it's too risky

twenty years ago, i sat in a room on the 40th floor of a toronto high-rise.

twenty young people. one entrepreneur.
his goal: convince one of us to take the leap.

he asked, “why not entrepreneurship?”

same answer every time.
too risky.

then he asked the question that changed everything:

what is risk a function of?

silence.

“information and control.”

two people. an anvil falling from the sky.
one tied to a chair. one free to move.

who’s at more risk?
the one without control.

same setup. both can move.
but only one knows the anvil is coming.

who’s at more risk?
the one without information.

then the gut punch.

john’s been at his company thirty years.
monday morning, new mba boss. “john, you’re fired.”

how much control did john have?
none.

how much information?
zero. he was barbecuing on sunday.

now the ceo.
can she pivot? renegotiate? adapt? yes.
does she see trouble coming months ahead? also yes.

the entrepreneur isn’t the risky one.

the employee is.

because that's how it's done

that’s the answer you get when you ask why.

why do we do it this way? why does it cost so much? why can’t we change it?
“because that’s how it’s done.”

which usually means: nobody’s questioned it in years.

first principles is simple.
keep asking “why” until you hit bedrock—physics, math, or human nature.

most people reason by analogy. it’s faster, safer, familiar.
but analogy traps you inside someone else’s assumptions.

when Elon Musk wanted cheaper rockets, the industry said “impossible.”
so he asked what rockets are made of, priced the raw materials, and found the gap was mostly tradition.

first principles won’t guarantee you’re right.
it guarantees you’re thinking.

pick something expensive, slow, or broken.
ask why five times. remove the assumptions. rebuild from truth.

you won’t always get a breakthrough.
but you’ll stop accepting “because” as an answer.

the world is full of solutions waiting to be questioned.

when the whales buy — and the ledger barely blinks

a fund quietly adds bitcoin to its balance sheet.
no press release. no headline. just a footnote.

you scroll past it. but something shifts.

not price. not hype. the baseline.

when patient, institutional capital enters bitcoin, it doesn’t roar.
it roots.

supply locks. scarcity deepens. security strengthens.
the network hardens.

this isn’t about the next pump.
it’s about permanence.

some buy for speed. others buy for inevitability.
money that can’t be frozen, censored, or diluted.

that conviction doesn’t shout.
it whispers.

watch charts and you’ll feel noise.
watch fundamentals and you’ll feel gravity.

when big money buys and nothing moves,
that’s not a trade signal.

it’s a hold signal.

gravity doesn’t need attention.
it just works.

the last one standing

twelve years ago, nobody wanted what we were building.

bitcoin in india sounded insane.
banks said no. regulators didn’t understand. people assumed scam.

we built Unocoin anyway.

december 2013. india’s first bitcoin exchange.
four founders. one belief: financial access shouldn’t need permission.

many others followed. louder. better funded. faster.
almost all of them are gone.

global giants exited. local players shut down.
we’re still here.

not luck. durability.

we fought the reserve bank all the way to the supreme court—and won.
not just for us. for every indian who wanted financial sovereignty.

we built compliance early. chose security over speed. trust over hype.
Tim Draper saw it and backed us when few would.

twelve years. millions of users. one mission.
bring bitcoin to india—and keep it here.

the easy path was to quit.
we chose the hard one: build something that lasts.

now, as others fall, we stand.

not the first anymore.
the last one standing.

that was always the plan.

he called it a swarm of cyber hornets

michael saylor could have said “bitcoin is a decentralized digital currency.”
instead, he said “a swarm of cyber hornets…”

one explains. the other changes how you think.

saylor didn’t just buy bitcoin. he invested in language.
digital property. apex asset. frames, not definitions.

call it “crypto” and it competes with everything.
call it engineered money rooted in energy and it stands alone.

language shapes belief. belief shapes outcomes.
so what are you calling the thing you’re building?

you don't need ten principles

you need one.

the one that’s been nagging you.
the one you keep skipping.
the one that makes you uncomfortable because it would force real change.

principles don’t work in bulk.
they work in practice.

you can read about focus, habits, resilience, self-awareness.
highlight the lines. save the articles. tell yourself “i should work on this.”

but knowing isn’t doing.

pick the principle that scares you most.
the one that triggers excuses. that’s the one.

not because it’s popular.
because resistance is information.

maybe it’s taking responsibility instead of blaming.
maybe it’s scheduling deep work instead of wishing for focus.
maybe it’s asking for feedback instead of avoiding truth.

the principle matters less than the commitment to live it.

you already know which one it is.

the only question is whether you start today.