What is Free?

☀️GM Defions

What does it mean to be free?

Do we have any control over our freedom, or is it something that's entirely determined by where we live and our physical surroundings? And what about the difference between physical and mental freedoms? Can we ever truly be free, or are there always limitations that we must contend with? These are some thought-provoking questions to ponder, and we'll be exploring them further in this newsletter.

Take a moment and ask yourself: do you feel truly free? Many of us reading this newsletter may be living in the US, which is often touted as one of the most free countries in the world. But even so, it's worth asking whether we really feel free. Can we honestly say that we have complete control over how we spend all 168 hours of our week? For most of us, the answer is likely no. We're trading our time for money, and that can put serious constraints on our freedom. Some might even argue that true freedom comes from having 100% control over our most precious resource: time.

When we talk about investing, we have to ask ourselves why we're doing it in the first place. For those who are financially savvy, investing and generating returns on our investments is a means to an end: it helps us achieve the ultimate goal of owning our time. For many years, the standard model was to trade our time for value, putting in 30-40 years of work in order to have enough set aside to retire and buy our freedom in the twilight of our lives. This used to be accomplished through company pensions, but these days only around 11% of companies still offer that option. Now, many of us are expected to manage our own retirement savings through a workplace 401k, which puts the burden on the employee to decide how to allocate their funds. This can be challenging, especially in an environment of rising costs for goods and services, where it's tempting to put off increasing our contributions until next year.

For many working-class citizens in this country, relying on the stock market is the only way to invest for their retirement. We pay into our company's retirement vehicles, hoping for an average return of around 7% over the course of our 30-40 year careers, and hope that it will be enough to buy back our greatest asset: time. But what happens when inflation hits 9% and stays high for an extended period of time, as it has recently, negating crucial years of growth and causing us to fall short at the end of the rainbow? What if we do everything right, work hard, and save diligently, only to realize that the system we've put our faith in doesn't have our best interests at heart and will leave us far short of our time-buyback goals? Sadly, myself and those in my generation and below will suffer the most from a system that was always destined to fail us.

Our mission is not just to provide education and information to people, but also to bring hope. Before the advent of Bitcoin and the technology it has spawned, we were stuck in a sinking ship with no way out. Now, we have a new way to generate and preserve wealth, and to take ownership of our own value. Defion Labs is committed to providing the content and resources you need to navigate this ecosystem. We want to grow with you and are grateful to everyone who chooses to learn from us and join us on this journey.

👋Defion Labs