Bitcoin is seventeen years old. In the span of monetary history, this is nothing. Gold has been money for millennia. The dollar has been the global reserve currency for less than a century. Monetary transitions rarely announce themselves loudly at first; they unfold slowly, then suddenly, often triggered by crises that expose the weaknesses of the existing system. We cannot know what Bitcoin will ultimately become. Perhaps it remains a niche asset for a small group of enthusiasts. Perhaps it evolves into the foundation of a new global monetary system. The important thing is that the code does not care about our predictions, narratives, or debates. It simply continues to operate. What we can observe is the direction of travel. Adoption continues to grow. Infrastructure improves. Understanding deepens. Each year Bitcoin becomes harder to dismiss and easier to access. Each halving reduces the flow of new supply, while long-term demand trends upward. The critics have been wrong at every major stage. They said Bitcoin would die. It did not. They said it would never reach $1, then $100, then $1,000, then $10,000, then $100,000. They will likely be wrong about whatever number comes next as well. Taking the long view does not require certainty about outcomes. It requires recognizing that we are still early in a process that will take decades to fully play out. A generation that grows up with Bitcoin as a normal part of the financial landscape will think about money very differently than we do. That shift is no longer hypothetical — it has already begun.