The Magic Notebook (and why your money isn't yours)

Why the money in your banking app isn't actually yours.

Last time, I left you with a bit of a cliffhanger. I told you I’d moved from being a skeptic to realising Bitcoin might be the most important asset of our lifetime.

But I promised to answer the question that stumped me for years: If it’s not just “digital gold” for speculation, what actually is it?

To understand the answer, I had to realise something uncomfortable about the money I already had.

The IOU Illusion

Open your banking app right now. Look at the balance.

You think you’re looking at your money. But you’re not. You’re looking at an IOU.

That number is just an entry in a database controlled by a bank. You are trusting them to let you spend it. You are trusting them not to freeze it. You are trusting the government not to print so much of it that your savings buy half as many eggs as they did three years ago.

The entire financial system is like a casino where the dealer holds your chips, controls the rules, and can print more chips whenever they start losing.

The problem isn’t money; the problem is trust. Every time we use digital money, we have to trust a middleman.

And that’s what Bitcoin actually solved. It figured out how to create digital money that doesn’t require a middleman.

The Magic Notebook

When I finally understood how Bitcoin did this, I stopped what I was doing and just stared at the screen.

Forget the technical jargon for a second. Imagine a magic notebook at a school .

• The Public Record: This notebook makes a copy of itself for every single student in the class. Everyone has the exact same record.

• The Verification: If someone wants to write “Kyfer gave Craig $20” in the notebook, everyone in the class has to check their copy and agree that I actually have $20 to give.

• The Permanence: Once it’s written, it’s written in pen. No teacher (or bank manager) can rip the page out or change the numbers.

This is essentially the Blockchain. It’s a public record maintained by thousands of computers (nodes) around the world, who reach consensus on updates roughly every 10 minutes.

Because everyone has the record, you don’t need a bank to verify the transaction. The network does it.

The “Immaculate” Feature

But here is the part that really creates the “Opt Out” moment.

Every other crypto project or company has a CEO, a founder, or an office. People who can be pressured, regulated, or corrupted .

Bitcoin’s creator, “Satoshi Nakamoto”, did something unheard of. They released the code - the recipe for this digital fire and then vanished .

There is no one to arrest. There is no one to manipulate. There is no server to unplug. It belongs to everyone and no one.

Why this matters to us

When you hold Bitcoin in your own wallet (not on an exchange), you possess a Private Key.

This key isn’t a password to an account; it is the asset itself . It’s a “bearer asset,” just like cash in your pocket or gold in your hand. If you have the key, you have the money. No bank can freeze it. No government can seize it.

For the first time in human history, we have a way to send value to anyone, anywhere, instantly, without asking permission from a bank or a government .

It is the financial equivalent of taking your power back.

The Scarcity Factor

Oh, and one last thing.

There are 56 million millionaires in the world. There will only ever be 21 million Bitcoin. You do the math.

I know this is a lot to take in. It took me five years to wrap my head around it. But once you see the difference between “money by permission” and “money by ownership,” you can’t unsee it.

Coming up next:

If this is such a “no-brainer,” why isn’t everyone doing it? And is it too late to start now that the price is high?

Next week, I’m going to ask you a riddle about a stadium. The answer completely rewired my brain and it might just prove that we are still incredibly early.

In the meantime, if you have any questions about Bitcoin, leave me a comment - I’d be happy to answer them.

I appreciate your time.