CZ talks about pressure resistance, adaptability, and lifelong motivation: Human resources leave it to fate, just do your best and you will win effortlessly

Original source: “Meanders” podcast

Original compilation: BlockBeats

TL;DR：

Casual chat about Bhutan, CZ says he no longer considers himself the busiest, but he replies to messages as soon as he sees them; regardless of progress, he only keeps those who push themselves forward, focusing on three to five things he needs to do. If he were to redo a global trading platform: from day one, he would not engage with U.S. users; contracts and financial products would be launched earlier and more comprehensively, while blocking certain regions. The feelings at that time are not clearly expressed in the book "Binance Life." The two most stressful periods: the ICO launch crash and the more than ten months stuck in the U.S. — the real pressure comes from uncertainty. Coping with pressure relies on separating tasks, not setting wealth goals, and believing in simulation theory: do your best and leave the rest to fate. Founders often underestimate difficulties, must be adaptable, and must love what they do; diligence for peace of mind can be skipped. He still believes Bitcoin has value, but payment and on-chain rights confirmation have not reached early expectations; RWA and stablecoins are concepts he understood later. He continues to work because helping others makes him happy — the Gogo Academy has grown from over 100,000 children at the beginning of the year to about 1.2 million now.

CZ appeared on the “Meanders” podcast, discussing stress resistance, adaptability, and lifelong motivation. The full conversation between host Han Yang and CZ is as follows:

Busy or Not, How to Reply to Messages, How to Manage

Han Yang: I have a small question, are you tired right now?

CZ: Not really, just a little bit, but it's okay.

Han Yang: Do you think you are one of the busiest people in the world?

CZ: No, definitely not. I think a few years ago I might have been one of the busier ones, but I shouldn't be that busy in the last two years.

Han Yang: It's been three years since I met you. No matter what time I message you, you can reply, which makes me feel like you don't have a time zone.

CZ: I reply as soon as I see messages. If I see a message and don't reply, I'll forget later. After meetings, I might take a few minutes to check and reply to messages. I do this in the morning when I wake up and before I go to bed at night. I check when chatting with friends for a bit. But if I'm doing something serious, I won't check first. If your message is quick to reply, I'll respond first; otherwise, I'll forget.

Han Yang: Do you think you can reply to 500 messages in a day?

CZ: Yes, absolutely, definitely more than that. Sometimes right after I reply to one message, I need to find a previous message I replied to, and I have to scroll down for a long time. I can reply to many messages within a few minutes.

Han Yang: I can imagine you must be handling a lot of things at the same time. How do you ensure your mind keeps up with everything? Like, where is this task at, and where is that task at?

CZ: I still have a lot of miscellaneous tasks now, and as CEO, there are also many miscellaneous tasks, so my tracking isn't very good. When someone comes to me, I tell them what to do, but I generally won't follow up proactively after a day or a week. I usually don't do that. So I need the people I work with to be very proactive; they need to push you forward. If we need to have another meeting tomorrow or the day after, they need to schedule it, not me going to find them tomorrow. If anyone works with me, I need to ask them how the project is progressing; I generally won't keep that person. And usually, in such cases, the project has some issues. So I hope that person will have updates tomorrow or in a week; if they message me, I'll remember. I need very proactive people around me. Everyone around me is quite proactive. Additionally, it's very important for me: you can remember three to five important things in your mind, but those three to five things are what I need to do, while the rest are what they need to do, and they need to proactively report back to me.

If You Were to Redo a Global Trading Platform with Today's Experience

Han Yang: Speaking of three to five things, my second question is related to this. I previously wrote about Binance and checked a lot of your public statements. What impressed me deeply is that around 2017-2018, you emphasized that the main idea for Binance was to become a faster, more user-friendly, and safer company. But looking at your statements in 2025, especially this year, you emphasize that you may have underestimated legal, compliance, and political aspects to some extent back then. Assuming today you could go back to 2017 with all your current experience and restart a global crypto trading platform, what constitutional rules or absolutely unshakeable rules would you set for yourself?

CZ: Looking back, hindsight makes things clearer. I think the first rule would be: do not engage with U.S. users. From day one, do not engage with U.S. users. Their definition of centralized financial platforms is: if you engage with U.S. users, you need to comply with U.S. regulations and obtain a license in the U.S. They don't implement this 100% of the time, but they have the right and ability to do so. Additionally, looking back now, in some areas, we still didn't execute quickly enough. Yesterday someone asked me online, aren't these two conflicting? Should you be more cautious or faster? If I could look back with today's experience, some things I wouldn't hesitate on, and some things I wouldn't do at all.

Han Yang: Can you give an example? What would you not hesitate on if you could do it again?

CZ: Many small product features. I might launch contracts a bit earlier. Even some other financial products could be launched earlier, and the coverage of financial products would be broader. But we would need to block certain regions entirely. Another aspect is communication with regulators, which I might do more thoroughly. First, I'm not good at this; second, we are not in one country, we need to communicate with over 100 countries, and it's hard to manage that. So I might do more in this area.

Han Yang: But from a third-party perspective, Binance is already one of the platforms that communicates the most with regulators.

CZ: Binance definitely communicates the most, even without a doubt.

Han Yang: But you still feel it's not enough?

CZ: The coverage is still a bit lacking. And if you really want to do this, the cost is very high. It's not just a matter of money; you need to hire good people, spend a lot of time, and manage this issue. When you hire a lot of people to do this, the CEO of the company might spend a lot of time overseeing this. These are all costs. If you do this, you might have fewer products. Because Binance covers the globe, there are many countries to communicate with. Most companies only need to deal with one regulatory body. The expectation from regulators is: most traditional companies spend 30% of their time on me, and they expect you to spend 30% of your time on them. But if you have to spend 30% of your time on over 100 of these, it's very difficult. So it's not just about adding people. You can't have everyone act independently; they still need to report up, and many decisions need to be made, so the higher-ups will spend a lot of time on this. There might be other ways to do this better.

Things That Were Hard to Express While Writing "Binance Life"

Han Yang: I had a particularly strong feeling when I read your "Binance Life." Sometimes when writing about past events, it can feel like you don't know how to express them. Some things are too complex to explain to others. Is there anything that you now see as particularly important from back then, something that people today might underestimate, but as the author, you find it hard to convey to readers?

CZ: I definitely have that feeling. Sometimes, the feelings at that time cannot be expressed. For example, in 2019, there was a time when we were hacked, and for an entire week, we couldn't withdraw coins, but trading continued, and the whole system was upgrading. I basically didn't sleep for those seven days; I slept a little here and there, and the engineers basically didn't sleep for seven or five days. The pressure at that time, I feel, is not expressed clearly in the book. Also, with a few law enforcement agencies from certain countries. Some law enforcement agencies are very unreasonable, and some even act illegally. They used public funds to trade, lost money, and wanted us to compensate. The communication pressure was very high. Some of these things are described in the book, while others are not included for various reasons and cannot be included yet. So writing a book always has many things that cannot be included. The things that are included sometimes cannot be described comprehensively. But it has to be this way.

Han Yang: Your answer is very interesting to me. I understand that your answer might refer to a specific thing that was underestimated, but it sounds like you feel a certain regret that the emotions of that moment are hard to express in words.

CZ: Yes. I feel that my ability to express is not that strong, and my writing skills are also limited, so many of those internal pressures or thoughts at that time are generally not expressed clearly in the book. I wrote this book in relatively simple language because my proficiency in Chinese and English is limited, so I used very simple language to describe what happened. At the same time, I also didn't particularly want to spend too much time on writing to describe how I felt. I just wanted the readers to read and feel what the experience was like at that time.

The Two Most Stressful Periods

Han Yang: After going through all this, looking back at everything, which event do you think truly caused you immense stress?

CZ: I think there are probably two, which is quite simple. One is the ICO. After our ICO, when trading opened, the price dropped. The pressure during those two weeks was very high. Then it was dealing with the situation in the U.S. I was basically stuck there for over ten months. They told me at the time that I would have to wait six months when I came, and then serve four months in jail. If it were 100% certain, you would know what was going on. When I went, I thought the chance of going to jail was very small because no one has ever gone to jail for violating the U.S. Bank Secrecy Act just once; I was the only one. We didn't commit fraud, and no users were harmed. So I thought I might be under house arrest in the U.S. for a few months. Being under house arrest is easy for me because I don't like going out; as long as I can go online at home, I'm fine. The most stressful part in the U.S. was the uncertainty. I wasn't sure if they would eventually let me go, or if they would keep adding more things, just continuously messing with you. The pressure from that uncertainty was very high.

Han Yang: So, it sounds like you didn't sleep well?

CZ: I usually sleep well. I haven't been sleeping well these past few days, but I have phases. 80% of the time, my sleep is still pretty good. I generally sleep for about six hours at night, and I take a nap during the day for about half an hour to an hour, so that adds up to six or seven, or seven to eight hours. I rarely get to eight hours, but I usually get around seven.

How CZ Handles Pressure

Han Yang: Before I met you for the first time, I had already written an article about Binance. Many friends said that if I met CZ, what questions should I ask him. Most people wanted me to ask: as a founder of a company that has grown so fast, you must experience tremendous changes and face a lot of pressure in a short time. They want to know how you handle this pressure and change.

CZ: First, in the early years, I did sleep a bit less and it was more fragmented. Sometimes I would sleep three or four hours at night, and the pressure was higher then. But I have always had a habit of taking naps; if I sleep for half an hour during the day, I feel much more awake. Additionally, regarding this pressure, I don't know how I developed this personality, but I am a very resilient person. I've been like this since I was young.

For example, when my parents argued at home, my sister and I would see them fighting, and both of them might not be in a good mood. When we went to school together, my parents' arguments would affect my sister's mood at school. When I got to school, my friends wouldn't notice that I was in a bad mood; they wouldn't realize my parents were fighting. My sister's friends would ask her why she was in a bad mood. So I would isolate that and separate the two issues. When I handle company matters, many people have told me: the first meeting might be dealing with a lot of pressure, like how to negotiate with U.S. lawyers, how to handle lawsuits, how to deal with the U.S. case; the next meeting might be about a product. Maybe one or two people attended both meetings, and they would say, wow, how are you so calm in the product meeting? For me, they are just two different matters. There is still pressure, and I can definitely feel it, but I generally separate these matters quite well.

Secondly, in terms of resilience, my worldview has always been like this. I rarely set goals for myself. I don't say I must rank a certain way, must have a certain amount of money, must earn a certain amount, or must grow by a certain percentage each year. I generally don't set those goals. I just do my best. This year the market is not good, so the company's performance might decline, but I did my best; I didn't slack off, and I didn't make major mistakes. I handle problems the same way. No matter how difficult the problem is, I just try my best to deal with it.

I mentioned in my book that I believe in simulation theory; I believe this world is simulated, so it's like a game. It's simulated, but that doesn't mean this game isn't important. But in this game, I just need to do my best; what else can I do? When faced with difficult problems, I also try my best to solve them; when faced with simple problems, I also try my best to solve them. As long as I did my best, whatever the consequences of the difficult problem are, I leave it to fate. Once I have this mindset, the pressure is greatly reduced. There is still pressure, but I just accept my fate. Whatever happens later, happens. You just try your best to deal with it, and after dealing with it, you can only wait and see.

Things Founders Often Underestimate and Whether Effort is Truly Useful

Han Yang: How's your stomach?

CZ: My stomach is pretty good. Sometimes my intestines aren't great, but my stomach is fine.

Han Yang: We are quite similar. Sometimes if I eat raw fish or something that's not particularly fresh, my intestines might not be great, but my stomach is fine. Because I increasingly find that the more outstanding founders you talk to, the more you realize that resilience is a particularly important prerequisite. People generally talk about entrepreneurship in terms of PMF and growth, but many overlook the founder's resilience. In fact, I think in entrepreneurship, product, technology, intelligence, or emotional intelligence are all easily visible. But many times, they don't mention resilience. I believe that any successful founder has to bear a lot of pressure. As a founder, I want to ask a question about founders. Now that you are investing, you must meet a lot of founders, and you are also an excellent founder. What do you think are the things a founder should know — including what you should have known when you first started — but perhaps those who haven't been particularly successful cannot imagine?

CZ: Most people underestimate the difficulty of doing something. Most people starting a business often think that an ordinary case is actually a good case. 90% of startups fail, but as a founder, they tend to be more optimistic. I think the first is optimism, the second is resilience, and the third is adaptability. Some people are very smart, but sometimes they lack adaptability. They may have high intelligence, but their ability to change is very weak; they need a structure, and that structure is hard to change. But in entrepreneurship, you not only need to be smart, but you also need to be able to adapt, accept change, and adjust at any time. Additionally, founders must love what they are doing. Without that passion, it's hard to persist. This work is too exhausting; all entrepreneurship is exhausting.

Han Yang: You also mentioned that you should do your best at work. How do you ensure that when you were doing Binance, some of your efforts — there's a saying that goes, "Don't use tactical diligence to cover strategic laziness" — how do you ensure that what you're doing is useful on a macro level, or are there things that just give you peace of mind, making you feel like you're working hard?

CZ: Anytime you feel that something is just for your own peace of mind, you don't need to do it. What you do must have meaning. If at any time you feel that something is just for your own happiness, you basically don't need to do it. You might as well do nothing and take a break. Downtime is also a form of adjustment. Sometimes when you're very tired, you can take a break. This is not slacking off. If you don't take a break, you can't go further. As an entrepreneur, there's no need to deceive yourself. Most investors won't be watching how many hours you work, etc. So this is entirely about self-management. Most entrepreneurs don't need external forces to push them. From my perspective, if I have nothing to do, I just listen to audiobooks. I generally don't listen to music. Sometimes I can take a break.

Han Yang: Do you watch short videos now?

CZ: Occasionally, but not too much. One advantage I have is that when I scroll through them, I find them boring. Because the current recommendation algorithms are too uniform; after watching three or four videos, they are all the same, and I lose interest.

Today's "Consensus" in the Crypto World

Han Yang: Let me ask a blockchain question. Back in the day, many pioneers of blockchain had various imaginations about the entire blockchain and crypto world, some of which have been realized, and some have not. The term I hear most often mentioned is consensus. My own feeling is that the consensus about consensus has changed significantly over the past ten years. What do you think today, especially for you, when we talk about consensus in the crypto world and blockchain, what does that consensus refer to? What do you still believe in? What do you think we haven't done well enough?

CZ: The term consensus has a special definition in blockchain: it is the first time in human history that a technology allows a group of people to not trust each other but still maintain a shared ledger. So, in that sense, this is a form of consensus. Additionally, regarding some industry consensus, I think some have been reached, and some have not. The core consensus that has been reached is that Bitcoin has not disappeared. Bitcoin has value. Whether it is currency or a commodity is something others attribute to it; each country can label it differently, but it is something of value and utility.

Moreover, the industry has been growing. This is a new technology for money. So at the most fundamental level, there is no issue. Some consensus has not yet been reached. For example, payment is still quite small. It hasn't completely materialized, but it hasn't reached our expectations: that in about ten years, it would be used everywhere for payments. This is also because the current payment systems in most countries are still quite good, and most people do not engage in cross-border payments. The people doing cross-border payments are slowly growing. Additionally, some things have not been realized. For example, because this is a consensus mechanism, should government real estate certifications use blockchain? Using blockchain would make it much easier. Anything that requires certification can be blockchainized. However, it seems that not much has been implemented in this area. That doesn't mean it can't be realized in the future; it's just that the current implementation progress isn't very high.

As for blockchain itself, I think the performance improvements, etc., are still too slow. Creating a new blockchain and upgrading it with new technology on Bitcoin is quite challenging. Because once you upgrade Bitcoin, community voting could lead to forks, etc., so Bitcoin upgrades are relatively slow. However, because it upgrades slowly, it is particularly stable, which is also an advantage. So there are both advantages and disadvantages. In many of our early thoughts, many things have been realized, and many have not. But the entire industry is still developing continuously, and many things we can't even imagine are happening. The RWA thing, even a year and a half ago, I was still a bit skeptical about whether RWA could succeed, but now it is growing rapidly.

To be honest, I was still a bit skeptical about stablecoins five years ago, wondering how long they could last; at that time, I hadn't fully understood them. Stablecoins have their uses. So these few things are things we hadn't thought of before. I hadn't thought of them before.

Who is Underestimated Outside the Industry

Han Yang: Because whenever blockchain is mentioned, a few names come up, like you, like Vitalik, and others. In your view, including when you were writing your book, did you think of many people who are underestimated by those outside the industry? For example, someone who is very important to this industry but is unknown outside of it? Or are there some events that are like this?

CZ: Yes. I haven't thought deeply about this question, but there are definitely many. There are many technical people who were once active but have become less so over time. Especially the core Bitcoin developers. Initially, there were about ten people who had direct email interactions with Satoshi Nakamoto. Among them, several have launched their own projects, some have succeeded, and some have not been as successful, but several have gradually stepped back. These people have made significant contributions. There are also many entrepreneurs who may have started early and contributed greatly to the industry, but their companies were sold or transferred. For example, there was a young man who created Blockchain.info at the age of 22, which was the largest Bitcoin traffic website in the industry at the time, serving as a Bitcoin block explorer and wallet, and it was quite popular. This young man was named Ben Reeves. Later, he was a very introverted person, so he gradually sold the company and stepped back. He is British and has become quite quiet. I estimate that if we really dig, we could find hundreds of such people.

The Reason for Continuing to Work

Han Yang: I have one last question. What do you think continues to motivate you to work today? Because you could completely stop working, but you are clearly still a very busy person, even if you are not one of the busiest. What makes you happy?

CZ: I think it's about living; we definitely seek happiness. We could play golf all day, spend all day at the beach, but those things can become boring. Occasionally doing them can make you happy, but you won't necessarily do them 100% of the time and be particularly happy. In my understanding, any animal that can help its kind will feel happy. Our genes are designed this way. If we don't help our kind, the combat effectiveness of the entire species will be relatively weak and may be naturally eliminated. So our genes are naturally selected: when we can take care of ourselves and can take care of our kind, we take care of others, and at that time, we will feel a very happy feeling inside. Whether others say thank you or not, you don't have to care. At least for me, that's how I see it. So our genes are designed this way; it's a very fundamental thing. And how do you utilize this? For me, if I do something that I feel helps many people, I will feel happier. This has little to do with making money or fame. I feel that if I do this, I will be happy.

Just like why I still spend a lot of time on this free education platform, Gogo Academy. Every time I have a meeting with them, I feel happy. When I hear that we are now teaching 1.2 million children, and at the beginning of the year there were only over 100,000 children, when I hear that number and look at the app, I feel very happy. So why do I still do it? Just because it makes me happy. What else makes me happy? I also feel happy when I eat good food, but I can't eat too much of it; I've already gained too much weight. There are many things you can do, but doing things that contribute positively to society and humanity is basically limitless. The only limitation is my energy and time. So I just do my best; I will do as much as I can with the time I have.

Han Yang: Is your back better now?

CZ: My back is much better now. I've had two surgeries, two minor surgeries for a herniated disc. I spent about two years gradually recovering and rehabilitating. I still feel discomfort in my back if I sit for too long, and I still feel my back is weaker when I move, weaker than normal people. But I have recovered to a point where I can ski, I can kite surf, and I can sit here for one or two hours for an interview. But most of the time when I work from home, I lie in bed while making calls in the morning, with a small stand on the bed to hold the computer.

Fixed Ending of the Program: Which Building to Leave Behind

Han Yang: At the end of all our interviews, we ask the same question: if you could choose one building in the world to model and leave behind forever, which building would you choose? This isn't my area; you can choose freely. Many people choose their own room, their school, anything.

CZ: I'm not an expert in this area. I think many buildings have significant modeling meaning, but from my perspective, the older they are, the more meaningful they are for modeling because the older they are, the easier they are to deteriorate. Like the Acropolis of Athens in Greece, and Machu Picchu in Peru, which I haven't visited. I've seen the one in Greece. Then there's the Taj Mahal in India, which is one of the Seven Wonders of the World. I think these things are — but these things have already been modeled by many people. But I think the quality of your modeling is quite high, and it's okay to model them a few more times. Just like we are in Bhutan now, the buildings you see outside are very culturally rich, and there are many old buildings; I think these are quite good. So I think I'm not an expert in this area; I'm just saying whatever comes to mind.

Han Yang: Okay, thank you.

CZ: Thank you.