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:
Psychologic-Anarchist. I also run the Psychologic-Anarchist Facebook page and produce many YouTube videos. My interests lie in the intersection of counseling psychology and anarchism. I write about the depredations of psychiatry, and also the new philosophy of compassionate anarchism. We have a large community devoted to discussing psychology and relational voluntaryism.My name is Sterlin. Follow me at @sterlinluxan,
Personally, I have improved two things since coming here. I have concentrated more on writing and creativity, and I have learned Markdown code, which I had to teach myself. Also, I have gotten a chance to spread the knowledge about Dash and its innovations to a new audience. Steemit has been very productive for me!
Awesome, Tao. That is incredible. This platform has done amazing things for us as far as improving our abilities. Thank you for sharing!
Yes, I agree. Incentivizing quality has led to this. Props to the founders @ned and @dantheman for their vision.
Excellent post, as always, Sterlin. I'm kind of a sucker for anything related to neuroplasticity, so I appreciate the link there. I too have been working to put out my very best and the results have been a lot of fun so far. I do feel like I'm growing and learning at an accelerated pace (though my sleep may be suffering a bit in exchange). I hope the enthusiasm remains platform-wide, even if the price corrects over time. If enough people are interested in purchasing influence (and if a marketplace is created to give more value to the tokens used here), we could see a pretty incredible positive change all around for so many people.
Thanks. I'm really appreciating the fruits of your effort. Steemit is giving people a platform to present their best stuff, and make it even better as the community responds and creators respond to very clever incentives.
I've only been on Steemit for a little over a week, but so far, my experience validates your self-help protocol assertion. I have been posting every day, even getting up early so that I can get a post written before I head off for work. Before I joined Steemit, my goal was to do some writing every day, but without clear incentives, I missed my goal more often than not. It's amazing how even the promise of a few cents, a few comments, a few people genuinely entertained by my writing, can motivate me to sit down and crank out a post. And, like you, @sterlinluxan, my mind has been spinning out ideas every night around bed time. I've got a list of ideas long enough to get me through the one month of daily posting that I promised myself I'd do when I joined Steemit. And at the rate the ideas are coming, I'll most certainly have dozens more by the time the month is done.
Great post. Thank you!
I've found the same experience while working on articles/blogs for this site. I overdeveloped mathematics and logic skills early in life and neglected writing and creativity. I read blogs I wrote 8-10 years ago and it's night and day compared to my writing now; it's like I was fucking illiterate. Never stop growing or learning.
However, I want to make a slight improvement on this statement:
I wrote a 3000+ word blog on one of the most interesting stories of my career: A Poker Paradox: Sometimes Winning Can Hurt More Than Losing. Unfortunately I chose to do so before I had built a large enough following, so the rewards don't match the effort that went into writing it and the intrigue of the story.
Steemit truly encourages individuals to participate in the community and cultivate a following on the forum and only afterwards, then produce and create their best possible content.
As always appreciate your work and hope you continue growing and learning as I have.
^ A great polished article. Thank you
No problem. Thank you. Did you enjoy the content?
Very much so. It was well written and a smooth read. You should check out some of my own articles if you ever get a chance. I'm the Editor in Chief of Digital Assets News.
I will certainly do that!
great outlook, steemit is Olympic training for the brain
Absolutely. Thanks, Craig!
YES! This is one of many reasons this platform is so exciting. This is a game with layers and layers of depth and meaning, and the opportunities for personal growth are infinite. We're digging the economic/social/political/financial implications, and it's a real hoot to enjoy bigger and bigger brains every single day. Thanks again, @sterlinluxan!
As with everything, motivation always drives us to improve. And the more immediate the results of our actions, aka how long it takes to get paid on steemit vs youtube, and the more granular the effects, the more effective the motivation is.
That's right erroneous. Well said. As per usual, I appreciate your interaction within this community.
I love my Steemit carrots. They keep me coming back for more.
Nonsense post.
Almost everything in life can promote all these things you just dscribed, including the rest of the Social Media platforms.
While only Steemit makes you a super moron!
Hey sterlinluxan, are you hiding something from us?
Awesome post, this is the beginning of something big!
None of my posts have really amounted to too much as of yet, but I'm encouraged by that feedback in the knowledge that there's nobody flagging me, and nobody inhibiting my exposure via some algorithm that prefers particular types of content. Now I can be sure that the crickets I'm hearing are specifically because my content needs work :), and I know that if I simply keep working at it and improve my work, people will start to follow it and consider it valuable by voting it up.Awesome post @sterlinluxan. I've only been on the site for a few days, but I'm already noticing the effects you mention about neuroplasticity and motivation. I attempted to create a blog several years ago, and because of the controversial and perceived political nature of my content, I was unable to monetize any of it, and so I became quickly discouraged, as I also experienced censorship when trying to share on social media. I've found new vigor since I discovered this platform, and I've had no shortage of ideas. I wake up in the middle of the night these days thinking of what to post up next, and when I am sleeping, I sleep much more deeply than I have up until recently. I attribute this to the mental energy I've been expending, and the synaptic connections I'm likely forming.
hereHi @sterlinluxan! I just wanted to let you know that my new post "The 40 anarchists you want to follow on Steemit!" is up, and you're on the list :-) You can find it
What about the incentive of downvoting/flagging others' posts? That seems like a huge negative to me.