Let's Get Comfortable...
...Being Uncomfortable
That’s my new bike.
It’s the greatest bike in the whole goddamn world.
When it ride it, I feel like Batman cruising around NYC in the Batmobile.
And sometimes I ride it indoors, too. (I feel less like Batman when I do that.)
When I ride indoors, I have to take off the back wheel so that I can hook the bike up to my Wahoo Kickr, a device that transforms my Batmobile into a stationary bike.
As I was dismounting my bike post-indoor workout last week, I accidentally knocked over the back wheel, which was propped up against a nearby wall.
As the wheel fell over and hit the ground, the cassette fell off.
(That’s the cassette.)
And not only did it fall off, but it fell apart into a bunch of pieces, including springs and metal thingy mabobs.
I was like “MOTHER EFFING EFFY EFF EFF. WHOSE GONNA FIX THIS NOW?!?!? I DON’T FIX BIKE STUFF!!! AND I DON’T WANT TO BRING THIS TO SOMEONE WHO DOES FIX IT BECAUSE IT’S PROBABLY AN EASY FIX AND I’LL LOOK STUPID!”
It was an extremely mature reaction, as was what I did next — ignoring it for a week.
The wheel sat there broken for a few days in my office/training room. Each time I sat down in the room to work or ride the bike, the wheel would look at me and be like “Oh, what’s up, Frank? You probably think I’m just going to go away or fix myself, right? Guess what, though??? I’M NOT. INSTEAD, I’M GOING TO HAUNT YOUR DREAMS AND EVERY WAKING MOMENT OF YOUR LIFE UNTIL YOU FIX ME!!!”
I was like “Man, broken wheel…WHAT DID I EVER DO TO YOU?!?!?!”
And the wheel was like “You broke me, fool… NOW FIX ME!”
By Friday, I’d had enough of arguing with the wheel. Plus, I was starting to get the feeling that my landlord might evict me if his son, who lives downstairs, heard any more of my arguing with this inanimate object.
I finally called the company from which I bought the bike, and the guy on the other end of the phone was like, “Oh yeah, this isn’t a big deal at all! So many people call with the same issue. Let me help you!”
He then sent me a YouTube video that showed me how to fix the issue and stayed on the phone with me as I fixed it.
It took me all of about 7 minutes to fix. And I felt like Hulk Hogan once it was done.
So, why am I telling you all this?
Well, I share it because I get the feeling that even though I’ve warned you about keeping your Bitcoin/crypto on exchanges, some of you are probably still doing so.
Now, please know that you can keep your assets wherever you’d like. I’m not here to tell you what to do with your investments, nor am I hear to tell you what investments to make, as I’m not a financial advisor, and nothing in this newsletter is financial advice.
But if you are feeling urge to get the assets off of an exchange an into a non-custodial wallet and haven’t done so yet because you’re thinking to yourself “I can’t do that. I’m not tech savvy. I don’t get how this Bitcoin/crypto stuff works,” I’m simply here to say that you might want to consider getting comfortable being uncomfortable — that is, learning how it works.
Again, I repeat, I’m not telling you to do this. I’m just saying that there is some risk involved with leaving digital assets in the custody of an exchange and that you might not want to let that voice inside your head that’s telling you that you aren’t capable of using a hardware wallet like a Ledger Nano S Plus win if you do feel uncomfortable leaving your assets in the custody of an exchange — just like I was uncomfortable leaving my bike wheel unfixed because I didn’t think I was the type of person who could fix it. (That was a long sentence.)
There are about a quadrillion YouTube videos and web pages that help you to set up and use non-custodial wallets/hardware wallets. Setting one up takes all of about 20-30 minutes — only slightly longer than it took me to fix the wheel on my bike.
We’re moving deeper into some very strange times, financially-speaking. During such times, it’s important to consider what we can control and what we can’t.
You can control whether you own an IOU for bitcoin (BTC) (BTC on an exchange) or actual BTC (BTC in a non-custodial wallet). But know that it’s on you to get it from the exchange to the non-custodial wallet.
One more time, I share this info not to tell you what to do, but simply to give you a nudge and to remind you that you are more capable than you think — whether that relates to self-custodying digital assets, or just about anything else in life.
Enjoy the rest of the weekend and take it ease :)
Best,
Frank
Twitter: @frankcorva
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