I thought these are gatekeepers... these are people who are preventing you from succeeding

Some interesting parts of Terry's recent interview have been pulled from the transcript, cleaned, and posted here, there are several powerful parts in this podcast but I'm highlighting the part of how Terry got into crypto. It is inspiring. You can watch the video as well from the source link posted at the bottom.

Terry:
"I'm gonna try to be as succinct as possible because it's a little bit of a long story but um one thing is I am an artist before I was a football player before I was an actor I was an illustrator. I actually thought my career in Hollywood would be in the special effects lane. I always thought my dream was to work for industrial light and magic and create special effects for movies and use my art and telling stories.

I had an art scholarship before I had a football scholarship so as an artist my whole thing was how I as an artist find ways to survive because when you are an artist the first thing that goes before your name is usually starving ..starving artists.

The whole point of a lot of times being an artist is always attributed to having a life of poverty, a life of relatively trying to make things work, you have to sacrifice everything, you probably have to give up everything and then someone else benefits off your work.

I'm also being an artist I've always been a patron of the arts I have always found people that I loved and I have always invested in them and when I was getting involved in the furniture business there was a friend of mine who actually is one of the world's best designers he had just left the school he was in Switzerland he was studying luxury at his university and we're creating really beautiful objects you know... this guy had been my friend when he lived in the united states and I flew over to Switzerland and I just I love this guy and I was like 'man... look what I have this budget I said whatever you want to do I'm going to contribute to you I'm going to invest in you and I said let's make a product I want you to design it and we'll put it out we'll make, you will blow up and the whole thing is to get you the recognition that you deserve because that's really really hard for most artists.'

So he came up with a whole line of the furniture set, table, chandelier and it was beautiful and we took it to Milan for the salon de mobile, there was an emerging designers conference called the salon satellite which was for brand new designers and it was a hit.

I spent all my money and I ended up spending double because all his designs were so beautiful, they were real marble and real glassmakers and we had to get things from all over the world but it was so beautiful it won awards and the thing was when we were at salon de mobile in it was in Milan Italy.

I flew everyone over and we had a nice little uh it was a huge exhibition and what was happening is the exhibitors needed more money and I was like oh okay there was always these little fees and little things that I had to take care of and I was out of the country so I didn't have my atm, it was more than my atm could give me.

so I had American express send me money & basically my own money basically and I was supposed to pick up the transfer of the wire at a bank right there in Milan.

I went to Milan... I went to the bank and there I was wait I had my passport I had my driver's license I have my American Express card I had everything in my hands I was ready to go and mind you, Camilla, I was already famous so this is one of those things where I was like and I was in the bank and people were like oh I know you, oh and I was like hey guys how you doing.

The bank manager had a secure glass.. I'll never forget this.

It was this big thick bulletproof glass that was sitting up there and here I was in line I showed everything to the bank to the teller and she went to her manager and the manager was on the phone in the background going "no.."

I was like what's going on and he was on the phone with American express literally and then I got on the phone with American express and I said I see the person you're talking to and I need my money and he was like no no...

and the teller came back gave me my passport gave me all my information back gave me my card back and said no... (without giving any reason)

I talked to the guy from American express and he's like I'm so sorry Mr. Cruz um we're having difficulty I can send you somewhere else and this is just weird what year was this was probably 2017.

So I realized something and one thing I looked around and I started to realize very quickly what was happening I was the only black person in the bank I was probably the only black person that these guys had ever seen in the area because everyone was white.

I believed right then and there he wouldn't do it and even you can't make apparently American express couldn't make the guy give me my money, I had everything but I had all my information right there, he thought I was running some big scam or something but the fact is that it is so unacceptable...

this was the thing, there's just as much racism in America as there is in Europe and in Italy... they're not used to seeing a lot of black people and so I'm sure he in his mind he probably felt like I'm being tricked there's some sort of scam going on...

so the American express guy sent me to the very very sketchy side of town and it was a side of town that the ubers wouldn't even go no way because they were like this is not safe I had to walk there to this 24-hour internet cafe and they were selling incense and smoke things it was really smoky and really uh it was so sketchy and the guy gave me my money

and I had to walk all the way back to the hotel because the uber wouldn't pick me up so this was like a different American express location...like a bad neighborhood it wasn't even an American express location it was just the people who would give me my money, American express worked hard to find someone who would agree okay and this is what happened but

I had a black card I mean this was like the best American Express card you could ever have I mean and you couldn't even access your money I could put a million dollars on this card and they would not accept it

on the way and this is why I said it's kind of a long story but this is where it all comes together

on that walk back to the hotel I said this could never happen again on that walk I was thinking I said look at the ability of someone I'm already rich I'm already famous and I can't get access to my own money.

I thought these are gatekeepers... these are people who are preventing you from succeeding in some way shape or form, even when you do everything right even when your credit is A1 even when you do everything down to the letter they can still say no it blew my mind.

It's crazy and I said there's got to be another way... once I started to look and do research and I found out about crypto and I started to look into the democratization of what crypto is and it did not care what color I was.

If I had fulfilled all the requirements of the smart contract it must go through, no one person can say no to me it's got its whole community it's no one person... it's one thing that blew me away is being decentralized is truly power because a country can't even say you can't have it what I mean this is about a whole new system.

when I went deep by and I saw the ability for people you have to understand when I started doing the research I started to see how people in Africa were being denied ownership of the places that they already knew their families already owned simply because they had no record.

So I said you can put it on the blockchain...

if you can put the record of you owning your own land and your own places and all your contracts with what your family has on the blockchain.

No one can refute it but now you have somebody to come in and say no you didn't you don't own it this is ours and this happens all the time.

This happens all over the world so many people are told nope that's not yours it's mine I have more records than you do but this the fact that we can have a ledger that proves who you are where you come from and I'm telling you I said this is the way of the future this is truly power when you look at the hundreds of millions of people who are being disenfranchised I was one person who was disenfranchised from the system.

I said I'm in after that I said I have to find a way to get involved with this cryptocurrency because it truly is something that everyone needs in their life you listen and this is the thing what and you mentioned how women's rights and women couldn't even get a credit card in the united states without a man signing for them in 1975.

What I mean is that it wasn't that long ago either, that's the 70s cause if you were a woman you could not get a credit card...that's insane just think about the women who were trying to get businesses trying to start things trying to single moms who were trying to raise their families and you were stuck not only if you were whatever race you were but if you were a woman you could not do anything you were subject to.

The way things work here is that its true freedom it's permissionless I love it, you don't need to ask permission for anyone you're your own bank you own your own assets...

You don't if you want to transfer... it doesn't care who you are but it doesn't matter where you are either.

so it doesn't matter if you're in Milan or in US, it's a global network so you can just transfer to wherever from wherever without asking any banks no intermediaries that it's beautiful."

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