My name is Josh Billings, and this is my first post on Steemit.

I'd introduce myself with a silly selfie, but I'm currently doing time in a controlled facility for doing drugs.

No, I'm not in prison or rehab (or any other celebrity hangout). This facility was built from the ground up for the explicit purpose of doing drugs.

@tim-rumford

Not the cool drugs that will make you see pink elephants (or forever reveal organized religion as a farce propagated by the patriarchy to control the masses), but the boring drugs that might one day help someone suffering from an ailment find relief.

Yeah. Stuff like that.

Except they don't have the fancy names or marketing yet. They're just experimental drugs in phase-1 testing that they need healthy people like me to take small doses of so the doctors can figure out how the body metabolizes it.

It's a completely voluntary, part time gig with decent pay, that also has the added bonus of affording me copious amounts of free time.

You know that scene in Fight Club where Edward Norton beats himself up after his boss calls security and makes it look like his boss just assaulted him so he could get paid without actually having to show up to work?

That's kinda what it felt like when I found this line of work.

Finally I had a way of getting paid without having to focus my mental/physical energy on something I didn't enjoy doing.

Sure I have to be here when I say I will if I want to get paid, but whilst here I am free to think about whatever I want. So I feel a tremendous amount of freedom.

Cryptocurrency and the World of Tomorrow

In Fight Club, Norton and Pitt use their free time to expand Fight Club and eventually take down the entire banking system.

Which is strikingly similar to what might actually happen if cryptocurrency ever comes close to reaching some of the outlandish predictions for its full potential.

On average, every year so far, the value of Bitcoin has increased by about a factor ten. From 0.1 dollar in 2010, to 1 dollar in 2011, to 10 dollar in 2012, to 100 dollar in 2013. From now on, there's a slight slowdown, as the value increased by a factor ten every two years, to 1,000 dollar in 2015, to 10,000 in 2017, 100,000 in 2019, and 1,000,000 in 2021. From here onwards, there's no good way of expressing its value in dollars, as the dollar is no longer used, nor is any central bank issued currency for that matter. There are two main forms of wealth in today's world. Land and cryptocurrency.

(The above quote was a fictional prediction made back in 2013, that just so happens to have panned out thus far. I included it purely as an illustration for what could be possible. Thanks to @adsactly's recent article for bringing that reddit post to my attention.)

Unlike Fight Club, in this model of the future we won't even have to blow up any buildings. We can simply continue valuing cryptocurrency more than fiat money and someday fiat money may be worth less than paper it's printed on. All that debt will still be there, but it can be wiped away with a coin or two.

Everyone drowning in student loans or trapped in an underwater mortgage will be free again to live their own lives, instead of having to conform to a system that is designed to churn out indentured servants by selling them on student loans, jobs, and products they don't really need.

I was lucky enough to avoid these pitfalls by dropping out of high school and being self-employed for the last 13 years. But I still find that upward mobility in our current system is way too restricted.

Steemit and Our Fullest Potential

If cryptocurrency is the path to the decentralized, uncensored world I've always wanted to live in, Steemit is the platform and community that I want to fully pour myself into. For the first time it feels like there's zero barrier between me and the future I want to experience. All I have to do is start living it more and more each day.

That's why I really want to help build this community and add my voice to the choir of amazing voices I've had the privilege of reading. Because this model empowers us to make a difference with our spare time.

The more we buy into crypto and build this platform into a Facebook that empowers people instead of selling their data, the more it will grow in value and bring prosperity within reach of all those willing to say yes to a brighter future.

I still have lots to learn about cryptocurrency and this community, so I look forward to learning from you all as we collectively bridge the gap between vision and reality.

The Future I Hope We'll Build Together

There are two patterns I notice in myself. One is playing small, the other is dreaming big.

Why do I play small? Because big seems too far out of reach. The image I create of it is some perfected version of reality that only exists on TV and the movies.

That's why one of my favorite posts I've read so far is this one by @mammasitta

It's beautiful, honest, uplifting, and alive with energy. And most of all it shows that you don't have to painstakingly craft every word to create valuable content, you can simply be real and share something that resonates with others, and you'll be heard and make a difference at the same time.

So that's what I want to do while I'm here. I want to hear you. I want to get to know you and discover the people I resonate with most. I want us to grow together and explore and expand. To enjoy the ripeness of the moment and simultaneously forge forward into a bold new future where we feel like we have the freedom to live the lives we were born to.

The powers that be are watching that power shrivel up in their aging hands as new generation of freedom seekers, empowered by technology, step forward to claim what's rightfully theirs.

This is our time. And I'm ready to fuel this fire into an undying pyre of freedom that lights the skies for generations!