QueenB.Divine
Notice this. Last week I found myself telling my nail technician a story about my mother. Somehow, between talking about nails, colours and what design I might choose next, I ended up talking about being three years old. That's how life works sometimes. You walk into a nail salon thinking about black polish, and suddenly you're three again.
One of the best times for me to think is actually when I'm walking to the nail salon. I'm not trying to solve the world. I'm not checking Bitcoin. I'm not wondering what's up, what's down, what I should buy, sell, hold or worry about. I'm thinking about something incredibly simple: What colour am I going to put on my nails? And I think my mind likes that. Because some of my thoughts haven't always been simple.
When I was about three years old, my mother would leave me in a rooming house and go to work. I remember sitting on the step with a sandwich beside my hip. I had on those funny little underwear kids wore back in the '70s, and I was basically waiting. Waiting for my mother. Waiting for time to pass. Waiting to be okay. Imagine that. Three years old and already carrying stress you don't even have the vocabulary to describe.
But I had angels. There was an older man upstairs. I remember him coming downstairs, getting me and taking me upstairs. He showed me how to build houses out of playing cards. We would build them and tear them down. Build them again and tear them down again. Meanwhile, he'd be in the corner opening his red-and-white can, and after that can he always seemed a little tipsy. I didn't understand any of that. I was three. All I knew was that for a little while, I wasn't sitting alone on those stairs. Eventually, I would be back there again, sandwich beside me, waiting for my mother. And she never knew. Funny what stays inside you.
Now what the hell does any of this have to do with crypto? More than I expected. When I think about that little girl building card houses, I think about how much of adult life is still about trying to build something that makes us feel safe. A home. Savings. A career. A relationship. A business. A crypto portfolio. We stack one card on another and hope the damn thing doesn't fall over.
Crypto especially can make you believe that if you just build the right portfolio, find the right coin, catch the right cycle or make enough money, you'll finally arrive at this magical place called safe. I understand the attraction. But here's something I'm learning: financial security and emotional security aren't necessarily the same thing. You can have Bitcoin and still be afraid. You can have investments and still carry the little kid who once wondered if somebody was coming back. You can watch your portfolio go green and still have parts of your life flashing red. Sometimes we don't even realize we're asking money to fix something money didn't break.
That old man probably had no idea what those card houses would mean to me decades later. Think about a house of cards. You can't rush it. You can't slam another card on top because you're excited. You can't build the entire thing on one crooked card and expect the rest to magically compensate. And you definitely can't control everything happening around it. Sounds a little like investing. Sounds a lot like life.
Sometimes it falls. When it does, you find out whether you actually understood how to build it or whether you were just copying what somebody else was doing. That's one of the things crypto has taught me too. It's very easy to follow. Follow the chart. Follow the influencer. Follow the prediction. Follow the person yelling that something is going to 100X. But your money has your name attached to it. Your risk has your name attached to it. And your life certainly does. Learning matters. Patience matters. Understanding what you're doing matters. Knowing how much instability you can actually tolerate matters too.
But here's the part I don't want us to miss. Sometimes self-care really is as simple as choosing a nail colour. We make self-care so damn complicated. Sometimes my self-care is walking to get my nails done and allowing my biggest problem for twenty minutes to be: black or red? That's it. No childhood. No bills. No crypto charts. No algorithms. No healing assignment. No figuring myself out. Just colour.
And while we're talking about nails, let's give the nails themselves a little respect. Think about how much work our hands do every single day. We tap computer keys, type on our phones, open doors, cook, clean, carry groceries, make things, work, scroll, text and probably hit the refresh button on a crypto chart more times than we'd like to admit. Our fingertips and nails are right there doing the work with us. Yet we rarely think about caring for them until one cracks, breaks or starts hurting. Nail care doesn't have to be about vanity. Keeping your nails clean, moisturized and comfortably trimmed, giving your hands a little attention and noticing changes instead of ignoring them can simply be another small act of taking care of the body carrying you through your day. Those same fingers tapping BUY, SELL, SEND and REFRESH deserve a little maintenance too.
Maybe that's why something so small feels so good to me. When your mind has spent years carrying heavy thoughts, a simple thought can feel luxurious. Sitting there while somebody takes care of my nails gives me permission, even briefly, to pay attention to something that isn't demanding an emotional solution from me. I can look at my hands and think, What colour do I want? That's a very different question from, Am I going to be okay?
People talk about wealth as if it's only measured in dollars. I'm beginning to think there are other kinds. Having twenty quiet minutes inside your own head is wealth. Feeling safe in your body is wealth. Having choices is wealth. Being able to remember something painful without allowing it to swallow the rest of your day is wealth. Taking care of the hands that work for you every day is wealth. Walking into a nail salon and choosing black because you damn well feel like wearing black is a tiny form of wealth too.
That's probably my biggest crypto thought from this story: diversification shouldn't stop at your portfolio. Yes, learn about money. Build something. Save what you can. Understand what you own. Learn about Bitcoin and crypto if you're interested in them. But don't put every bit of your hope into the idea that money will eventually make you okay. Invest in your peace. Invest in relationships that feel safe. Invest in your health. Invest in knowing yourself. Invest in your hands, your body and those little maintenance rituals we tend to dismiss as unimportant. Invest in simple pleasures. Invest in moments when your nervous system isn't being asked to solve another damn problem.
Because you don't want to spend your entire life building the perfect financial house only to realize the human being living inside it is exhausted. And you don't want to spend your life tapping keys trying to build wealth while forgetting about the fingers doing all the tapping. Sometimes taking care of yourself isn't a grand spiritual awakening. Sometimes it's hand cream, a nail file, a walk, a conversation and twenty peaceful minutes deciding between two colours.
So what colour did I choose? Black. Maybe next time I'll choose something mysterious and dark again. Maybe I'll change my mind halfway there. That's part of the beauty of it. For a few minutes, I get to walk down the street and think about colour instead of survival.
Perhaps that's one of the strangest things healing has taught me: when you've spent part of your life wondering whether you're going to be okay, eventually being able to think about something as ordinary as nail polish can become its own little declaration that you are.
The card house fell down. I built again. And I'm still building—just differently now. Notice this: your portfolio isn't the only thing in your life worth investing in. Take care of the person holding the wallet. Take care of the hands tapping the keys. And occasionally, close the damn chart and go pick a colour.
The cure is conversation. Self-love and self-care will get you there.
— QueenB.Divine would love your support but, truly who wouldn't
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Self-love and self-care will get you there.— QueenB.Divine
Personal commentary and lived experience. Nothing here is individualized financial or investment advice.
