, but beyond my research goes way beyond simply running a marathon.

There is a trend going around, perhaps since the dawn of time, about “living forever.”

Well, the truth is I do believe we all get to live forever…just not in this body per se. In the new and resurrected body with Jesus Christ.

But people don’t think about that either. They want to live forever on this earth. In this body.

I, personally, don’t care for that. I’d rather be in Heaven enjoying meals and working with Jesus in a perfect body.

But one thing that catches my eye in this search for longevity is the idea that we truly don’t want to live a long time. We want to live a long time with a healthy body.

It’s not going to be fun if you are 102 but can’t move, eat, drink, or talk on your own.

In other words, we want to be able to run, play, and do adventurous things with our grandkids…not just our own kids.

And the sad reality is a lot of parents are too out of shape or damaged to even do those things with their own children, let alone grandchildren.

**Obviously, much of life is out of our control. **

But…I don’t think that means we just neglect our bodies for the parts that are in our control!

So, no, I don’t want to live forever on this earth. But for the years I am on this earth, I want to be healthy.

I think about it this way. If I don’t take care of myself then eventually my health will decline and my wife will have to take care of me instead of someone who is truly needy. But if we are both healthy in old age, that gives us more time to serve the needy around us.

I know that was quite the tangent.

All I’m trying to say is that over the next 12 weeks the things I’m going to share are not just pertinent for people that want to run marathons. They are pertinent for anyone that wants to live a healthy life mentally, physically, and spiritually.

If that is of interest to you or a friend of yours, then make sure to share this along and subscribe!

And if you want to show support in some way, remember, all of these posts are collectible. Every time you collect a post you increase your odds of getting put as a sponsor on my race jersey come November! Plus, you might just win a unique one-of-a-kind airdropped NFT of this post!

All Previous Collectable Running Posts :)

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All these posts in the running series are collectible! If you collect this post today, you will not only have a chance to win a free custom airdrop for this post (the image above), but you will be an official sponsor of my running where you can appear on my custom jersey in my upcoming November marathon!

Did you know that ultra swimming was a thing people do?

I’ve heard of ultra marathons where people race 50-200 miles. That’s already a pretty wild feat on its own! People race over mountain ranges or deserts for sometimes up to 3 days, living off of very little sleep.

But at least in an ultra marathon you can stop, walk, sit, take a break, stop at an aid station to eat, etc.

**Ultra swimming, however, is not quite like that. **

The one I heard about is a classic race through the Catalina channel off the coast of California. It’s about 20 miles in the open ocean and can take like 12 or 15 hours!

But no breaks. You just have to summon your inner-Dory and…🎶 *just keep swimming *🎶 *just keep swimming *🎶…

I recently heard an interesting podcast about a guy who has completed this particular race, along with numerous other ultra swims.

The biggest thing that struck me from his conversation was the feeling he described once he reached the shore at the end. He said, like many of us, we’ve all been on the seashore, we’ve stood in the sand, or maybe even come in from the ocean to the shore. But for most of us, we went in the ocean to cool off, play in the waves, or maybe even just go to the bathroom.

That feeling of stepping back on the sand isn’t something that impacts us in a deep way.

However, if you just swam for 20 miles in the open ocean, then the feeling of stepping on shore is incomparable.

What once was a simple comfort you may not even notice, now becomes an ultra comfort, creating such an emotional high you might talk about it for weeks to come. That first step on shore.

That story made me realize running does the same thing.

Every time I go on a really hard run or a long run, every “norm” after is heightened.

The shower I take is so much more enjoyable than if I’d just woken up and jumped in the shower.

The food I eat is more enjoyable and leaves me energized instead of sluggish.

Running even gives me an energy boost in my writing, working, and the more monotonous chores in life.

But what really made this all click for me was walking.

My wife loves to go on walks after dinner, it runs in her family. I have grown to love it as well, but I can definitely tell you it takes me a few steps to get into it. Every fiber of my body is telling me to just keep sitting and relax, not get up to walk.

However, rewind to a few hours prior when I’m in the middle of a really hard quality session, running intervals as fast as I can. *If you told me to start walking then? *

I’d switch to a walk like I was floating on a cloud.

To go from an extreme discomfort to anything less makes that thing more comfortable.

And that made me think of life itself. Isn’t this true of anything? When we step out of our comfort zone, then it makes the comfortable things that much more comfortable.

I have a much easier time stepping out of my comfort zones for physical tasks, running, climbing, high endurance things, whatever. Social interactions out of my comfort zone are much harder, but I have still discovered the same truth. When I step out, it makes the “normal” so much sweeter.

Furthermore, over time, the uncomfortable can even become the new “normal.” I believe that’s what they call “growth.”

It is true for running, for sure. I used to think it would be impossible to run 100 miles in a month, but now I’m running 50+ miles every week. It didn’t happen overnight. It was small uncomfortable decisions that added up to this new “normal.”

Maybe the truth is that we all desire growth and the only way to grow is to get uncomfortable.

And when our bodies can feel the growth, it makes everything else in our lives more exciting, comfortable, and enjoyable.

Remember if you collect this article you will have a chance of getting a one of a kind airdrop NFT of this article!

All Previous Collectable Running Posts :)

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I think I mentioned this crazy idea of mine a few weeks ago, but I wanted to take some time to fully explain it. And in light of last week’s article, I must tell you I came up with this idea on a run!

If you’ve been subscribed to my newsletter for any amount of time, you probably know I enjoy writing about my interests. Whether it’s traveling (as this newsletter began), writing, web3 and crypto, or most recently, running.

I wanted to come up with a cool project where I could combine all of these interests, and I think I found it.

There is a really cool platform out there called Mirror. Here is my profile…you might want to subscribe there for what I’m about to tell you: https://mirror.xyz/0x7C7622b5431662eBF69455854FA6aAF1362CD35D/subscribe

Really quickly, Mirror is a blogging platform built on and for web3. This essentially means they have a lot of powerful tools built into the platform like getting paid through crypto, subscribing to people via a crypto wallet instead of an email, and most importantly creating writing NFTs for fans to collect.

Don’t worry, you can still subscribe to people with a traditional email too.

Here is what my plan is. All my newsletters that come from this Substack, I plan to post on Mirror as a collectible NFT.

**Each article will only have 10 available, each priced at 0.001 ETH (~$1.96). **Eth is a crypto currency that powers the Ethereum blockchain, which is what powers the Mirror platform (more or less).

I plan to put out a new article (hopefully weekly) all about running. My goal is to make these articles educational, entertaining, inspiring, or hopefully all 3. **My other goal is that you don’t have to be a runner to enjoy these or get something out of them. **

These articles will focus on different aspects of running as I continue to learn and grow in the sport. It could be on my nutrition, training plans, or anecdotes I think of while out on a run. But I plan to tie them all into life lessons that can be applied to all aspects of life.

Now, the golden question is why should you collect any of these NFTs?

Especially if you can read the articles for free on Mirror without collecting?

This is where my fun collaboration of web3 and running comes in. Each NFT you buy and hold will go into a final tally around October.

If you recall my debut marathon race is the Outer Banks, NC marathon in November. This is the race I plan to qualify for a guaranteed spot in the Chicago marathon in. And, if all goes according to plan, I could be looking at a top 10 finish! Fingers crossed 🤞

As such, whenever you collect one of these NFT articles, you will become a sponsor and supporter of my running.

Once I tally it all up in October, then my plan is to create a custom jersey to wear on race day to showcase my sponsors!

**The top 3 collectors will each get to select a logo, business, or profile on the jersey. **This could be your business logo, if you are a content creator it could be your username and profile pic, or who knows what else. As long as it’s family friendly 🙂

As a bonus, for every post, I will airdrop one lucky collector a unique collecteble NFT specific to that post!

For the rest of my sponsors, their username will appear on the jersey under a list of sponsors.

This will be just a really fun way to support me, but it could also have a cool incentive for you as a collector where I can give back as well and promote you on race day.

So that’s it! That’s the idea!

I will be creating a custom themed cover photo for each of these NFT articles so when you go to Mirror you know exactly which ones to collect.

I’ll also make sure to post them at the end for easy grabs!

If you’ve never purchased or used an NFT before, then this will also be the perfect time to learn 😀

As such, if you collect this post today, you will not only have a chance to win a free custom airdrop for this post, but you will be an official sponsor of my running where you can appear on my custom jersey in my upcoming November marathon!

https://mirror.xyz/0x7C7622b5431662eBF69455854FA6aAF1362CD35D/isADgO7kTt-B1tQQlfd_5q0TdwKRzodsl0PKZBBt2Rk

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To all who are interested in my running journey thus far, I have a couple of exciting updates you might be interested in!

Also, remember, all these posts are collectible! If you collect this post today, you will not only have a chance to win a free custom airdrop for this post, but you will be an official sponsor of my running where you can appear on my custom jersey in my upcoming November marathon!

First, let me level set you on what my running goals are, what the plan was, and what the plan is going to be.

To be clear, my goal of running in the Boston Marathon hasn’t changed.

My goal of eventually running in all 6 marathon majors hasn’t changed either.

But we are actually going to fast-track some of it a little.

Let me explain…

My original plan was to debut my marathon in March 2024 in the Asheville Marathon. This was going to be the race I’d qualify for Boston 2025 with.

If there is one thing I’ve learned about all these marathon majors races it’s that you have to sign up like a year in advance, and they are all tricky to get into.

So the cutoff to run in the Boston 2024 isn’t closed per se, but it opened in April and I think it would be tight to try and get in for 2024.

That being said, since I would love to run in all 6 marathon majors I thought perhaps 2024 would be a good year to get in one of the other majors.

What are the marathon majors, you may be asking?

Well, they are as follows:

• Tokyo Marathon

• London Marathon

• Boston Marathon

• Berlin Marathon

• Chicago Marathon

• New York Marathon

Rumor has it they will be adding a 7th to the line-up in 2025 in Cape Town, South Africa too!

Running in all these races would be an awesome challenge for me, but it would also include some really amazing places in the world that Taylor and I would love to travel to. So it’s a win-win!

Anyways…my new plan is…

To run in the Chicago Marathon in 2024.

The Chicago Marathon is always run in the Fall and so planning ahead, this means their deadline for sign-up is this November!

Here is another fun detail about all these major races…they aren’t easy to get into.

Boston and London are the special ones:

• Boston is the only one that requires a qualifying time. That’s why I’m training so much to qualify for the Boston.

• London is the only one that solely does a lottery system.

The rest of them do both.

However, entering via the lottery system gives you like a 5% chance of entry. Buuut, if you run a qualifying time, then you are guaranteed a spot!

That’s my ticket in.

For Chicago, the qualifying time for a guaranteed spot is 3:05 which is actually slower than the time I need to qualify for Boston.

But I have to do it before November 17th.

So a marathon debut in March won’t cut it.

Therefore, Taylor and I did some searching around and I found my first marathon…

The Outer Banks Marathon!

It is held the second weekend in November, which will give me about 5 days to sign up for the Chicago Marathon if I qualify.

As you can tell, trying to plan out doing these races takes more thought than I realized, haha!

I do still plan to run the Asheville marathon for my Boston qualifier, though.

Why?

Well, Boston has this “cool” policy where even if you make the qualifying time, it doesn’t guarantee you a spot.

See, just because they don’t do a lottery system doesn’t mean they don’t have limited spots.

They do have limited spots.

I don’t remember the numbers but it’s like 30,000 or something.

So if they have 40,000 people with qualifying times sign-up, they start shifting the qualifying times down until they hit 30,000.

This means that if I ran a qualifying time of 2:59 (my age group needs sub 3 hours), they might end up sliding the qualifying time down to 2:55 and I’d be kicked out.

Chicago is not like that. If I run the Outer Banks Marathon in 3:04 (right below the 3:05 qualifying time) then I’m guaranteed a spot no matter what.

This makes the training and pressure for Outer Banks less. But it also means that I might need to train a good bit more going into the Asheville Marathon so I can aim more for the 2:49 range instead of 2:59.

Ok, ok, I know…that was an information overload.

Let me summarize:

• My main running goals: run in all 6 marathon majors, mainly including the Boston Marathon

• My 2023 goal: run in the Outer Banks Marathon to qualify for a guaranteed spot in the Chicago Marathon

• My 2024 goal: run in the Asheville Marathon to qualify for the Boston Marathon

• My other 2024 goal: run in the Chicago Marathon, one of the 6 marathon majors

• My 2025 goal: run in the Boston Marathon, also one of the 6 marathon majors

Before I let you go, I have 2 more things to mention!

I promised weekly videos a while ago. Truth be told, that was a bit ambitious. So we’re going to change that, haha!

Apologies.

I have been posting when I can on TikTok (@theMeyerPerspective) and YouTube (@theMeyerPerspective) so you can follow those accounts to get any of the short clips I post.

As for my longer videos, I plan to do these on a monthly basis.

I really want to learn and grow as a video content creator, but as I mentioned some time ago, my truer passion is still in writing.

You can definitely count on me continuing to document my running journey, the things I learn, how I’m training, how I’m eating, etc etc. Just mainly in written form, and then once a month in a longer video.

Last but not least, I have a fun new idea. I haven’t laid all the details out yet, but I got excited about this one so I couldn’t wait to share it.

As many of you know, I’m also heavily interested and involved in this web3 space. I have been brainstorming how to involve my new running passion into the space as well, and I think I have an interesting idea.

There are several platforms in the web3 space right now for writing. Two of the biggest are Mirror and Paragraph.

Mirror is like Medium if you’ve ever used that. It’s mainly just a blogging site.

Paragraph is literally just a web3 version of Substack. Substack is for newsletters and powers the newsletter you’re reading right this second (if you didn’t know).

Both of these platforms allow you to turn your free-to-read articles into collectible NFTs.

I haven’t decided how this will all work yet, but my plan is to start minting any of my running journey articles as NFTs for people to collect.

Then, leading into the Outer Banks Marathon, I’ll do a tally of my top collectors/sponsors.

Then I’ll take their social handles, name, business, or whatever they want to promote and get a custom jersey made for the race that will include all my top collectors/sponsors/supporters.

I think this will be a fun initiative that combines my passion for writing, web3, and running. We’ll see how it turns out!

Remember if you collect this article you will have a chance of getting a one of a kind airdrop NFT of this article!

https://mirror.xyz/0x7C7622b5431662eBF69455854FA6aAF1362CD35D/iQN7Fg4XaG4nV3lxohKO7BLYOO5GiHR75MiSjyUDHiQ

https://mirror.xyz/0x7C7622b5431662eBF69455854FA6aAF1362CD35D/f4JhCY_gFASZl-Gv1M7BvD0dome4L_wPDuUksktZwIk

There I covered them all I think…oh wait…also good night.

There, that should be everyone!

Today, I wanted to share what my current running plan is, why it is this way, where I came up with it, and what my goals are for our next half marathon and beyond.

Also, remember, all these posts are collectible! If you collect this post today, you will not only have a chance to win a free custom airdrop for this post, but you will be an official sponsor of my running where you can appear on my custom jersey in my upcoming November marathon!

It might not be all that interesting to some of you who don’t like running, but I encourage you to stick around regardless. **The main goal here is to show a valuable lesson I’ve learned through running, which can be applied to any goal we set in our lives. **

But you have to stick to the end to find out.

Right now, I’m at the beginning of a 16 week running plan. This is what I think of as more of a base training plan.

What that means is that I’m not necessarily prepping for a specific race distance or pace right now. I am just building a stronger base fitness level in running.

The reason I’m doing this is because my next real preparation is not the October half marathon. Although I do have a goal set for that race.

If I accomplish that goal, however, it will be a good milestone to know I’m on my way to qualifying for the Boston marathon.

My current plan is to debut my first marathon next March at the Asheville marathon and to qualify for the Boston then.

Prior to the Nashville half marathon, I was on a specific training plan for a half marathon. My mileage was a bit higher than what I’m currently doing now and my overall training was slightly different.

But coming out of that race as I continue working towards Boston, one thing is for certain: my marathon pace needs to get much faster.

Therefore, for the next 16 weeks I am doing a general base training plan. The goal will be to increase my pace, overall endurance, strength, mobility, and a couple of other fun fitness goals.

Let’s jump into it!

All my plans are based on Jack Daniel’s running formula (not the drink, I don’t think he ran much). This is the specific book I’ve been following if you’re interested: https://amzn.to/3pPDe3F

This is the formula I followed to accomplish the Nashville half marathon. One thing I love about his plans is that he breaks down how to actually build running fitness over time. One of the biggest improvements I learned is about how crucial it is to train at different paces. In fact, he says 80% of your runs should be at an easy pace.

Anyways, this is where it all comes from and so as you will see as we break down my current plan, the majority of runs are at an easier pace and 2 days of the week are quality session runs (or harder runs).

Right now, I’m actually about to finish up week 3 of the plan. The schedule is split up into 4x4 week segments.

That means for 4 weeks I’ll have the same routine, then move to the next routine.

That being said, each segment will have the same daily routines, the only things that will change are what my actual quality (harder run) sessions are like.

Alright, so I’ll break down my plan real quick:

Monday morning I like to get up at 6am and hit the road for a 5 mile run. This is done at an easy pace and always without headphones.

This gives me a great way to start my day and week with some thoughtful prayer, and come back ready for the day.

Later, around 11am when my morning meetings are done, I will go on a second run.

That is correct, a second run like a crazy person.

Don’t worry, it’s just this one time a week. It is also only 3 miles this time.

To get my total weekly mileage up, I wanted to add a second run on Mondays instead of running 8 miles in one go. This way is less daunting.

The 3 mile midday run also lets me bring Merlin (our dog with too much energy) on the run so he can get some exercise. 3 miles is a good distance for him; he can do 5 miles, but I don’t think he really enjoys it.

Tuesday is my first hard quality session of the week.

I am never awake enough or excited enough to hit a hard session early in the morning.** Thus, Monday is actually the only day of the week I start out with a run.** The rest of the week I dedicate mornings to writing or reading.

On Tuesdays I usually go to do my hard session once again around 12 right before lunch. Although, I usually eat my pre-workout meal an hour before my run.

Right now, my Tuesday run totals around 6 miles, which includes a 1 mile warmup and cooldown.

The actual workout itself is around 4 miles and consists of 8x400m repeats.

Basically, I use this pace calculator to plan my runs: https://vdoto2.com/calculator/

Again, all my planning is based on the Daniel’s Running Formula. He is the one that came up with this vdot idea, which is essentially your overall endurance level.

So when you get into his plan, he sets up different training paces:

• Easy - your easiest pace for 80% of your runs

• Marathon - your marathon pace…pretty self explanatory

• Threshold - *we’re getting faster now…I think he says this is a pace you should be able to hold for 20-40 minutes. I believe the idea is we’re right on the Threshold of an aerobic easy pace and an anaerobic hard pace. *

• Interval - even faster for shorter hard workouts

• Repetition - the fastest pace for the shortest distances

So on Tuesdays I run at that repetition pace, but I only hold that pace for 400 meters, or about a ¼ mile. Then I jog and rest for a ¼ mile.

I repeat that 8 times, run one more mile for a cooldown, and then go home to eat my hard earned lunch.

But wait…there’s more!

Tuesday evenings I like to add in a strength training session for my legs.

Again, I know…I’m crazy, but you gotta get the hardest days done early.

Strength training typically involves following a workout on the Centr app from Chris Hemsworth and his team. It’s like squats, deadlift, more squats, and calf raises. Stuff like that.

**But it builds the muscles around my joints to prevent injury and help with overall recovery. **

I found that after starting weekly strength training, all my ongoing pain from running has vanished.

Currently, Wednesdays are a break from running. Tuesday is a hard day and so it is a good day to take a break.

However,** I do still get active.** One of my other fitness goals is to be able to do muscle ups.

If you don’t know what that is, it’s like a pull up, except instead of chin to the bar, you keep going all the way until your thighs touch the bar. Just look it up and you’ll know what I mean. (Or check out the gif below)

Thus, Wednesday around noon, I do a workout of pullups and dips and stuff.

It doesn’t help my running, but it helps overall fitness and still gets my blood pumping, which for me is a necessary mid-day break from work.

I work a lot better taking a break mid-day and doing something active, eating lunch, and then getting back to work. I find my afternoons are 10x more productive when I do that.

Soon, I plan to add a 5 mile evening easy run on Wednesdays. Partly to get my weekly mileage up, but also because our dog could really use another run by this time in the week.

Thursday is back to running! We are doing another quality session today.

Once again, I target the noon time for the run, but sometimes if Tay is at the barn until the afternoon, we’ll go around 2 or 3.

This run in the current plan usually ends up being about 7 miles. But again, 3-4 miles are at my easy pace for a warmup and cooldown.

3-4 miles are the actual workout.

This time my workout is focused on that Interval pace, which is slightly slower than Tuesday’s pace. Specifically I do **4 intervals where each interval is simply running at Interval pace for 4 minutes, then jogging for 3 minutes. **

The nice thing about Thursday’s run is I know exactly how long the workout part is: **28 minutes **for those that don’t want to do the math :)

Friday is a casual day. I keep it very simple.

Around lunch, I just go on a nice casual easy paced run. I target 5-6 miles, and I try to bring Merlin if I think he’ll make it the distance, haha!

The weekend is the time for a long run.

Currently in my plan, a long run is a consistent 8 mile run. This usually takes me just over an hour, so it’s not that much time out of our day.

Last week, we did our long runs Sunday morning before church.

But whether we do our long run on Saturday or Sunday really depends on what our weekend plans are. Either way, basically one of those days is an 8 mile run, and the other day is a full on rest day.

I think I have learned a ton from this plan so far. But if I could boil it down to 3 main points that I believe can be applied to any goal in life, it would be this:

I would never have run the Nashville half marathon at my goal pace without this training plan.

Going out to run as fast as I can 3 days a week wasn’t going to cut it.

That wasn’t a real plan.

This running formula has been tried and tested for decades. It worked for me already, and so I trust the process. And that is what I believe is the key to accomplishing any goal:

Make a plan and trust the process.

I have yet to finish a week’s plan perfectly.

I might have a Monday where I’m in the office so I can’t do my afternoon 3 mile run. That’s ok.

I have days where I can’t hit my paces 100% on the quality sessions. *That’s ok. *

There are weekends where we’re busy and we don’t get in a long run. *That’s ok. *

**I think if you set your goal too low where it’s too easy to achieve, then you’ll never grow. **

You need to set your goals just far enough out of reach that there is a little pressure on yourself. This makes you stretch to reach the goal, and with stretching comes growth.

But never beat yourself up for not achieving the plan to perfection.

You cannot set a goal and just immediately conquer it or jump into the hardest version of your plan.

If you were going to learn a new language, you don’t just walk up to someone and try holding a fluent conversation in that language.

You take small, baby steps to get there.

Running is the same way. You can’t get off the couch, having not run in years and expect to run 40-50 miles in a week.

Unless you enjoy pain and injury.

You build gradually, increasing mileage little by little each week.

And the same can be said of any goal in life. When we make a plan, we need to make it with the expectation that growth is gradual at first and exponential later.

The worst thing I can do to myself is let the plan take over my life.

James says it best in the word of God:

“Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” (James 4:15 CSB).

If it’s not in God’s will for me to finish my running plan, that is 100% ok in my book.

Ecclesiastes also talks about all the vanities in this world. Your plans and goals are just that, vanities. Not that they aren’t important, but just that they aren’t the most important.

They aren’t everything. **Giving any plan too much priority and weight is not good for your overall physical, mental, and spiritual health. **

Thus, if I fail at my running plan, that’s ok. Because it’s not everything. In fact, it’ll help me be more resilient, get back up, and try again.

And that is my running plan in a nutshell. If you liked this kind of content, let me know and I’ll do some more!

Remember if you collect this article you will have a chance of getting a one of a kind airdrop NFT of this article!

I figured if I wanted to be respected in the running content creator community, I needed to do one too, haha!

In all reality, this article doesn’t come from peer pressure but has actually been on my mind to talk about for a while.

So here we go.

I started running when I was about 1 year old.

But that’s not the kind of running I’m talking about. We all ran as children and then society and culture stifles the joy of running inside of us.

There are 10 times more signs that say “Don’t Run” than say “Run.”

In fact, I’ve never seen a sign that tells people to run or to enjoy running.

Honestly…that’s why I think so many people hate running, but we’ll save that for another conversation.

I will say that when you get older, running takes a different form. You stop running for fun and start running for some form of exercise or training.

What is the differentiator? I think the biggest difference is that when you begin using running for training, you begin tracking the miles.

For me, I started running for training when I was about 14 or 15. I didn’t run cross country or track. But I did do a lot of karate.

And as I started training for my black belt test, I started incorporating some running into my training regimen.

I can still remember building up to run 3 miles. It felt impossible, but when I finally broke the mark it was one of the greatest feelings of accomplishment!

But back then, running still wasn’t fun, though. It was just something I had to do.

Fast forward to today and my relationship with running has taken a drastic shift.

I’m still running for training, but this time I’m training for a run.

I first got the idea of running a marathon in college. I thought it would be a cool goal to run one before I graduated.

However, senior year came around and the most I’d ever run was 6 miles, and that was mainly because I ran to this river in Barcelona and was forced to run all the way back. I had no idea what the distance was. And I also walked a good bit on the way back.

So senior year rolls around and I decided to downgrade that goal to a half-marathon. Still a very worthy goal.

I remember training with my roommate at the time, who did cross country growing up. During races and in practice they weren’t allowed to listen to music!

That blew my mind. I thought those kinds of people were crazy.

But let me tell you…whoever his coach was had it right. I started running my easy runs without music and it’s not as crazy as you may think.

Running all of a sudden can become this really cool spiritual experience. It’s not just a grueling workout anymore.

This realization came because of 2 things actually:

1. I changed my training so that instead of running as fast and hard as possible every single run, 80% of my miles are at a slower pace.

2. I run those slower-paced miles without music.

When you run slower, it’s not as hard, but you’re still getting the training in. After a while, as crazy as it seems, you don’t dread running as much.

Running becomes refreshing, you feel great when you get home, and the actual run is serene.

One of the biggest reasons I love running is that running is so simple. You only have to do one thing: run.

When you are at the gym, there are tons of ways to get distracted, sell yourself short, or even just leave.

But when you are on a run (especially an out-and-back run), that’s it. It’s just you and the road, sidewalk, or trail.

The best productivity tool I’ve discovered in life is to focus on one single task at a time, complete it, and then move on.

The amount of time you waste going between different tasks and context-switching is exhausting.

My problem, however, is I have a really hard time focusing on just one thing at a time. I constantly think of all the other things I need to do. It only gets worse if the current task is boring or difficult.

Running, however, is different.

When I’m on a run, that is the single task I need to do. It takes zero mental effort, and once you get the routine in, even easy runs aren’t a huge physical effort.

There is nothing else I could be doing. The run itself is productive, it’s good for my body. It’s not like vegging out on YouTube where I feel this guilt in the back of my head that there is something better I should be doing with my time.

Running is a good use of time!

It also helps clear my head…or more so, it helps me organize the thoughts that are already in my head.

If I have a problem at work, I often get some of my best ideas when I’m out on a run!

But lately, when I started running unplugged from music, the experience has gone even further.

My mind wanders and has some of my most creative ideas and inspiration.

But it also gives me an amazing time to just pray to God.

A lot of times I’m running down this beautiful road in the mountains. It’s filled with rolling green hills, streams and creeks everywhere, cows and birds all over the place, and in the horizon is the constant view of the blue ridge mountains.

It’s gorgeous!

One thing that brings me closer to God is nature, so running through that scenery with very few cars or sounds from the world is the perfect place to just pray.

There is also nothing else to distract me.

Even sitting still on our serene deck can distract me because I’m not moving. But when I’m on a run, I’m constantly moving, seeing different things to be thankful for.

It is so wonderful!

So, in close, running has taught me a lot!

• It’s teaching me to be better at focusing on one task at a time.

• It’s taught me that running can actually be enjoyable again like when we were children.

• It’s taught me that you don’t need music and that the sounds of nature and your own footsteps are sometimes the best noises to relax you.

• It’s taught me that running is also the perfect time to pray and be thankful for everything; especially the legs and body that gives me the ability to go on that run.

What is your relationship with running? Do you hate it? Do you miss it? Do you love it too?

We haven’t gone anywhere and I apologize for being a bit quiet on Deso.

It’s a one-man band over here and I needed to take a breather from social media for a bit. I’m slowly coming back though!

I don’t want to waste time just talking nonsense, so let’s jump into what we’ve been working on!

Self Publishing NFTs

We are very close to wrapping up our full self-publishing NFTs so anyone can purchase one directly from spatiumstories.com!

This will 100% unlock self-publishing to anyone that wants to join in on the fun!

We will have 3 different NFT tiers (yes one is FREE), each with different levels of features.

Some features for the higher tiers won’t be available immediately, but we’re working on them soon!

Each tier can be purchased for a month or for a year. When you purchase an NFT you will be shown the expiration date in the NFT post body.

Until we have a sophisticated way of creating rolling subscriptions, once your NFT expires, you will need to come manually purchase a new one.

That being said, we are also working on integrating with Stripe so you can easily purchase an author subscription with a credit card too!

Author Associations

Some of you may be wondering how these self-publishing NFTs actually work behind the scenes.

Well, we think we’ve come up with a creative approach.

When you purchase an author NFT you are actually also given an official Spatium Association too. This association will be for whichever tier of NFT you purchased.

This does 2 huge things:

• It makes it easier to verify you are an author when publishing since the NFTs minted are all unique. Keeping track of thousands of NFTs is an overhead nightmare. Being able to check an Association is quick and easy.

• We have a simple service that checks once a day for all our author associations and ensures they still have a valid author NFT. If not, then the association is removed. This makes #1 even easier. Otherwise part of the overhead of checking multiple NFTs would also include multiple expired NFTs. This would add up over time and make everything slow.

This will also make it super easy to find all our author’s books for the marketplace by simply gathering all our associated authors.

Book Associations

Speaking of Associations, we are also going to start using Associations to mark every single one of our published books!

This will make identifying whether an NFT is an official Spatium book seamless and secure.

This innovation will also unlock the ability for authors to publish official Spatium books from their own account or project account! A feature we are really excited to release soon!

Life or Death

My personal short story compilation will be published soon!

This is my very first piece of fiction work and the inspiration for me building Spatium in the first place!

If Spatium ever takes off like I hope it does, these books will be historical to the origins of the platform.

Just saying ;)

R2M2 Revamp

Some of you have taken part in the super fun R2M2 promotional feature with the Wizard of Oz.

https://spatiumstories.com/#/r2m2

If not, let me explain. R2M2 stands for Random Rares Minting Squared. The name itself is just a fun word-play thing.

But the feature allows a way to mint your book with multiple covers, rarities, and ultimately gamify the release of your books!

For example, right now we have the Wizard of Oz mint on R2M2. There are 10 covers with varying numbers of each cover ranging from 50 all the way to the 1/1 Wizard cover.

When you purchase a Wizard of Oz book, you pay a one-time flat price and get a random cover, it could be the least rare or the most rare.

We think this will be a lot of fun for authors, but we think we can make it better.

In our revamp, we are giving even more control to the authors. Now when you create a promotion, you can select which books go in. They don’t have to be the same book.

You could do a Christmas special where you release special editions of all your books, bundle them into a promotion, and then when someone purchases a book they just get a random copy of any of your books!

Again, we want to supply the tools for you to use in any way you imagine.

As for right now, this promotion tool is not widely available to our authors yet. However, once the full self-publishing is released, the next thing we’ll be doing is allowing our authors access to this really cool tool!

The HG Wells Collection

The revamped R2M2 will debut with a fun promotion of several HG Wells books! We’ll have really cool covers, multiple copies of each, and multiple books from this genius fiction teller.

Or is he really a time traveler? hmm…

Can you collect all his books?

Author Pages

Coming very soon will be author pages!

Once you have an author NFT, this will be your one-stop shop to manage your titles, start R2M2 promotions, publish new titles, burn books (possibly frowned upon, haha), and even start your own book clubs!

Book Clubs

I also plan to start up a weekly book club very very soon!

Probably covering one of our published books! Stay tuned for details!

Conclusion

In conclusion, we have not gone anywhere. Our founder was simply burned out on the social media game. Ugh.

We believe we have some really exciting updates coming very very soon!

To summarize:

• Self Publishing NFTs

• Author Associations

• Book Associations

• Life or Death launch

• R2M2 Revamp

• HG Wells Collection launch

• Author Pages

• Book Clubs

That’s a big list in my humble opinion, haha!

I hope you are all very excited! Once all of this is out and live, we will love to get everyone’s feedback!

In the meantime, we plan to start up our weekly coffee chats again live on Twitter every Friday at 11am EST.

Until next time! Take a pause with us!

Blockchain technology is driving innovation all over the place.

I see new projects popping up all the time offering new ways to do things in this digital world. Sometimes it’s brand new ideas, other times it’s just improving upon pre-existing technology or ideologies.

One ideology I’ve seen rekindled lately is the idea of collaboration.

What do I define as collaboration and why did it need to be rekindled?

Before we jump into that, though, I just want to make sure you are subscribed :) It helps us out a ton and allows you to get instant access of all our future newsletters directly in your inbox! Win-win!

The Death of Collaboration

To be clear, I don’t think collaboration has died. But it has taken a major hit in recent years.

Why?

Is it cliche to blame covid?

I don’t actually blame a virus, but I think the virus revealed something within our society.

Let me ask you a question. When was the last time you collaborated on a project and it went really really well?

You might actually have some positive experiences, but odds are you can think of at least one time collaboration was a disaster. Especially in academic environments.

I believe the cause to any collaborative disaster comes to a simple lack of communication.

Without effective communication, teams trying to collaborate will inevitably fail.

Individuals won’t understand their role and responsibility, they won’t effectively or efficiently ask questions, and if a disagreement pops up, all bets are off.

Through the rise of the internet and cloud based technologies, virtual collaboration is not just possible, but it gets easier every year.

Virtual collaboration, however, still doesn’t really solve the communication problem.

Sometimes it can help. I for one, can communicate way more efficiently and effectively over virtual channels than trying to think on my feet out loud. But it’s not for everyone.

So virtual collaboration doesn’t help the problem, but it isn’t the root issue either.

But if that’s not it, what is?

The Root To Collaboration Disaster

Let’s jump back to the communication issue. I’m going to throw my theory out and then we’ll talk about it briefly.

I don’t think our society knows how to disagree anymore.

Today, it’s not “normal” to be friends with someone you disagree with. Nobody “disagrees” they just “dismiss” and move on with life.

The problem with this is you are now part of a cult. The only people around you are the ones with the same beliefs and morals as you. That’s why we see such extremist behavior in the world, especially on social media.

It is extremely toxic.

What I loved most about the book, Bandersnatch, is that it highlights a group of men gathering together every week, who call themselves friends, who collaborate constantly, and who disagree on almost everything.

Without those disagreements the main character in the Lord of the Rings would be named Bingo.

Think about that for a second.

The whole point of all of this is for us to recognize there is a major problem with collaboration in our society. But I believe I’ve seen a rekindling of it on the blockchain.

Rekindled Collaboration

Because of blockchain technology, artists of all kinds can now collaborate on projects in brand new ways.

Thanks to built in royalties on NFTs, artists can collaborate, mint an NFT, and collect their share of the sale automatically because of the blockchain.

It’s beautiful!

Because of this, I’ve seen all sorts of projects collaborate.

Poets putting together long collaborative works together, fiction writers getting together to each write a chapter for a book, digital artists teaming up with authors to create amazing rare book covers, popular NFT projects teaming up to release combined NFT works, and the list goes on and on.

It is really powerful, and I’m excited to share how Spatium is preparing to get involved and help facilitate more and more collaboration and community.

Spatium’s Community

As I’ve mentioned before, one of the blockchains we’re built with is DeSo.

Well, DeSo has just released their full version of the Deso Chat Protocol (DCP). This expands upon their already unique on-chain messaging protocol. This is the technology we’ve utilized for the Dragon protocol. But it is also been used for almost 2 years now by Deso users to send private messages to each other fully on-chain.

The new and improved DCP now expands upon this feature to allow private group messages fully on-chain!

But wait, there is more!

It also is multichain! They must have taken my advice 🙂

You can actually send messages to people on Ethereum using their address or ENS name directly from your Deso account now! Or vice versa.

This will roll right into our strategy of becoming multichain as we plan to expand books into the Ethereum ecosystem!

This will enable a ton of powerful tools we plan to release. Some of these ideas we are going to implement very very soon. Here are just a few:

For Authors

Every Spatium author will soon be added to a unique Deso group message for just the authors.

This will be fully on-chain, and a way to communicate, collaborate, and ask questions.

A unique, fully decentralized, private online community for all of our authors!

We plan to expand this to the context of Vibehut too where authors can get on video calls with each other and form web3 writers groups just like CS Lewis and Tolkien!

For Readers

One feature I’m super stoked for is book clubs!

Every book collector will have the ability to join a book club for the book they just bought.

This will also be easily facilitated through Deso group chats fully on-chain.

This means you don’t have to read a book alone anymore!

You can discuss all the things you love or hate with other fans! I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. I don’t care how good a book is, it is 10 times better when you can talk about it with other people.

Other Future Plans

Those are our main initial plans, author communities and book clubs.

The really cool thing here is it’s built using Deso and it is multichain.

Why is that cool?

Well, for starters, all the messages being stored securely and encrypted on-chain, means that any app can utilize the technology.

I know we’ll work hand in hand with an app called Squadz, which is building an awesome version of Discord where you can create and join different Squadz based on criteria like owning an NFT, creator coin, or maybe even an association.

The second reason it’s cool is that the Deso Chat Protocol is heading multichain while we are too. They already support Ethereum and ENS for messages, and soon they plan to add Solana and Near.

This means when we are multichain, if you buy a book through Polygon or Ethereum, then you can join book clubs with that address, no Deso account needed!

The same will eventually be true for Solana too!

We will do a longer post and video demo once this is implemented and ready to go on Spatium.

Until then, we’d love to hear your ideas, excitement, questions, or concerns!

Thank you all for reading, and once again, if you aren’t subscribed, it means the world if you would. And if you are, please consider sharing this newsletter with someone else!

Maximalism.

We have maximalists (or extremists) everywhere now and it annoys me to no end.

I don’t know what happened to our society, but it seems like maximalism is the new norm.

In fact, if you have a reasonably balanced opinion, society disregards you as spineless, unable to make a decision, or just complacent.

Really!?

Should you need to have an extreme opinion and be “all in” to be listened to?

Don’t get me wrong; there are times when you should go all in on your beliefs.

But when it comes to things like politics, technology, and today’s conversation: blockchains, I don’t think maximalism is the best.

This leads us to today’s topic: multichain.

But before we jump in, make sure you hit that subscribe button :) It helps us out a ton and ensures you get all these articles directly in your inbox! Win-Win!

What is Multichain

Last time we talked, I explained how different cryptocurrencies power different blockchains.

We talked about how this affects decentralized social media in particular, but the truth is it goes beyond that.

A lot of these blockchains have huge followings. And a lot of them have a weird cultish behavior. The blockchain followers disregard and shame any other blockchain out there.

Don’t get me wrong; this is a new technology and we should all be cautious. There are tons and tons of blockchain projects out there, and they aren’t all legit.

But you shouldn’t just close off to any new project because you believe the one you found is the best.

And every big chain has issue.

Bitcoin maximalists (or maxis) believe that because Bitcoin was the first decentralized blockchain in the space, it’s the only one that matters. It will be the de facto replacement for currency, and no other blockchain will stand a chance.

I tend to believe Bitcoin will probably be the one to replace gold, dollars, etc, but does that make it the only important and useful blockchain?

Not at all!

The same goes for Ethereum followers too. This was the first blockchain with smart contract functionality, so any other blockchain that has smart contracts like Solana are deemed garbage.

The reverse of that one is true too. Solana followers think that the Solana blockchain is faster, cheaper, and smarter than Ethereum and will ultimately squash Ethereum into the dust.

Here is another example. There is another very popular NFT book marketplace and publisher called Book. They are built on Cardano, which has another huge cult following.

So much so they believe that what Book is doing is extremely innovative, no one else is doing anything remotely like it, and they have a blind eye to any other NFT book project out there…simply because all they see is Cardano.

The list goes on and on so I’ll stop there.

I want to hone in on the point that we shouldn’t close off on these other blockchains.

What is a Blockchain Really?

Technologists will cringe at my oversimplification, but in reality what is a blockchain?

I would define it as a fully decentralized and open database.

We talked about his last time with decentralized social media.

Anybody in the world can tap into the Deso blockchain and build a social media app with their data.

Because it’s open.

You can’t build an app that ports your Facebook friends or Twitter data or any other normal social media. Those databases are closed off.

This concept of open data is true for every single blockchain. Anyone can tap into Bitcoin and see all financial transactions.

Anyone can tap into Ethereum or Solana and view transactions, call other people’s programs, or build an NFT marketplace.

If you sell Solana NFTs on your website, anyone in the world can build an app that showcases or uses your NFTs in some way shape, or form.

Ok, you get the picture.

To summarize: a blockchain is a public database. So what’s the big deal?

How are Databases Used Today?

Here’s the thing. Databases come in a variety of forms depending on your use case. At the end of the day, yes, they have one main function: store data.

But there is a lot of technique, software, and design that goes into storing and retrieving that data as securely and quickly as possible.

The type of data really defines the kind of database you need. Some databases are faster than others, but might not 100% guarantee all the data is stored in real time.

Others can store the data in real-time guaranteed, but it just might not be immediately.

For instance, financial data needs to be secure and accurate 100% of the time. What if the stock markets had lagging data that wasn’t real-time and people could trade at lower prices than others? That wouldn’t be good.

However, what about storing the number of likes you have on a YouTube video? If you have tons of followers sending you likes, do you really care if you see the accurate count in real-time? If you see 10,000 likes but in reality, you have 10,100, does it matter as long as all the likes show up eventually?

The list of database uses is quite large: some are for storing large data (like videos), financial data, temporary data that is accessed frequently, data that relates to each other (like social data), data for AI and machine learning, etc etc.

The point of all of this is if you went into Facebook or Google or even small applications and asked what kind of database they use, what would they say?

They’d probably tell you they use at least 3 or more different kinds of databases for different parts of their product.

Because they have a lot of services and each use case needs different database technology.

Back to Blockchains

So if blockchains are databases, then doesn’t it make sense for a decentralized app (dapp) to utilize different blockchains too?

Why build an app that limits itself to just 1 ecosystem?

There are so many different blockchains, each have different users, different apps, and can be tapped into for different use cases.

In the future, this will evolve more and more. For now, we see a lot of apps being built on one blockchain. Especially with NFT projects. But slowly all these apps are supporting different NFTs from different blockchains.

OpenSea started on Ethereum, but now you can sell Ethereum, Polygon, or Solana NFTs. MagicEden started selling Solana NFTs, but now you can sell Ethereum NFTs there too!

The NFTs are stored on a single chain, but the app that utilizes them is not. They tap into all the chains.

In the future, I’d love to see apps utilize the different blockchains for their unique use cases and advantages.

Solana, for instance, is very fast, and in my opinion ideal for quick financial transactions through things like Solana Pay. Ethereum, however, has a slightly easier, broader, and more standard smart contract ecosystem so perhaps running certain programs there could be beneficial. Deso and Polygon are the biggest chains for decentralized social media right now, so they should be integrated for social interactions.

You get the picture.

We aren’t 100% there yet, but that’s what I think the future will hold.

How Spatium Plans to Become Multichain

Now let’s focus more on Spatium Stories.

As you may or may not know, Deso is the core blockchain Spatium is built on right now. All our books are currently stored on Deso.

*However, technically, we store the book cover image and encrypted book file on the Arweave blockchain. Which I guess already makes us multichain :) *

Deso will always remain a social layer for the app. This means to interact with any authors or book clubs, a Deso account will be necessary. For readers, we plan to offer custodial Deso accounts if you don’t want to make one. For our authors, we think it’s important they create their own accounts for publishing. But if enough interest comes in, we may add custodial Deso accounts for them too.

Deso is also the key blockchain for our Dragon Protocol encryption service.** We use Deso to securely store all our encryption keys and plan to continue to do so.**

However, the actual encryption/decryption processing is still done on a normal AWS server.

On an aside, I believe this still makes us decentralized.

Here is why: All the data is public.

Anyone in the world can build their own AWS server to add their own encryption/decryption service too. Anyone in the world can build their own book store or cloud reader and utilize Spatium books. Without our permission! That’s decentralized.

From a security point of view, by the way, the Dragon Protocol shares the keys between our account and the author. So if anyone else wanted to build a cloud reader they would still need the author to agree to share those encryption keys.

Anyways, as we become multichain, however, we do plan to move that encryption/decryption service onto the blockchain through smart contract technology.

Furthermore, as we become multichain one thing we will foster is storing the book NFT on multiple blockchains. This helps with data redundancy because if you publish your book on multiple blockchains and one happens to disappear somehow, then your book would be on other blockchains too.

This also allows our books to be resold on multiple blockchain marketplace apps, thus expanding the reach for our authors.

As other chains like Polygon advance social features, this also allows us to utilize the social features of not just Deso, but Polygon too!

Lastly, becoming more multichain allows our authors to utilize better payment technology and get paid in any cryptocurrency they want.

The use cases can go on and on.

But in reality, here is our current plan in bite-sized chunks:

• Deso will be our base chain for social interactions and the Dragon Protocol

• We plan to add (as soon as possible) Solana, Polygon, and Ethereum books, making the total chains you can buy books on 4.

• Authors minting RARE books (limited edition books) will specify which chain they want to publish on.

• Authors minting MOD books (infinite copies available for purchase) will have a very unique twist. MOD books will be minted on the Deso blockchain at first. But this is just the root copy. **Any reader can then buy a MOD copy on whichever chain they want! **The author doesn’t have to do anything to set it up and they still get paid. I believe we will be the ONLY NFT bookstore to offer this.

That’s the plan!

We hope and believe that becoming multichain will broaden the reach of our authors, increase the number of unique features we can utilize from these other powerful blockchains, and spark more unity instead of cultish maximalist behavior.

Thank you for reading Spatium Stories. If you enjoyed it, share it so others can too!

It wasn’t until later that doctors realized how addictive and dangerous cocaine was and outlawed it.

Today, many people have equated social media to modern-day cocaine.

It is massively addictive, releases dopamine, and destroys your mental health if you aren’t careful.

The reality is, there are many, many problems with social media.

This is probably a very odd intro when you look at the title of this article. But here is where I’m going with this:

Thanks to modern blockchain technology, if we can decentralize social media, many of those problems will come to a halt.

We may not be able to stifle the addictive power or comparison games, but it can certainly solve a lot of other major issues social media has brought to the modern human.

And so the question is: what is decentralized social media, what problems are they solving, and what will the future of these look like in 5-10 years?

Before we answer those questions, would you consider subscribing? It helps us out a ton and you can get notified of all these great articles and updates! Win-win!

Let’s get into it!

Decentralized Socials

I am a huge fan of the DeSo blockchain. When you truly understand what has been built, it is pretty novel.

A blockchain fully designed from the ground up for social interactions (follow, post, like, etc). And they keep adding new primitives.

Having a decentralized social media (whether built on Deso or not) solves a wide range of problems we have with normal centralized social media companies:

1. All data is public: anyone can build an app on top of that data without asking permission or paying for some API key.

2. No censorship: for Deso, at least, censorship (or content curation) is at the node (or app) level. If you want a social app called SportsBall that only shows sports-related content, you can do that!

   1. When something is blocked on an app, it is not blocked on the blockchain. No one can control what does or doesn’t go on the blockchain.

3. 1 account: you only make one social media account that can be used across 100s of apps.

Let me dig into that last one a little bit more as it’s one of the focuses of today’s article.

What is the problem with modern “web2” social media?

If I want to have a presence, build a following, build an audience, or whatever you want to call it, I have 2 options:

1. Pick 1 social media platform and go all in

2. Pick multiple social media platforms and build separate audiences

The problem with strategy 1 is that oftentimes if you’re starting from scratch, that’s not enough.

If you are trying to sell books or make videos, being on Facebook alone won’t cut it. With videos, even being on YouTube alone might not cut it.

The problem with strategy number 2 is it takes a ton of time. Valuable time you could be spending on content creation.

Typically, if you’re trying to build some kind of business through social media it’s because you have some kind of content your’e passionate about. It could be your art, books, writings, songs, videos, or educational material.

At the end of the day, you have something you want others to see and/or buy.

Most people don’t build social media audiences for the sake of it.

Odds are, if you are trying to build a content creation business, it’s not your main job either. So your time to work on it is already limited.

Now try adding in time to navigate building an audience on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube?

I call that inevitable burnout.

That’s why web3 social media platforms like those built on the DeSo blockchain are so valuable!

When you create an account on Diamondapp and start building followers, they stick with you.

Your followers are tied to you via the blockchain, not Diamondapp.

So if you want to start doing a lot of photos on Stori, your followers on Diamondapp will already see them! If you want to start making videos on Videso, your followers on Diamondapp will already see those too!

You don’t need to make separate followings anymore!

You “own” your followers like you “own” an email list.

This is also extremely powerful when you think of censorship. There are people that have worked for years to build 500K to a million followers on Twitter or Instagram only to be banned.

**All those followers? Poof! Gone! Like dust in the wind! ** On DeSo that can never happen.

If you were banned from Diamondapp, you could switch to another app, your content would still be on the blockchain, and your followers could still hear from you.

Ok, ok…so we understand the value, right?

Hopefully so. What about the title of the article? Where does this “multichain ecosystem“ concept come into play?

Multiple Blockchain Ecosystems

We all know there are thousands of cryptocurrencies out there, right?

Some are just coins on already-built blockchains, but many are cryptocurrencies that power unique blockchains. For instance:

$SOL powers the Solana blockchain.

$ETH powers the Ethereum blockchain.

$MATIC powers the Polygon blockchain.

$DESO powers the Deso blockchain.

You get the picture.

Here is where I got the idea of a multichain ecosystem:

There is another popular decentralized social media protocol called Lens.

Lens is not a blockchain itself, but rather a protocol for the Polygon blockchain.

Confused?

Protocol is just a fancy word for a set of standards and rules.

It says, hey, this Polygon blockchain has these basic functions. If we define rules for how to use these basic functions in a social media context and everyone follows those rules, then we can have a social media application.

For Lens, I believe they use NFTs everywhere. So every post you make is a special Polygon NFT, your follows and likes, all NFTs. That’s the rules they made.

That was your brief introduction to Lens.

Here’s where it gets interesting. If you make an account on Lens using your Polygon wallet, then all the benefits we talked about with Deso still apply. Lens has Twitter-like apps, YouTube-like apps, and Instagram-like apps.

It’s the same idea. No one can block you from the blockchain, your content is all on-chain, and any followers you get on one Lens app carries over to the next one.

Do you see where I’m going yet?

If you want to build an audience on a decentralized social media, you don’t have to pick between apps anymore.

However, there is a new issue at hand. You may not have to pick between an app, but you do have to pick a blockchain.

If I build a huge audience on Deso, but decide I want to build an audience on Lens too, there is no carryover.

They aren’t connected. They don’t share data.

And Deso and Lens are not alone, by the way. There is another called Farcaster, and Jack Dorsey is supposedly building one too called BlueSky or something.

So when it comes to having only 1 follower set and not having to start from 0 anymore, my question is: is this really true?

If in 5-10 years all of these different decentralized social media “ecosystems” are as big as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube, is the problem solved, or is the problem just morphed?

I mean, if you pick one ecosystem like Deso, then yes, you have access to multiple different kinds of apps with 1 singular account.

But isn’t Facebook like that too? They have games, a messenger app, the main Facebook app, a marketplace, group messaging tools, etc.

And when another social media application releases a cool feature or novel concept, all the others add it on too. TikTok came out, it blew up, and now you can do Reels on Facebook and YouTube Shorts.

Where Does This Leave Us?

So what will the future look like?

First, I think the future will look more decentralized.

I think these ecosystems are not competitors. They are all pioneers and the more pioneers we have, the quicker we can expand to the masses.

I think even if we do have multiple ecosystems to choose from, it still solves the first 2 problems I discussed earlier.

All these ecosystems will be decentralized, censorship-free, and open so anyone can build an app on top of the blockchain.

Ideally, this will help breed a more united culture, not the negative divisive one we’ve seen on social media these past few years.

Second, I think we will see more multichain apps.

I think from a technical perspective it will be a challenge, but as these ecosystems mature, we’ll start to see more and more decentralized apps built in a way that these ecosystems can interoperate.

So if you have a Lens account, you can still log in to the same app and interact with people who only have a Deso account.

Conclusion

In conclusion, when we look at the broad crypto industry, we already know that multiple blockchains exist with vibrant communities following each one.

With the rise of decentralized social media, we know that inevitably there will be multiple blockchain ecosystems to join in on.

Regardless, decentralization will fix a ton of problems with modern social media.

It may not immediately cure people from the addictive powers and negative mental health issues, but I believe it gets us in the right direction.