9 years ago today, I founded Coinbase. One of the most important lessons I come back after all this time is long-term focus.
I’m grateful to see how far crypto has come since Coinbase was founded. Hard to imagine that only 9 years later we would see crypto regularly discussed by Presidents, Saturday Night Live hosts, and Tom Brady. Or that it would show up in songs by Nas.
It’s tempting to get caught up in the excitement of the current moment, but the truth is there have been many ups and downs of the 9 years.
It was during the company’s low periods that I worked to find balance and avoid getting distracted. It was only because of perseverance and focus that we made it through those hard periods where we lost many employees, partners, or public support.
Importantly, we had to maintain that same mindset during the periods of excitement around Coinbase and crypto. There are just as many risks to getting caught up in your own hype as there are in giving up when times are tough.
Times feel good right now. But when this current cycle ends we may see crypto prices fall, and some people will become disillusioned and walk away from crypto (again).
It makes no difference to me; we will keep building and moving forward, because I want to see a world with more economic freedom, and this is the best opportunity I see to create it.
I like to tell my team: If you can't ignore the hype while things are trending up, then you can't ignore the despair when things are trending down. We need to develop resilience, ignore the noise, and continually make forward progress on our mission.
This has served us well over the last 9 years, and I expect it will continue to do so over the next 9 years. In terms of long term focus, we are still at the very beginning of this journey. Let's keep building!
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