(Beware, this story is an experiment, and I am still in the process of editing it. I’m exploring different ways to share my YouTube videos and have decided to try posting them on my Medium page. This is still a work in progress. So, please forgive the messiness and clutter. Also, please let me know if you have any recommendations or suggestions for either the video or the article. Thank you again for your continued support!)

Afraid of losing money when investing?
- Then you may need to watch this video!

Addressing the Fear of Losing Money

So, are you afraid to lose money when you invest?

Let’s talk about that fear and how we can overcome that fear. We can use that fear for good instead of bad. And so, I’m here at the park again.

Hole number six on this disc golf course. So, we might take a look at one or two holes while we talk. So, a lot of people are afraid to invest. They’re afraid to lose money. This course, if you look at that trail, it’s kind of it slants over a little bit. And so, there’s water on this side. You can probably hear the water. You see the water? So, if I was to throw a disc and try to hit a goal, which I can’t even see the goal from this this pad here, I might be afraid that disc is going to go in this water over here and I’ll lose my disc, but I still would probably play. I don’t have a disc with me right now or I’d throw one. Um, so when you invest, it’s just like making a throw on a disc off with a hazards on both sides. You got water on this side and you got trees on this side.

Evaluating Specific Odds and Circumstances

So when you invest, there’s always a chance of losing money. It doesn’t matter whether you invest in people or you invest in property or you invest in stocks or crypto or maybe a college course. there’s always a chance that you’re going to lose out on it. And so what people do, the best thing to do is weigh your chances. What are your odds? And instead of being general, like what are your odds in investing in general or what are your odds of getting your money that you spent on college back and you get that job? It’s what are your odds in that specific thing at that spec, excuse me, I had a burp. That specific thing at that specific time. Just like what are my odds of falling down this trail? This is not a bad trail though. Let’s see if we can walk down it. If I go down it, what are your odds of losing money in this in a specific investment? You’ve got to look at it specifically. There’s some cool water down there. I ain’t getting too close there. So, when you invest in something specific like a certain piece of property or a certain stock company that you invest in or a certain crypto or a certain app or maybe you’re investing time in a person, what are your odds in losing out on that specific investment? So, you have to go case by case.

The Importance of Diversification

And the thing is, you don’t want to put all your money in that. Just like if you look at some of my shorts in the past and my videos in the past, I’ve learned I don’t put 80% of my money in one protocol. And I got stuff in my throat. I don’t put 80% of my money in one protocol because if that h something bad happens to that, I lose 80% of my money. So, it’s good to spread things around. So there’s the basket for this course for this hole. So some pretty cool pretty cool boats. Um people invest money in these houses. What are their risk in investing money in the houses? Are they getting back a return off of their investment or is it just a lost cause? Well, you’d have to talk to the people and find out. Just like one investment may be really good for one person. Somebody may really like a certain investment and then oh there squirrels in the trees. Somebody may like a certain investment and then not like the one that you’re in. And so you got to be prepared for that.

Navigating Investments and Friendships

Sometimes uh there’s a loss of friendship when you invest. You know, everybody likes what they’re in, but they might not not necessarily like what other people are in. And so, in my experience, it’s okay to be in different investments than your friends or your cohorts, your buddies. And so, it may be really good for you, but it might be not be good for them. And the same thing for them. It might be good for them, but not good for you. But that doesn’t mean you need to badmouth them because then that investment will cost you a friendship. I would encourage them encourage their success because then you’re a supporter and you’re for them even though they may not be investing in what you’re investing in. I have a guy that’s uh I talk to sometimes and he gets irritated and he wishes that all of my Bitcoin would go to zero so that I would lose money to prove that he’s right. And so that kind of builds up a wall in the friendship. When people do that, you want to wish good things towards people, towards their investments, and towards their goals, what they’re trying to achieve. You want to pray for them to have good things and pray for the Lord to bless them and so that they would have a good thing and y’all can celebrate together. So, uh, don’t be afraid to invest. Don’t be afraid to invest in people.

Accepting Losses as Part of the Journey

Oh, wait. There’s a squirrel. See the squirrel? Is he going up the tree? He’s going. Let’s see here if I can zoom in on him. Oh, my zoom. There he is. He’s got a acorn or a pawn cone or something. and he is running home. So anyway, don’t be afraid to invest. Don’t be afraid to lose things cuz I mean, you’re going to lose when you invest. That’s just the way it works. Losses are part of investing. It’s kind of that uh you know, part for the course. that hopefully we can learn from losses and produce some gains in the future to make up for those losses.

Personal Reflections and Outro

So anyway, I’m not telling you what to do, what not to do. This is just some things, some some ideas and some theories that uh have happened to me, some things I’ve had to think about along the way because I’ve had a if you look at my videos, you’ll see I’ve had several losses. I’ve had a lot of losses along the way. I’ve had a lot of gains along the way, too. And I’m learning and that’s the whole process is just to keep picking yourself up and keep going. So anyway, I don’t know it all. This is the learning of Esther. I will talk to y’all next time.

How did my investments do in April?

• Keep reading to find out more!

Read all the way to the bottom of this article to see what my final numbers on Medium might be!

READ THIS FIRST

(As always, invest at your own risk. Do your research & find out how these different projects operate before investing. This post is not to be taken as financial advice. It serves only as a record of what has already happened & my intentions going forward. Only invest what you are willing to lose. Use risk capital only. DYOR. NFA.)

Table of Contents

· How did my investments do in April?
· READ THIS FIRST
· Table of Contents
· Portfolio Percentages
· Monthly Summary:
· Project Rankings
· Bitcoin
· BTCI ETF
· Atlas Earth
· Defi IRA
· Ethereum
· JLP Token
· HBAR and LINK
· NEHI ETF
· YouTube
· Grand Totals
· Portfolio changes for the month:
· Thank you for reading this article!
· Learn how to use Limit Orders on Coinbase!
· The Last Monthly Update and Medium article for a while…

Portfolio Percentages

Here is how my investment portfolio looked at the end of April

Here’s how much of my Paycheck “DCA” is going into each investment.

Monthly Summary:

Here’s how things went this past month…

• Removed Substack section. I’ll still use Substack posts to share links to my YouTube videos, but I probably won't have much time to write articles in the near future.
• My BTCI investments have overtaken Atlas Earth in portfolio percentage
• Published a YouTube video detailing how I figure the Net Growth of my assets
• Lost a mayorship in Atlas Earth, then gained it back plus more by the end of the month
• Published a Defi IRA CD update video
• Surpassed my 0.5 ETH goal and set a new goal of holding at least 0.75 combined ETH
• Surpassed 2,500 views on my YouTube channel!
• Reached over 4,000 HBAR tokens on Coinbase!
• Halting my HBAR paycheck DCA once I have at least 4k tokens. Concentrating on growing my LINK balances more for now.
• Went to the Bitcoin conference in Las Vegas and learned about Bitcoin mining.
• My total Bitcoin holdings dropped from 62% to around 59%, as other investments grow in value
• There has been a problem with earning from ads on Atlas Earth recently. We’ll see if they can fix it in May. If not, then I’ll reassess my Atlas Earth strategy accordingly.
• Also, this will be my last Medium article for the time being, due to reduced Medium earnings/ payouts. See the end of this article for more info.
• My YouTube views were down 37% in April, but total watch hrs were up almost 100%. New watch hours goal set at 200 hrs.

Project Rankings

Here is a list of my investments, from the highest net growth for last month to the lowest-earning.

• (Net Growth equals Increase in balance/ value, plus withdrawals & minus any investments/reinvestments.)

You can watch a detailed video below on how I figure my Net Growth numbers.

Bitcoin

I use a lot of Bitcoin buy limit orders to automatically buy the dip. Here are their numbers. (You can find out how to use limit orders in this short ebook.)

The Bitcoin price went up over 17% in April!!!

Is the bear market over? Is this just another bull trap?

What will Bitcoin do next?

Only time will tell…

• Current combined goal = 0.175 Bitcoin
• Current combined holdings = 0.17034 Bitcoin
• Left to reach goal = 0.0047 Bitcoin (~$360!)
• Net Growth last month = $2,302.33

Latest article:

Did You Buy The Dip?!?!?

BTCI ETF

I achieved another BTCI goal, 50 shares, last month. Now, my new goal is 75 shares, which I should be able to reach this month!

My long-term goal of holding 120 shares of BTCI should be achieved sometime in early fall this year.

• Goal = 75 shares (was 50)
• Current holdings = 72.43 shares
• Est. Cost to reach goal = $91
• Net Growth last month = $314.74

Find out more about BTCi below:

BTCI - Bitcoin High Income ETF | NEOS Investments

Latest article:

Do you want to earn dividends from Bitcoin volatility?

Atlas Earth

Atlas Earth is a game where you earn USD by buying virtual parcels of land and earning location badges.

I have been playing this game since July last year. It is a very slow-growing investment for me, but I enjoy playing it, especially trying to finish the monthly challenges!

I currently hold 10 different mayorships in Atlas Earth and am constantly looking for more mayorships to take over.

Recently, Atlas Earth has been having issues displaying some of its ads in the game. Hopefully, this will get fixed in May. If not, then I may reassess my strategy for this game…

Current goals:

• Accumulate enough Atlas Bucks to tier jump to the breakeven point in the next tier
• Gain another mayorship if possible
• End of the month ROI% = 22.88%
• Net growth in value last month = $264.91

How to start playing Atlas Earth:

You can get started playing this game, too, by visiting the Atlas Earth website and downloading it.

https://www.atlasearth.com/

You can also experiment with earnings and strategies with the Atlas Earth Calculator, linked below.

AE Calculator

Defi IRA

The Defi IRA CDs paid out steadily in April.

• My little $1,400 investment paid me $96.59 in IRA dividends last month!

This grew my IRA holdings from 80.6k tokens to 126.8k tokens, up 57%!!!

I am looking forward to the launch of V2, coming in May!!!

• Check out the video below for more info.

IRA Goal:

• Reach 250k tokens
• Current holdings = 126.8k IRA tokens
• Current Cost to reach goal = ~$357

CD Goal:

• Reach $1,400 in CDs
• Current holdings = $1400 in CDs
• Cost to reach new goal = $0

Total Defi IRA Net Growth last month = $183.99

Latest article:

Here's what I think about the Defi CDs

Latest Video:

Ethereum

I’m still steadily DCAing into ETH with each paycheck, among other ways.

ETH is used on several different blockchains. Plus, some have speculated that ETH’s price will skyrocket soon. So, the more ETH I hold, the better!

My ETH holdings surpassed 0.5 ETH, my old goal, in April!!!

Now, the new goal is 0.75 combined ETH holdings.

• ETH goal = 0.75 ETH
• Current holdings = 0.53 ETH
• Left to reach goal = 0.22 (~$418)
• Net growth last month = $162.17

JLP Token

I have started converting 5% of my JLP holdings to USDC to realize profits and build more dry powder for other investments.

My JLP holdings grew from 33.35 tokens to 36.23 tokens due to the small JLP/Bitcoin flywheel I’ve started using, even after converting 1.9 JLP tokens to USDC.

• Current goal — 50 JLP tokens
• Current holdings — 36.23 JLP
• Cost to reach goal = $53.14
• Net Growth last month = $27.26

HBAR and LINK

• Hedera (HBAR) has strong backing from many well-known companies.
• Chainlink (LINK) connects several diverse blockchains.

Once I reach 4k HBAR tokens, my focus will shift to LINK tokens, with a goal of reaching 40 LINK tokens.

Current stats:

• HBAR holdings = 3,831 tokens
• LINK holdings = 35.32 tokens
• Combined Net Growth last month = $26.21

NEHI ETF

I’m reassessing my current strategy between BTCI, NEHI, and Bitcoin. I plan to add STRC to the mix in May. So, I’ll need to reassess and adjust my ETF strategies.

Subscribe to my YouTube channel to find out more when I announce my new strategy!

• Goal = 35 shares
• Current holdings = 4.34 shares
• Est. Cost to reach goal = ~$1,082
• Net Growth last month = $17.34

YouTube

You can visit my YouTube channel at the link below.

The Learning Investor

YouTube Goals:

• Views in 28 days = 1.5k
• Current views/28days = 640 views
• Left to reach goal = 860
• Subscriber goal = 50
• Current subs = 46
• Left to reach goal = 4
• Public watch hr goal = 200 hrs
• Current watch hrs = 130 hrs
• Left to reach goal = 70 hrs
• Net Growth last month = $0.00 (not yet monetized)

Grand Totals

This section lists the grand total net growth and estimated passive income for my portfolio for the month.

• Total net growth for the month = $3,271.69
• Estimated monthly passive income = $468.87 (Up $30.30!!!)

My goal is to grow the passive income number over time…

Portfolio changes for the month:

Monthly Net Growth = $3,271.69

Monthly Portfolio Growth
- Up 21.27% for the month
- Up 29.54% YTD
- Up 21.00% the last 12 months
- Up 37.72% since 12/30/23

Highest net growth
1. Bitcoin
2. BTCI
3. Atlas Earth

Lowest Net Growth
1. HBAR on Coinbase
2. LINK on Coinbase
3. NEHI ETF

…a lot better than last month’s numbers!

Thank you for reading this article!

Well, that’s it for this monthly update.

Thank you for reading my article.

• It is much appreciated!!!
• Claps, comments, and other feedback are greatly appreciated.

Please let me know your thoughts.

Till next time.

God Speed!

(NONE OF WHAT I WRITE IN MY ARTICLES IS TO BE TAKEN AS INVESTMENT ADVICE. It primarily documents my activities and the strategies I’m using to achieve ROI and generate profit in DeFi. I am neither an advisor for this nor suggesting any financial action on your part. Invest at your own risk. DO NOT INVEST MORE THAN YOU ARE WILLING TO LOSE! DYOR. NFA.)

Learn how to use Limit Orders on Coinbase!

Do you want to learn how to buy & sell at specific future prices automatically!

Discover how to trade on Coinbase without needing to monitor the charts!

Check out this eBook on Gumroad and Etsy!

The Last Monthly Update and Medium article for a while…

My Median earnings have been going down month after month since the algorithm changed a while back.

I used to earn over $100 monthly around the summer of 2023. Since then, earnings have come all the way down to less than a $1 per month. The Medium membership still costs ~$50 per year.

• Less than $1 / mo = less than $12 per year in earnings
• This leaves me in the red by around $38 per year on the basic Medium membership.

Because of this, I will be canceling my Medium membership very soon and stopping content publication on this platform for a while. (Maybe they can fix the earnings issue and I can start writting here again.)

Here are my estimated final numbers and ROI%:

• Amount invested (3/11/22 until now) = $433.22
• Amount paid (including variou Medium contest) = $2,350.66
• Estimated ending ROI% = 542.60% (Roughly 135% per year)

As you can see, Medium has been a great investment overall. Recently, though, not so much. Which is why I will stop publishing content on Medium starting this month.

Thank you again for all your patience and support of my Medium page!

Best wishes for the future!

God Speed!