The Cash Battle

This text is featured in Bitcoin Journal’s “The Main Challenge”. Click on right here to get your Annual Bitcoin Journal Subscription.

I all the time discover it humorous when I’m attending a Bitcoin occasion like Bitcoin 2023 — or subsequent 12 months’s Bitcoin 2024 in Nashville — and a battle fan acknowledges me with a bewildered look of their eyes and asks,

“Cyborg?!…What are YOU doing right here?”

The reply all the time appears apparent to me, “as a result of I’m a Bitcoiner!”

One factor that makes Bitcoin particular is that it’s for everybody and that the extra you perceive it, the extra sure you turn out to be of its success. Every time I meet somebody and discover out they’re additionally a Bitcoiner, I immediately really feel a reference to them — a way of respect. It’s laborious to elucidate to somebody who isn’t concerned in martial arts, nevertheless it’s a sense similar to how I really feel round my Muay Thai or Brazilian jujitsu sparring companions. Perhaps that is the explanation for the bewildered appears to be like on the convention; I do know we’re each a part of a neighborhood of monetary freedom warriors. In some ways, Bitcoin jogs my memory plenty of martial arts, in that anybody and everybody can profit from taking part, and the proof-of-work is confirmed within the optimistic, life-changing outcomes.

I’ve been preventing professionally for 18 years and through that point have received each championship within the sport of MMA. I’m the present Bellator MMA Champion and former UFC, Invicta FC, and Strikeforce Featherweight Champion which makes me the one “Grand Slam Champion” within the historical past of the game — a title reserved solely for individuals who have received all 4 main World Championships. Throughout my time as a fighter I noticed the game change dramatically from a “No Holds Barred” spectacle into one of many largest-grossing dwell sporting occasions on this planet, entertaining a very world fanbase. Once you battle for cash, it is named “prize preventing”, with cash being the prize. As a fighter, our careers have very quick incomes durations the place now we have to hunt the largest “cash fights” in an effort that we can save and make investments that cash into retirement.

MMA is a comparatively new sport. This 12 months the UFC — the biggest MMA promotion — is celebrating its thirtieth anniversary. A glance again on its temporary historical past exhibits a tremendous world development fee in recognition and an acceptance that has by no means been witnessed in skilled sports activities earlier than. Whereas the Bitcoin community is lower than half the age of the game of MMA, I see a robust resemblance in how it’s really evolving into a worldwide phenomenon, rapidly turning into widespread tradition and reaching a tipping level the place it’ll now not be simple.

Early within the historical past of “Final Combating” there have been few guidelines. With no athletic fee sanctioning the sporting competitors, Congress tried to create legal guidelines that will have banned the game within the U.S. Via training, regulation, and self reform, finally audiences acquired to see the game of MMA evolve into what it’s at present: organized, sanctioned, and comparatively secure for the rivals.

Once I meet fellow Bitcoiners who’re educating themselves concerning the community, advocating for adoption, and even operating their very own node or miners, I have a look at them just like the early pioneers of my sport of MMA. I do know that every of us collectively play an vital position in serving to strengthen the Bitcoin community, guaranteeing that the true advantages of a decentralized, peer-to-peer change of worth are by no means compromised.

The primary 30 years of the game of MMA has taught us extra about hand-to-hand fight than the earlier 200 years of martial arts coaching mixed. With the early Model versus Model MMA fights the viewers and practitioners rapidly realized that regardless of the previous Kung Fu films, there was no “5 touches of dying” punch. Over time, we noticed the best martial arts get confirmed inside the cage, finally inflicting rivals to solely concentrate on these methods that had been confirmed to be efficient and precious throughout an precise battle.

I see Bitcoin doing to finance what MMA has performed to conventional martial arts. The primary 15 years of Bitcoin has taught us extra concerning the retailer of worth than the primary 150 years of fiat currencies mixed. After getting been “Orange Pilled”, it’s like signing up for “Monetary MMA”. When you perceive how bitcoin is the best retailer of worth — confirmed to be probably the most sturdy, transportable, divisible, fungible, scarcest, trustless, censorship-resistant, and universally accepted as a type of cash — you can also make it your monetary focus, figuring out it’s the best and precious instrument at saving your worth long run.

BJJ isn’t karate and Bitcoin isn’t crypto! As an athlete in MMA, it’s my job to coach in a number of totally different types of martial arts. To a novice watching a martial arts class, there may not appear to be a lot of a distinction between a karate uniform and a Brazilian jujitsu uniform. Regardless of the same uniforms, the 2 martial arts couldn’t be anymore totally different. One focuses on punches and kicks (karate), whereas the opposite focuses on wrestling and submissions (BJJ). Most individuals don’t perceive that MMA stands for “combined martial arts” and that we use guidelines from Olympic sports activities like boxing (punches), taekwondo (kicks), wrestling (takedowns), and judo (submissions) to compete in hybrid competitors with the objective of proving what’s the simplest system of fight.

Bitcoin isn’t crypto. Bitcoin is decentralized, digital foreign money exchanged by way of a peer-to-peer community. It’s open-sourced and permits anybody to take part with no central level of management. Nobody particular person or entity is in cost and it proves itself day by day as the best retailer of worth, block after block, by way of proof of labor. Similar to the methods used within the sport of MMA, the proof is within the work and the outcomes (rewards). It’s vital to distinguish between Bitcoin and cryptos with a purpose to perceive why Bitcoin is the best hybrid system of finance.

If my business has taught me something it’s that girls are wanted to steer the revolution. Regardless of the primary UFC going down in 1993, it was not till I received the Strikeforce World Championship in 2009 towards Gina Carano that the game of MMA had a feminine acknowledged as undisputed World Champion. Wanting on the sport at present, it’s wonderful to see how important ladies have been to its total development. Now we see the largest occasions being showcased by high feminine athletes, and we witness coaching services around the globe full of younger, motivated, and hungry ladies eager to show themselves within the sport of MMA.

On the Bitcoin 2023 convention in Miami I acquired the chance to attend the second annual “ladies of Bitcoin” brunch hosted by Natalie Brunell, which had over 250 ladies from around the globe in attendance. It was inspiring to satisfy so many younger, educated, motivated ladies working collectively to make sure the Bitcoin community turns into a type of monetary empowerment for girls all around the globe. I really feel assured that years from now, as we glance again on the journey of Bitcoin, that the historical past goes to be full of tales of feminine entrepreneurs, builders, and evangelists who had been instrumental within the community’s development and development as a result of Bitcoin is all-inclusive — each race, faith, and intercourse.

In my sport, with a purpose to have longevity and success as a fighter, you must perceive the idea of “time choice”. As an athlete, you can’t be out partying, consuming poor meals, and having fun with fast gratification if you’d like long-term success. Success requires us to concentrate on successful the small day by day targets with the understanding that every one the trouble is rewarded with a victory come the night time of the battle. I have a look at bitcoin and the observe of stacking sats (DCA) with that very same mindset. When you determine on a Bitcoin technique and also you perceive there may be solely ever going to be 21 million bitcoin out there, the idea of delayed gratification and time choice turns into simple to concentrate on. Much like successful a championship belt in my sport, the outcomes of all of your laborious work being saved in sound cash goes to be life-changing.

Early within the historical past of the game of “final preventing”, it was taken off the air. MMA largely made it by way of this “darkish period” due to a devoted loyal fanbase that spent their time on web boards, and sharing VHS movies of fights to make sure folks continued to get publicity to this growing sport. By no means in one million years did I think about myself preventing in entrance of fifty,000 followers inside a soccer stadium and promoting thousands and thousands of pay per views.

The Bitcoin community jogs my memory plenty of these early combined martial arts followers who invested their very own time, vitality, and efforts into the neighborhood as a result of they believed within the outcomes. Much like these early years in my sport, there isn’t a turning off the web and due to that the Bitcoin community goes to proceed to develop. It’s going to proceed to get stronger, and with it’ll come the tipping level that may drive a worldwide acceptance of Bitcoin.

Followers admire my ability, braveness, and focus after I step inside the cage to compete in a championship prize battle, however the actuality is they don’t seem to be so totally different from me. The way in which I see it, everybody who swallows the orange tablet has already signed the contract for the last word cash battle.

The subsequent time you see your favourite UFC or Bellator MMA fighter at a Bitcoin convention don’t look bewildered. As a substitute give them a heads-up, figuring out you’re each monetary freedom warriors coaching as a part of the Bitcoin community of prized fighters! 

This text is featured in Bitcoin Journal’s “The Main Challenge”. Click on right here to get your Annual Bitcoin Journal Subscription.

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