Steemit is much more than just a cryptocurrency payment platform for content builders. It is also a psychological tool to improve overall functioning. It can make users SUPERHUMAN.
It is the self-help protocol.
The incentive structure on Steemit encourages individuals to produce and create their best possible content, while being mindful of and disclosing their own experiences. As podcast host George Donnelly said, the platform beckons people to perform a little open heart surgery.
The Steemit experience revolves around constantly exploring the self and revealing internal discoveries for the Steemit community. This subjective expression allows for personal growth and greatly adds to the total value of the ecosystem. In this sense, it is about collective catharsis and improving the quality of life through collaborative value production.
In my mind, this is the hidden brilliance of Steemit and it is revolutionary to me. But currently, it is a more subtle or peripheral aspect of the technology.
How Exactly does the self-help protocol change people?
Whenever people practice a skill or ability, including the creative arts, photography, or writing, their brains network and grow in those areas. Neurons create new synaptic connections like a network reaches out to produce new nodes. In the literature, this brain rewiring is referred to as neuroplasticity. It just means that the brain changes in response to human activity, potentially making it stronger.
Indeed, repetitive creative endeavors gears the brain for more semantic and memory based learning, which improves all of these abilities and more across the board. For instance, look at a professional athlete's brains and one will notice that their motor areas are more dense and networked than the average person. Look at a musical genius, and notice that brain areas associated with music are consolidated and thick.
Steemit simply promotes the same kind of professionalism and consistency that allows its users to grow their brains in the same way as a professional or genius would, and this creates a kind psychological network affect. It will allow creators to more quickly get in their 10,000 hours of practice in order to achieve mastery in a given area, as Malcolm Gladwell discussed.
This will occur because the Steemit blockchain rewards consistent output and maintenance of the creative process. Therefore, constant work will transform the brain and ultimately make many Steemit users more intelligent, creative, and self-aware.
Here are my personal experiences in using the platform:
I have always been a creative person, but I have not always been consistent or could find incentive to do the work. And prior to Steemit, I was using a lot of my creative energy to satisfy some third party rather than myself.
This will still occur on the platform to a degree, but I can produce more of what I want and I am still encouraged to make something novel or game changing. Because of this new kind of self-therapy and spontaneous dynamic, I already see myself growing as a productive human being within my particular niche.
Sometimes I even stay up at night contemplating the next idea with a cup of coffee or bottle of gin. I am regularly trying to produce something amazing and awe-inspiring, and therefore the creative circuits in my head are always buzzing with ecstasy at the process of seeing the value of my original productions.
In this sense, Steemit has been one of the most important creative platforms or technologies to grace my existence. I cannot wait to see more of marvelous creations crop up from users on a daily basis. I may even surprise myself as I continue to make things.
Speaking of which, this was the video I created about this phenomenon of self-help or therapeutic protocols:
My name is Sterlin. Follow me at 