0:00 the most surprising thing is how many businesses are zombie companies 0:05 businesses that are not producing any profit that are not producing positive 0:10 cash flow but are surviving because of credit because of debt so easy credit 0:16 leads to short-term thinking leads to ultimate failure their passion and their 0:21 drive gets drowned out by the debt and it's just a function of the system we're 0:26 in bitcoin has shown me is if you want something that's going to actually be valuable in the long term you have to be 0:33 able to push out your your time horizon once you understand bitcoin you can't look at inflation the same you can't 0:39 look at the world economy the same now that i've discovered bitcoin and i understand it like i feel so much more 0:46 empowered or like optimistic for the future why do i feel like there's 0:51 something under the surface that i can't put my finger on bitcoin allowed me to put my finger on it bitcoin evokes more 0:57 of a a community-minded approach and allows you to actually be incentivized 1:04 to be a good person rather than just looking out for yourself and kind of 1:09 moving with the flow of how the rest of the fiat world does so i think it speaks to that the power if money the financial 1:16 institutions if we're saying that it's objective then bitcoin is the most objective source of value we have due to 1:23 its [Music] properties medium of exchange is 1:28 sponsored by the bitcoin payments advisor if you own or run a business and 1:33 you'd like to accept bitcoin but don't know how the bitcoin payments adviser can help from specific software 1:40 recommendations and accounting implications to training employees and marketing so your customers know you 1:46 accept this new form of payment the bitcoin payments adviser can help simplify your journey in accepting 1:51 bitcoin for your business check out bitcoin paymentsadvisor.com and get 10% off when 1:58 you pay in bitcoin again that's bitcoin paymentsadvisor.com now let's get back 2:03 to the show so welcome to the medium of exchange podcast Jordan we're really 2:08 excited to have you on today this podcast as you know we talk about bitcoin and bitcoin adoption specifically uh tended towards small and 2:16 medium-sized businesses so as we think about bitcoin and as it kind of transforms the world as we know it we're 2:23 seeing a gradual change to it becoming that medium of exchange and how jason 2:28 and i view purpose of this conversation is to be that tip of the spear to show how businesses and how people like 2:35 yourself are adopting bitcoin researching bitcoin and also helping 2:40 others discover bitcoin so with that Jordan welcome to the show would love to kind of just start off by passing the 2:47 baton over to you give us a little bit of an intro talk about yourself where what you're working on and also how you're uh how you got introduced into 2:54 bitcoin and um really incorporating it into both your business and your life 2:59 perfect thank you jack and thank you jason for having me i'm super excited to be on this podcast and always love 3:06 meeting other bitcoiners and this is my first podcast actually talking about bitcoin so it's going to be exciting to 3:12 you know kind of navigate that together but yeah kind of a little bit of backstory about me so i started a 3:18 bookkeeping firm about four years ago and when i started my my company i was 3:24 pretty obsessed with with finance in general but more traditional finance in terms of financial analysis um 3:31 fundamental analysis not so much technical analysis with businesses and when i started my business bitcoin and 3:38 and this was back in 2021 bitcoin was obviously i knew about bitcoin at the time but i wasn't interested in it i was 3:45 interested in stocks bonds all of those things traditional finance and i was 3:52 very influenced by warren buffett early in my kind of years of getting into finance and what actually drove me to 3:59 bitcoin getting over that cynical kind of i would say path was i actually had a 4:06 client this was during 2022 that was getting into the NFT space and i was 4:12 helping navigate that on the accounting side and i kind of was like okay this kind of all kind of seems a little 4:18 scammy like this whole space and that's what drove me to learn more about bitcoin because it just took me down 4:24 that rabbit hole of understanding ing what was like the foundational piece of that industry and why that is the only 4:33 piece that really matters and all the other stuff is just kind of you know dust in the wind so that was kind of my 4:40 impetus of becoming interested in bitcoin and then as you all well know 4:45 that once you learn about it you then just start to go down like little little like niche rabbit holes about you know From Traditional Finance to bitcoin for Businesses 4:52 the the federal reserve the jackal island all these other things that have happened that have led to where we are 4:58 today economically and now that i am more i guess well-versed in the space i 5:07 really found a passion in like educating business owners and that's kind of what has led me to um building not only my 5:15 business like still the bookkeeping accounting in the traditional space but trying to branch off and build something that's going to add value to the 5:22 business space for years to come and that was kind of um i'm you know starting a little project on the side 5:29 bitcoin for businesses that i'm trying to build up and this is kind of the first stage of me talking to other 5:34 individuals like yourself so that's kind of the the quick roundabout of where we are today Jordan that's amazing can you 5:42 tell so tell us more about bitcoin for businesses yeah so kind of the vision 5:47 that i have and this is very early stage is one of the biggest value propositions 5:53 that i have found within my business my traditional kind of bookkeeping business 6:00 is the the need for small businesses to be more proactive in their financial 6:05 management rather than reactive so many businesses you know we all know the statistics about businesses and failure 6:11 rates and obviously one of the biggest that drive that is the cash flow issues 6:16 that businesses face and one of the things that i've tried to it's so hard 6:22 to be in the traditional space when you have the bitcoin knowledge and that was kind of this thing that i was trying to 6:28 bridge of like how can i find a way to get average joe's business owners that 6:34 have no understanding about bitcoin to start to walk the path the the orange 6:42 you know path to bitcoin and what drove me was okay i want to provide educa it's 6:48 really like grounded in educational services that i would hopefully be able to build to more of a consulting of how 6:54 to have a a bitcoin treasury at least start a little bit and that's kind of 7:00 like i'm just taking little pieces at a time trying to find what are the pain points and trying to solve them 7:05 individually rather than just saying "hey we're going to adopt a bitcoin you know standard right?" it's like how can 7:11 we just get a little bit of adoption slowly and that's kind of been i'm kind of in the research and development phase 7:17 of the business just trying to understand where are those business owners at and how can we nudge them 7:24 towards a little bit of understanding the the fundamental problem that bitcoin's trying to solve 7:30 and how we can do it in the most efficient way possible so very early stages but i i really would love to be 7:36 able to develop that over time as bitcoin grows so when you're talking about your background in traditional 7:44 bookkeeping and finance and as you are really in the weeds there and i 7:50 emphasize weeds because of how confusing and complex our financial system is and has become what are some of those pain 7:56 points when you're reaching out to business owners that you're like hey this could actually be a solution for 8:01 you bitcoin is a decentralized peer-to-peer system that maybe you can use as a treasury to start and then grow 8:09 that to the point where oh i want to that a customer will want to start taking bitcoin and uh transacting with Breaking Through bitcoin Misconceptions in Business 8:15 it um what are some of those points that you've found either really interest you or even better even interest your 8:22 clients yeah so the biggest hurdle i always find is the it's the mindset component of 8:29 what they're used to you know in a credit based system it's so easy to to to get loans or to put everything on a 8:36 credit card and we all know what that does for cash flow is like you're borrowing from your future self and when 8:42 business is not you know when the business cycles are happening and you know things are not working in the business it's it's a vicious cycle if 8:50 the business is not operating efficiently so i would say the biggest the biggest pain point is just helping 8:57 people get over the hurdle of how can this really help my business especially when all they know about bitcoin is the 9:05 media what the media is pushing in terms of it being used you know in the early 9:10 days for you know illegal transactions or that it's just there's no value to it 9:16 and when i ex when you know when you it's very hard to explain to a business owner sometimes without getting into the 9:22 weeds and then when you get into the weeds you sometimes lose them and i think the biggest hurdle is just how do 9:30 you approach it in a way universally that everyone sees the value 9:36 without without them becoming cynical or dismissive and i don't know if that's 9:42 just a function of yes it's an early asset and maybe that's just how it's going to be or maybe there just needs to 9:50 be a better way to educate them and actually show them the value very quickly so it clicks and that i think 9:58 has been the hardest thing is finding a way to explain bitcoin quickly and simply enough to where they're like 10:04 "okay where do i sign like where do i start to take payments or how do i start to onboard it?" does that answer the 10:10 question oh yeah i mean i think that is the total like you know we're in that process of going zero to one and 10:18 understanding like most people don't know about bitcoin they don't know 10:24 what's going on in the dayto-day they don't they don't care to know because they're focused on their work their job 10:31 their family putting food on the table for them for themselves and what i think 10:36 bitcoiners are really working towards now and we're evolving towards what i call this bridge cycle of you know like 10:43 you mentioned really meeting these people where they're at is getting some of those quick uh valuable insights and 10:51 and propositions to people where it's like okay i can implement this into my business and it will help me in the long 10:58 in maybe the short term there might be some volatility but in the long term i'm willing to take that risk and that's 11:04 what i find so interesting about where we are at in terms of adoption you know 11:09 river put out a report uh the other week that we're at 4% adoption so super early 11:15 we are still early and understanding that most people are going to be resistant to any change whatsoever that 11:23 when you start talking about money it just becomes a very personal and uh real issue and i mean i love what you said 11:31 about warren buffett too of of taking it from a actually risk averse approach 11:36 versus just this is a super risky asset that you know is going to be very volatile but when you actually think 11:44 about and study the qualities of bitcoin and and change your perspective on security and how the protocol works and 11:51 you know deflationary uh secured by the miners and the nodes in the network all working together 11:57 towards a common goal of of uh the next block in consensus it creates that 12:05 diversified almost riskaverse asset that can also be uh a passive savings tool 12:12 for for that business so i i totally agree with what you're saying there and i think then once you start to implement 12:19 that people will want to uh use bitcoin as a way to pay and receive and say why 12:27 would i need dollars here because it's just adding a layer of additional you know confusion and costs and complexity 12:34 so i totally hear you there and i think like like i like you said like we said we're we are still early Jordan can i 12:41 ask a question of course so Jordan you mentioned the average joe business i 12:46 like to call them everyday business owners when you're working day-to-day with the average joe business owner you Real-World Use Case: Introducing bitcoin to Clients Strategically 12:53 guys are talking about bitcoin what would you say to them like how does bitcoin help their business 12:58 yeah that's a that's a great question and it can be somewhat of a hard one to answer because it's like getting to that 13:05 part of like mentioning bitcoin because i think it it definitely depends on how 13:11 long i've been working with them and my relationship with them and how much you 13:16 know that's the amazing thing about running a small kind of boutique firm is i have a personal relationship with all 13:22 my clients and i'll give you an example of of of a client that i had that is 13:27 kind of startup up not like a brickandmortar type business more service-based working with software and 13:35 the impetus to bring up bitcoin for them was they had they had a business structure that was had a a time period 13:44 somewhat like insurance where they collect payments upfront and they have an obligation in the future to disperse 13:50 those payments and we started off kind of on the financial side of just putting 13:56 that in a high yield savings account trying to get some yield on it and kind of what i mentioned to them was hey like 14:04 would you be interested in potentially putting it into bitcoin in a strategic 14:10 way obviously understanding what funds you can use that are not going to put you 14:15 know clients funds at risk but having that to catch some yield on top of the 14:21 fee that you're already taking from your services and they were very much they 14:27 were interested they were you know intrigued but it's been a conversation 14:32 that i've been having for six months now and things have kind of changed in their business you know due to market changes 14:40 and just things happening so it's kind of like we put it to the side now just because of the uncertainty but that's an 14:47 example of when you when there's an opportunity to potentially build more wealth for the 14:55 owner i think that is one of the the the greatest ways to start off and finding a 15:00 a specific point on how you could use it rather than just saying "hey you know do you want to invest in bitcoin?" i think 15:07 positioning it in a way that is going to set the the client up long term and 15:13 and that's one thing i also mentioned at the outset with with this client in particular was like this is not a 15:19 short-term play that's why we have to be very strategic with it and they're very 15:24 much also this this client is very much in interested in like you know independence and just kind of that that 15:30 mindset they already had that so it was an easy conversation to have now if i were to do it with some of my more you 15:37 know maybe brickandmortar type established businesses the conversation would probably need to be more well 15:42 thought out rather than just like me bringing it up randomly you know off of the off the cuff but i think if you 15:50 target a specific need and you have a a use case example in the business it's a 15:56 lot easier to bring it up and then if they're interested that's when you could go into the the bitcoin conversation of 16:02 what is bitcoin what is it solving you know why wouldn't i just put it into a stock portfolio you know those kind of 16:08 questions and and kind of navigating those i love that that what i wrote down 16:13 here on my notes meeting them where they're at because when you're in a 16:19 relational situation and you have that one-on-one relationship you can meet each business owner where they're at i 16:26 think that's one of the really critical things is like all of us are on a different stage with our bitcoin journey 16:32 right uh and so many folks at at this 16:37 time don't don't really know that much about bitcoin and so how can you meet 16:43 them where they're at what would you say for obviously here on the medium of exchange 16:49 podcast we believe in the adoption of bitcoin not just as a store of value but 16:55 as a medium of exchange you're talking let's say to the average joe business and they're like yeah so bitcoin um you 17:03 know should i accept that in my business what what would you say to them i would say yes i mean i i would say yes because 17:12 to me that's just a whether they're going to use it let's say they they do accept it i think then going from okay 17:19 well what are you going to do with that bitcoin once you get it do you want to you know do you want to create some sort of storage policy you know having those 17:27 things and obviously it gets tricky because then once you collect it and then if you convert it like i think the 17:33 complexity is what stops a lot of people beyond the understanding you know once 17:38 you get the understanding you then have to understand the complexity of okay if i do accept it it's not considered you 17:45 know like the dollar right where you can just accept it and then you can use those funds without having to care about 17:53 any tax consequences etc so i think the complexity side i is where it gets 17:58 tricky but if if someone wanted to accept bitcoin i'd be like that's a great idea especially if you want to you 18:04 know use it as a store of value and then especially businesses that let's say 18:11 have crossber payments or all these other things like that's where i could see extreme value with those type of 18:16 clients that are you know having kind of a globalization business rather than more local but 100% accepting bitcoin i 18:26 would say yes so let's figure out the best way to do that you mentioned global 18:31 and uh so your firm is called Ikifi did i pronounce that correctly yeah Ikifi 18:38 Ikifi and there is uh this is based off of a Japanese philosophy icky 18:46 uh i think that is profound especially in this conversation around bitcoin so 18:52 just for our listeners can you give a little bit of a background into how you came up with the name what ickifi means 18:58 to you sorry what icky guy means to you uh and and how you kind of incorporate 19:03 that into the underlying values of your business and then from there we can see Philosophy, Fulfillment & bitcoin: The Heart of IFI 19:08 you know how bitcoin just totally uh totally makes sense and fits in with that overall culture yeah thank you for 19:16 that recognization i mean for me when i started my business from very day one i 19:24 i knew something needed to like something felt off in the financial world to me i couldn't pinpoint it i 19:30 felt like it was very transactional in nature very much of a you know push 19:35 someone down to get to the next level and we all know the the power money has 19:41 in our lives it's it's it's in every aspect whether you love money or you say 19:47 you don't love money i mean it's pretty much the same thing and for me i knew i i knew i wanted to infuse 19:55 some sort of values into my business from the very beginning i just didn't really know the path and about a year 20:02 and a half into my business i discovered the philosophy of eeky guy and for me 20:07 fulfillment is so important because i think happiness is a fleeting feeling 20:13 happiness is not some it's something that we feel in the moment whether it's eating something sweet or seeing someone 20:19 we love like we have that happiness feeling but it it it kind of goes away it's not our homeostasis and i think 20:25 fulfillment is that level that is actually more valuable because it's longlasting 20:31 and for me that just felt so aligned within the financial space because in so 20:37 many ways people are trying to do you know get-rich quick schemes and just trying to make as much money as possible 20:43 but not really understanding their why behind it why do they want money and we 20:48 all want it for some reason so that's kind of what developed the the Ikifi 20:53 concept was i wanted to intertwine that philosophy into my business and you know Japanese philosophy is very 21:01 much driven on this equilibrium between humans nature and just this kind of 21:06 holistic approach which i really appreciate and that's kind of the approach i wanted to take in my business 21:12 and kind of going back to what jason was talking about with the relationship and how it's it's so crucial when you're 21:19 small is having that relationship with your clients and when i can understand 21:24 what a client's why is and what their purpose is and why they started their business because yeah you could start 21:30 your business to make millions of dollars but why do you want to make millions of dollars like there there's something behind that and that was kind 21:38 of the the approach i wanted to take was understanding what the business is 21:43 trying to accomplish what's the lifestyle the entrepreneur wants and kind of intertwining that in the the 21:49 financial analysis i i do in the client's books etc and then kind of 21:54 bringing it full circle with your question with bitcoin is there's a there's something deeply philosophical 22:01 about bitcoin and i think that's why i became so interested in it because it's 22:06 not just something that was invented because they wanted to you know 22:12 revolutionize the financial system like maybe on some level that was a long-term vision but it was very much just driven 22:18 off the small piece of that peer-to-peer electronic you know cash right that the 22:24 thing that they were trying to do for so long and then it builds into something more it's not you know we're going to 22:30 change everything from day one it's we're going to build towards that and i think the purpose in that and that why 22:37 is exactly why i became interested in bitcoin because i understand the why is more important than the surface level 22:44 approach that's you know we're so often driven to take in life 22:51 that's great yeah know that that that is exactly kind of how i was how i was 22:56 thinking of it and i love that framing of you know yeah you can say something on the surface of i want to do this for 23:04 that reason and you know a equals b but there might be something that's 23:10 underlying that true motivation and if you can find that common ground then that's where you really you know make connections and you can become a sort of 23:17 trusted adviser uh and you understand that you're working towards the same uh 23:22 the same goal or strategy or whatever it may be so uh i i just definitely wanted to give a give a shout out there because 23:29 Japanese philosophy is something that i'm also very uh very passionate and interested about so once i once i put 23:34 that those two together i was like "okay this is i was like this is going to work i appreciate that thank you." Jordan on 23:42 your linkedin it says that you are empowering clients by giving money How bitcoin Changes Your Thinking About Money and Life 23:49 meeting what does giving money meeting mean to you 23:54 yeah so meaning is is subjective meaning is something 24:01 that we all put on everything that we have in our lives and i think that's 24:07 where it gets very nuanced is in the traditional space money is 24:14 just a is is seen almost as the goal right of like i want to make a million 24:19 dollars or i want to see this number in my bank account and the the meaning 24:25 behind it comes down to kind of a personal i would say journey personal growth phase of 24:32 understanding what it is money provides us and being able to bring that to life 24:38 for for clients and being able to bring in what they've told me and show them 24:44 how they're progressing towards their goals show them in tangible ways because i think a lot of times you know meaning 24:50 and these these words kind of get lost in abstract thoughts of oh meaning and 24:56 fulfillment and everything and to me money and finances is a very it's 25:02 objective in in terms of like the value and all the things there but it's very 25:08 subjective in how you how you perceive it and how you look at the the the 25:13 current circumstances you're in so for me you know giving money meaning is really 25:18 about understanding where where people are at and trying to tell them a story 25:24 that's aligned with with where they're going or where they want to go because as soon as someone feels a level of 25:31 confidence or empowerment that they're let's say they're paying down debt to to reach a goal of you know being debtree 25:38 because they want to be able to you know travel or whatever it is or have a family knowing those things allow me to 25:44 kind of bring in a more personal touch and i really think that is also why 25:51 bitcoin is so important because if money if the the financial institutions if we're saying that it's 25:58 objective then bitcoin is is the most objective source of value we have due to 26:03 its properties and if we can infuse that into what we have now the meaning becomes even more powerful 26:10 that's so good that's so good yeah 26:15 and it it just feels it feels right because as soon as you learn about bitcoin as soon as you learn about the 26:22 history of money or asking the question what is money you then start to to to on 26:28 some level you might feel a little discouraged because you're like i've been lied to my whole life you know you learn about in economics 101 that 26:35 inflation is just fundamental to you know economics and keynesian economics and all these things and then you start 26:42 to figure out oh wait there's this other school of economics austrian economics out there never even heard of it you 26:48 know and and and you just start to learn that there are other frames of thought that we are just not aware of and i 26:56 don't think it's a malicious act and for the most of the the world i think it's just unconscious that we live in this 27:03 but as soon as you start to see the trends and you say "well that makes way more logical sense than what we're we're 27:08 we're basing everything off of now you kind of can follow that that trail to and i'm telling you when i now that i've 27:16 discovered bitcoin and i understand it like i feel so much more empowered or like optimistic for the future." and 27:24 that's something that i feel like if i didn't have that i feel like i would have been questioning why do i feel this 27:30 way why do i feel like there's something under the surface that i can't put my finger on and i and bitcoin allowed me 27:36 to put my finger on it yeah and i mean i think that's what's so 27:41 interesting about meeting bitcoiners and going to different bitcoin type events and having conversations with you know 27:47 the continued growth of more bitcoiners that uh get introduced to to the 27:53 protocol every day is because to your point everybody has a different why everybody's you know going through life 27:59 trying to find or figure out different things but what's great about bitcoin 28:04 from my experience is when you start to talk to somebody they might have 28:09 approached the rabbit hole from a entirely different uh realm of the 28:15 universe but then you start to adopt like these similar uh ideas and 28:21 philosophies and then you also can almost reframe it all and apply it to 28:27 things that you that you already know because to your point a lot of it is unconscious so when you're learning 28:33 about you know just microeconomics 101 and and all of these uh regular uh 28:39 curriculums that are taught in schools you're like "oh there was there there was another door there was there could 28:45 have been a fork in the road." um but i digress and i think that's you know 28:51 finding that's something that is is empowering because it shows you that 28:56 there might there might not be uh other other areas or things that we're 29:02 familiar with about money but then also what else is there what else is out there and it just continues that um that 29:09 journey and you get deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole to the point where like you know myself i see things 29:14 through a lens of bitcoin i like you know some people see things in a different light i tend to see things in 29:20 an orange light and it helps it helps just it helps apply some logic to things 29:26 that seem really uh out of place in in some instances 29:34 yeah could could not agree more and once once you have that shift it's very hard 29:40 to go back and and and see the world in a different way uh it it does remind me 29:45 of my my own journey in personal development is before personal development or understanding mindset 29:53 or different sorts of how we speak to ourselves the word we use we're not 29:59 taught how to think you know we're taught what to think in school we're not taught how can i app how can i reframe 30:06 this how can i reframe my failure all these other things as soon as you change your mindset or or start reading about 30:12 personal development your whole worldview changes and your your your standard of life and the way that you 30:20 almost see yourself changes and and that's how i kind of relate it to bitcoin is once you understand bitcoin 30:27 you you can't look at you can't look at people talking about inflation the same you can't look at uh the world economy 30:34 the same because now you see it through this bitcoin lens and you're just like "oh my gosh like i wish everyone could 30:40 see this you know i wish everyone had this mindset or like you know wish everyone was this positive." but that's 30:46 not the world we live in you know everyone comes from different places and you know you can be you can go on your 30:51 whole life and eventually someone has a terrible accent that leads them to changing their mindset and i think it's 30:58 the same with bitcoin is sometimes it takes those events that make them say holy holy crap like what needs to change 31:04 or like what needs to change in me to kind of see the world differently Jordan i uh i love that so 31:12 much and i so deeply relate 31:18 to not being able to see the world the same way and when you begin to peer down the rabbit hole and you learn about 31:25 economics and you learn about all these different factors 31:30 um all the the many so many things that you begin to learn about through the 31:37 lens of bitcoin i met a business owner yesterday and this is like again goes 31:42 back to how early we are and i won't share the the the full name of the business uh but the first word in the 31:49 business name was fiat and i asked them it's spelled f i a t and i asked them 31:55 about where they got the name and uh she mentioned it's from the bible and it 32:01 means let it be but people always bring up the car company it has nothing to do with the car company and and she had 32:07 some frustration about that uh that mixup of the branding of always the car 32:13 company and um and so i said oh it that's you know it's interesting in my 32:18 industry we talk a lot about fiat uh but it's in the context of money and she was like what does fiat have to do with 32:25 money and uh and and there was no connection there but her entire brand is 32:31 built around fiat and uh and so it's just fascinating how much you begin to 32:37 learn you know so many of us maybe don't even know what fiat money is at all uh 32:43 before we begin this journey and then you begin to learn how impactful 32:48 uh bitcoin rather than fiat can be for yourself as an individual and then for 32:55 your business and for your employees and your customers and all the many ways 33:00 that it can help shape uh your sphere of influence 33:06 you jason just to uh jump in there because that's amazing that's an incredible 33:11 story and it made me think of um not to get too philosophical but there's a 33:16 commencement speech from david foster wallace titled this is water and the 33:22 opening story or parable of the speech is basically two fish who had just 33:27 graduated are swimming downstream they pass an older fish the older fish says 33:33 "hey fellas how's the water?" the fish say nothing continue streaming down so a 33:40 few seconds later look at look at each other and go "what the hell is water?" and that is just such a that is 33:47 just such a like oh my god moment of wait like you can ask does it really 33:54 have to be this way do we have to you know live on so much debt and print 34:00 money in order to stimulate the economy and have very small groups of power that 34:08 are manipulating you know interest rates and and all this financial hoopla and 34:14 it's like wait like you can ask that question and then to what you were saying Jordan like you can start to think about it differently and you can 34:20 kind of take take back that agency of what you're thinking about and how you're thinking about it uh and 34:26 bitcoin's really just a i mean again at the end of the day it's just a protocol so it's a blank set of rules where it's 34:33 there use it or don't but it's going to keep going so you might as well just 34:38 like at least figure out whether or not you want to use it before before you just dismiss it uh but yeah most people How bitcoin Empowers Business Owners to Regain Control 34:46 most people just are that don't even know that don't even know that it's an option 34:52 no and and i i've heard that commencement speech and it was a a while back and it it really plays into this 35:00 this idea of you just don't know what you don't know and i think the people 35:05 that tend to like lean towards bitcoin are the people that are just curious and 35:11 open-minded to question the the the system and you see it in in in the 35:18 traditional space and just in general very very like well like very smart people 35:25 that just dismiss it because there's almost a a sense of once once you have a 35:31 once you have a an idea of how the world works you just settle in that and i think that's why you see a lot of 35:38 younger people interested in bitcoin or just that generation you know my generation and i think that is honestly 35:46 going to be the key long term is it's hard to like you know it's unfortunate but it is hard you know the the the the 35:53 quote it's hard to train or what is it it's hard to teach an old dog new tricks and on some level it it's just it's 35:59 unfortunately true and i think that is why the younger generation the generation that's coming up that are 36:06 building companies they they it's like intuitively understood with them that 36:12 that there's something wrong or that something needs to change and i i think 36:17 that is also what gives me a little bit of optimism on top of the bitcoin optimism is kind of like what that next 36:25 stage is yeah and i would love for you to kind of 36:32 uh dive a little deeper into your thoughts on incentives and maybe we could bring it back to to some of those 36:38 conversations you've had uh with both current and prospective clients of how 36:44 you view the incentive structure around bitcoin adoption um obviously there's 36:50 early and first mover advantage but what are some of the other incentives that uh you can kind of point out especially in 36:57 contrast to the traditional fiat uh system and and the work uh of of the bookkeeping business that you're um that 37:04 you're involved in yeah so i would say one of the major incentives that really 37:11 sits well with me and resonates is the the idea of independence and actually 37:17 being independent from the system itself and a lot of business owners don't 37:23 realize that the decisions that are made thousands of miles away in you know in 37:30 the presidency and you know the government etc how much it influences them and how much they feel they don't 37:37 have control over that and and i do believe that you have to focus on your sphere of control your sphere of 37:44 influence we can't control what other people are going to do but i think bitcoin is one of the biggest decisions 37:50 we can make as individuals but as businesses to take control and i think 37:56 that is is one of the key elements that i feel is a value proposition for 38:02 businesses and on some level it's it's somewhat abstract of there's no monetary 38:09 real you know it's not really selling it off of a monetary perspective of hey bitcoin is you know you know gone up 38:17 this much but it's really about when you have a c when you control your money when you understand that you feel a 38:24 sense of freedom and for so many business owners and i would say for most of them it that is why they started 38:30 their business was to become free you know free from the time constraint free from other people telling them what to 38:35 do but they're just not aware of 38:41 that they they are not as free as they they probably think they are and so that 38:46 would kind of be that that maybe setup i would say of like when i talk to business owners or when i talk to them 38:53 in the future and then the second part i would say is very much driven off of and 38:59 i'm sure jason has you know a lot of experience and can say a lot about this but how transactions flow through the 39:06 system you know when it comes to processing companies that are just ripping businesses off with no value ad 39:15 that's just one piece of the puzzle and then sending you know payments to other people or even the the ability for um 39:23 for example payroll being every two weeks like i think there's so much opportunity there and this is kind of 39:29 looking maybe too far into the future but when you have a monetary system that's not driven off of the governments 39:36 and it's not driven off of the ac network or swift or all these other things that it's going all the time we 39:43 then have a path to like real time financial financial opportunities at any point and 39:50 like i said maybe i'm projecting too far in the future but like those are the value propositions that i see in the future of companies being able to take 39:57 advantage of it and they don't need to worry about the bank being closed on the weekend like they can do business whenever they want like that's freedom 40:05 so i would say those are kind of those big elements that i see value proposition wise 40:11 medium of exchange is sponsored by polaris payments let's face it for now 40:17 businesses still need to accept fiat and credit cards polaris payments helps with all your credit card processing needs 40:23 using a consultative approach think of polaris like a performance coach helping take your business to the next level 40:30 when it comes to accepting all forms of money for more information visit 40:36 polarispayments.com now let's get back to the show Jordan what's the most surprising 40:41 thing that you've learned about money or finance um since starting Ikifi and 40:47 supporting small and medium-sized businesses and has bitcoin played a role in that realization man the most 40:54 surprising thing and this is just coming off the top of my mind is how many businesses are zombie companies and what Why Small Businesses Struggle — and How bitcoin Helps 41:02 i mean by that are businesses that are not producing any profit that are not 41:08 producing positive cash flow but are surviving because of because of credit 41:13 because of debt and i've realized this firsthand because and i see this and 41:19 it's sad because so many business owners they they want so bad to to be in a 41:27 place where they can pay themselves consistently where they don't have to worry about payroll and all these other 41:33 things and then i realized that they've dug themselves in a hole that's so hard to get out of and they have to keep 41:40 digging it deeper just to stay alive and i think the easy credit and the the way 41:48 that the the lending industry is in terms of issuing debt the biggest realization was just oh my gosh like 41:54 unfortunately there's a lot of businesses that maybe are operating inefficiently because they're operating 42:02 off of a off of debt rather than focusing on how to improve their actual operations because debt is so easy to 42:09 come by it's so easy to you know swipe a credit card you know and feel the 42:15 effects later rather than thinking how can i position myself to be in a better place 3 months from now than just be in 42:22 a better position right now so that that was my biggest realization and surprise 42:28 and i'm talking small business too because it is just it's engraved in them and so many 42:35 business owners they're no matter what industry and this is not industry specific it's very much of there's so 42:41 many business owners that have so much to focus on that they can't even focus 42:47 on the the financial health of their company operationally and they just have to be so reactive in terms of i need to 42:53 take out another loan i need to do this or i need to get another credit card i need to approve i need to transfer my balance and the debt is so consuming 43:01 that it it almost influences how they think about running their business that 43:06 they don't think about it from a how can i improve my business to make clients 43:12 happier or customers happier or to get more business it's so much more driven on oh reaction i'm you know cash flow is 43:19 low this month let me take out uh you know a loan or cash advance and it's just very much reactive 43:27 so easy credit leads to short-term thinking leads to ultimate failure yes 43:32 yes sir that is correct that is so true and it's sad 43:38 because so many business owners are passionate about what they do but their passion and their drive gets drowned out 43:46 by the debt and it it's just a function of the system we're in and i i i think 43:52 it it's uh it's scary and it's unfortunate and i feel for them because 43:58 i see it everything from a financial lens and and that's also my problem because i go down these these you know 44:05 kind of i worry about my own finances my business but then i have to worry about everybody else's and that's you know stresses me out but it's it's also a 44:12 good thing because i i enjoy it but that is one of the biggest things and the surprises that bitcoin has shown me is 44:17 that bitcoin there is no it's either it's either you understand it and you 44:24 understand the value proposition or you almost you almost don't because on some level easy credit is addicting and i 44:31 think that is also some some hurdle to that's going to that may lead to pain 44:37 because it's almost like you need to understand that if you want a hard money system if you want something that's going to 44:44 be valuable in the long term you have to be able to have a you have to be able to 44:50 push out your your time horizon and that can be tricky especially when you're focusing on the day-to-day 44:56 yeah and that's one of the things that you know bitcoiners are well known for their low time preference uh but that is 45:04 on the exact opposite end of the spectrum for not just finance we also see it in our health care system we see 45:10 it in you know the our news cycle uh and so many other things um and i think it 45:18 is really hard to to get people to really focus you know more than even 30 45:23 days if that's being generous down the road uh for when their next payment is due uh because oftentimes people aren't 45:29 even thinking three days down the road um but in bitcoin we usually think three 45:35 years minimum down the road uh and and that is a mindset shift but it's also 45:43 another way to kind of tell the story of bitcoin and understand how little 45:50 decisions today compound into really large and uh potentially great outcomes 45:57 in the future um and you know maybe this is a more personal question for you but 46:02 what are some of those things that you do where you're you know uh you're taking on small steps whether it's uh 46:08 whatever it may be um where you see the growth uh for your business for yourself 46:14 uh and and how how just that helps you improve uh the this journey you're on 46:21 yeah i mean if anything bitcoin is just compounded or been like a rocket ship 46:28 for my own understanding of little actions today are what set you up for 46:33 the future and i think the best example i could give you is the early stages 46:39 about three years before i started my business was kind of went on when i went on that personal journey of personal 46:44 development getting into finance everything that i did led up to starting 46:49 my business and i think sometimes we we almost discount the the the beginning 46:56 stages and it's very hard to almost start again when it's like to get to the 47:01 next phase in life you have to reiterate you have to be learning and you you have 47:06 to be always questioning and i think for myself sometimes i i i i'm so focused on 47:13 keeping up with what i've created that i'm not thinking about what do i want to get to in the future and what do i have 47:18 to do today to get there because if i'm not growing if i'm not studying or 47:24 learning to get to that next phase i'm going to be three years down the line and say "damn i wish i started that 47:30 three years ago because i would be where i'm at where you know far far you know 47:35 further than i was then." so for me i think it's just compounding in any sense 47:41 whether it's you know studying to get to the next level in my business um 47:47 connecting with new people like always expanding my network not being close-minded to say "oh i already know 47:52 everybody i need to know i you know i i don't want to say yes to this connection." so it's those little things 47:58 of just being aware of my trajectory where i want to go and making sure those 48:03 action items are being taken care of every day to get to where i want to be 48:08 so and that can be even you know obviously compounding is used mostly on the monetary side but it's so prevalent 48:16 um in every aspect of our life so that's what i really focus on is just those little things those those little things 48:22 that move the needle i do kind of get sometimes stuck in the the big picture but i have to like kind of pull myself 48:27 back no 100% i think i think we all do to an extent so yeah i appreciate i appreciate 48:34 you sharing that's that's that's awesome yeah yeah of course so Jordan for our listeners maybe a solopreneur a small 48:42 business someone listening in a business owner that's listening in what's one actionable tip or resource that you 48:50 would recommend to explore uh for when it comes to bitcoin and their business 48:57 yeah i would say my starting point always is youtube i i i just love like 49:04 learning on youtube and like finding videos that and you have to find reputable people obviously you know 49:09 there's a lot of noise out there but i would say just researching like what is 49:16 bitcoin like just if if you're just brand new like looking it up on youtube and finding a video that has a good 49:22 amount of views that also has a a a a good background on everything to kind of 49:30 get started and then i would also say one of the best things to do is also 49:35 just reading so whether it's the the bitcoin standard you know that's pretty uh normal or reading the white paper of 49:42 bitcoin even though it can be kind of technical i think reading a source document like that gives gives the 49:49 individual more of a empowering feeling of i don't you know most people that 49:54 probably talk about bitcoin online or all these other things probably haven't even read the white paper so i think if 50:00 you read the white paper and you know finding that online and just getting that source document i think that'll be 50:05 helpful to understand what the the vision behind bitcoin was and then going into more i would say recent topics 50:13 around bitcoin and once you kind of go down a little rabbit hole of someone you're just going to find what every 50:19 other bitcoiner ends up at uh you know the people that you listen to so i i 50:24 would say that is just kind of start out with curiosity start with youtube you know start with the white paper and 50:30 it'll take you from there that that's my thought i love that i was just thinking about how i think they removed this 50:37 apple did but at one point if you put in the right command in a macbook the 50:44 bitcoin white paper would pop up someone had hidden it inside operating system i 50:49 i did it i tried it and the bitcoin white paper just pulled right up on my computer it's amazing that's pretty cool 50:56 like a little easter egg there exactly yeah yeah yeah was kind of off the off 51:03 the i guess record here was was that like a good resource i mean i i at first i was like "oh is that a good idea?" 51:08 because there's so many scammy people on youtube talking about bitcoin or xrp and all these other things okay you youtube 51:15 is great i think i think that the bitcoin buy paper could probably be pretty overwhelming for for a lot of 51:20 everyday business owners just because they're they're trying to run their business they're not always techsavvy 51:26 people necessarily um but i love you know you learn so much about going back 51:32 to first principles with bitcoin like that's one of the beautiful things about 51:38 about bitcoin is like you you begin to look at economics and money and things 51:43 through the first principles and so if you can go back to the source and at 51:49 least start to to begin to to try and understand it from there um and then of 51:56 course reading books and and youtube videos and those can all be really tremendous resources as well yeah 52:04 definitely i mean that's how i got started was just youtube videos i mean that's how i got started with pretty 52:10 much everything now is just as soon as i'm interested i'll watch a youtube video i'm like "oh okay now i need to 52:15 read a book about it." you know get to that next level 100% 100% 52:22 Jordan is there anything you want to ask us why are you both so passionate about bitcoin like why why are you doing this 52:29 podcast why do you think it's important one of the big aha moments for me i was 52:34 at a conference and so many of these things that were 52:40 being said on stage were so grand and had such deep impact the implications 52:48 were extreme and i realized that i in my case i've got three 52:57 children and those three kids may go on to each have one two three kids of their 53:05 own and if what these folks are saying are true on stage i owe it to my 53:12 children to my grandchildren and beyond to learn educate myself and then do 53:20 something i i did not believe that hodddling was enough that that buying and holding bitcoin as amazing as that 53:27 is to extract your dollars out of the fiat system and vote with your money and 53:33 say "no enough is enough i'm going to now live on a bitcoin standard." and as 53:40 important and and impactful as that is uh for me i believed that i needed to 53:46 step up and do something and for me i've got 15 years in fiat payments and so 53:52 beginning to bridge the gap of small mediumsiz business world with bitcoiners 53:58 and really move the needle and and we've got a $2 trillion asset but no one accepts bitcoin how do we solve that 54:04 problem how do we get the conversation going so that everyday bitcoiners are 54:09 accepting bitcoin in their businesses uh and are paying with bitcoin and the the 54:16 small and medium-sized business community that's my world i i've i've been supporting those guys for the last 54:23 15 years and so how do we how do we connect those two and and see thousands 54:29 of merchants uh throughout the world begin accepting bitcoin in their business so that we can ultimately 54:36 realize satoshi's vision i love that yeah and then for me so i initially got 54:42 kind of into bitcoin through just the permissionless aspect of it i mean i've i think i might have told this story uh 54:48 to you jason before but um when i was very young i tried to like create a bank 54:55 account in my local credit union and they rejected me they just wouldn't let me open a standard checking account very 55:01 strange so then when i found out about bitcoin however many years later uh i was like "oh this is like direct to 55:08 consumer money like that's kind of cool." uh so that was like my initial um 55:15 just justification of what bitcoin was and not growing up in the payment system 55:21 or working in the payment system like jason has i initially got introduced to bitcoin through that savings uh 55:27 technology and thought it was really dope to save an asset that actually increased in value versus saving in cash 55:34 that is getting getting inflated to zero so that was kind of my initial first 55:41 however many let's say five years of my bitcoin journey then i started to kind of really you know get introduced to a 55:48 lot of the people in bitcoin a lot of the businesses that were building on bitcoin and this idea of positive sum 55:55 games has always been just what i enjoy i i've loved working uh and 56:01 collaborating with people to where it's mutually mutually beneficial for us right um so i've started to apply that 56:10 towards this idea of circular economies and really using bitcoin as a way to 56:16 make like transactions and projects and ideas flow better in a system because 56:23 the best thing about a circular economy is that it is built on trust and when you have a money that can supplement 56:30 that that is not ba that is based on you know just a a verifiable code then it it that just equals growth 56:40 to me um so i am i've kind of gone through that entire adoption curve 56:45 myself where i was like no i will never spend my bitcoin my bitcoin is for my grandchildren like like that is i expect 56:52 to die never having sold a satoshi and that will be that will be passed on to 56:58 my you know my future uh generations but now i'm at the point where i'm like well no actually if there's a business or a 57:04 trade that i want to make where i can transfer my bitcoin and it's mutually beneficial to us then yeah sign me up 57:10 that makes it easier that's exactly what i'm looking for i want it to be as you know uh as personable as possible where 57:16 you have that connection you have that relationship with whoever you're you're making this deal with uh and i think 57:21 that's the that's kind of that like next step um which we're starting to see across the world uh you know in places 57:28 like costa rica in places like el salvador uh and in places like austin texas and nashville tennessee it's just 57:35 it's becoming more and more part of the conversation and again we're really 57:40 early we're at the tip of the spear so sooner sooner or later it's it's going to be like we look up and it's like whoa 57:47 maybe we are living in a hyper bitcoin bitcoinized world uh maybe everything is getting settled in bitcoin uh but as of 57:54 right now it's just it's it's really that grassroots movement of making those 57:59 connections growing that network um and helping people you know meet them where they're at rather but like you were 58:04 saying building that bridge meeting them where they're at and i think that's the uh that's kind of how i progress forward in in in my mission um in and having it 58:13 be a win for everyone involved because it doesn't need to be zero sum and oftentimes in fiat it feels zero sum and 58:21 it feels like you know dog eat dog type of world and that's just not my personality um you know i'm competitive 58:27 about some things but i'm not going to i'm not going to cheat steal or lie in order to do it uh and bitcoin was just a 58:34 a very fair level playing field that everybody has the opportunity to opt into um and i think that's what's that's 58:41 what's beautiful about it well said jack yeah and just to kind of tie both of those thoughts together kind of with 58:47 everything in in my mind is it almost both what you said it it bitcoin and 58:53 maybe this is cliche but it almost makes you a better person in a way it evokes something in you to look for 59:01 opportunity that is not just potentially beneficial for you and i think that is what the fiat system trains us to think 59:07 is very much driven off of yes self-interest is is is a component of 59:13 human life but it is not complete self-interest there's levels to it there's a nuance level to it and i feel 59:20 like bitcoin evokes more of a a community-minded approach and allows you 59:25 to actually be incentivized to be a good person rather than just looking out for 59:31 yourself and kind of moving with the flow of how the the rest of the the fiat 59:36 world does so i think it speaks to that the power it's it's so true i i i think 59:43 Jordan it's like it's almost like fiat says what can i extract out of the system and bitcoin says what can i do 59:50 for others and it's all time preference yeah it's all time preference it's bitcoin is low time preference fiat is 59:57 high time high time preference Jordan you mentioned the bitcoin standard nobody explains time preference better 1:00:03 than than safe uh and it's it's really that just perspective shift um that i 1:00:12 think is is so important because you can't just if you're trying to if you're 1:00:17 trying to live your life just in three-day periods versus threeear periods i don't know why three is the 1:00:23 number that i that i keep coming up with but four there you go it's every four years let's do four yeah let's say four 1:00:30 uh let's say four four days four four weeks four years um it just you you can 1:00:37 bring along people with you and you can help build something that is on a solid foundation versus uh versus what a lot 1:00:44 of the stuff we see breaking today well and it and it's crazy just to kind of round out this thought is when i was 1:00:50 kind of starting my business i was very interested in capitalism and i like being an entrepreneur like you just kind 1:00:56 of you gravitate towards okay yeah capitalism is good etc and for a second i'm like so why is there so much what 1:01:03 what's going on something still feels wrong you know and i got interested in like you know conscious capitalism and 1:01:08 understanding those components and i realized fundamentally what they talk about in the in you know in general is 1:01:15 longterm long you know time preference and like with companies and not only caring about the bottom line and then 1:01:21 when i learned about bitcoin i'm like wait a minute this is not like a problem necessarily with the this this this 1:01:26 capitalistic idea it's what is the fundamental idea of capitalism the capital what's flowing through the 1:01:33 system and how is it how is it infusing into all of our lives and how is it 1:01:39 dictating how we how we make decisions and and i'm like "oh my gosh like that's actually this is not the problem the 1:01:44 problem is fundamentally the money." and and it kind of all just clicked for me and now i'm like "okay this is the 1:01:50 problem we need to solve we don't need to change people we need to change the way that people are operating in the 1:01:56 system." 100% incentives matter i love the br the fact that you brought up conscious capitalism because uh i think 1:02:03 for me that's another reason why i'm in bitcoin the more i explored how to be 1:02:09 conscious through capitalism the more i realized bitcoin is the answer it is the 1:02:15 most conscious it's one of the best ways that i found to be thoughtful about money 1:02:22 uh investing um others incentives you put all that together and you think about 1:02:29 especially thinking about you know fiat thinks geographically this is my country 1:02:35 right bitcoin says no no no we're all citizens of this world we're regardless of what country we live in where we are 1:02:42 geographically our skin color our socioeconomic status it's a level playing field and we're going to bring 1:02:49 empowerment to the people instead of a top down approach it's a bottom up and 1:02:54 like that's conscious capitalism right there yeah it's so true and and i think 1:03:00 that's why i'm so optimistic about the future is because it's not an abstract future it's not i wish the future was 1:03:07 going to be like this there's like a clear path that incentives are aligned 1:03:12 within the actual system itself rather than oh i have to i have to influence 1:03:19 other people to be conscious know like if the system is if that is a part of the ecosystem what is going to sprout 1:03:26 from that like that's how i think about it and i think that is the beauty of bitcoin is it's an ecosystem that allows 1:03:32 for everything you mentioned and it and it doesn't need to be a forced kind of 1:03:39 system of you have to be a conscious capitalist you have to think this way it's the incentive that's driven inside 1:03:45 the system itself if you're not going to be that way that's fine like you can be a top- down thinker 1:03:51 but you might not you might not succeed very well in this new ecosystem because 1:03:56 that's not what the incentives are driving which is really what makes me optimistic for the future Jordan thank 1:04:02 you so much for joining us here today on the medium of exchange podcast this was really a fun conversation yeah thank you 1:04:09 so much i i really appreciate it you you and jack have uh a lot of uh insightful 1:04:14 questions and just grateful that you guys allowed me to come on here and you know it was a great conversation so 1:04:20 thank you both awesome no absolutely thank you