All spark, no fire

Two electricians, two carpenters, a painter and plumber walk into a house...

There is a lot of activity around our place today and unfortunately, there have been a few slipups and oversights in various areas. One of them was that a cable for a power outlet was pulled through on the wrong side of a wall. While this wasn't a huge problem to correct, the correction means that three walls will need to be repaired and repainted, as they had to have a channel cut into them to hide the cabling. In Finland, it is quite common to have electrical wiring on the outside of the wall, but we have done our best to hide as much of it as we can, since we have put in a lot of new walls.

The electricians also found out that there was no cabling put in for the smoke alarms and now that the ceiling is in place, we will have to put in battery operated ones instead, rather than having them on the same network as all the rest. Not the end of the world, but still annoying.

The plumber is also looking into a leaking shower unit and according to him, we are going to have to get a plumber from the manufacturer to have a look also, as it is likely a warranty thing and will require them to check it. We have already contacted them and of course, they don't want to take responsibility either, even though it is still under warranty.

These kinds of things are no big deal for each individual error, yet when they are clustered together, they make quite an impact. Mistakes happen of course, even though there are plans made and conversations had, but they always seem to come at inopportune times when schedules and resources are tight and time and money is of the essence. Such is life.

There are a lot of things that are going on now and the coming few days are going to be pretty active around here, as we try to get all of the little tasks done, on top of all the big tasks. After that is done, we then have to clean every service we have, as the dust has got into every nook and cranny it possibly can.

On another note, I read a FUD article about Bitcoin, that had nothing to do with Bitcoin at all. Like I was saying in my article yesterday on how the media generates clicks, they are connecting anything they can to Bitcoin.

At first glance, it would appear that this criminal mastermind who was unknowingly hiring an undercover detective to kill his ex, was using bitcoin to mask his identity, which is obvious proof of what Bitcoin holders are like - until the last line.

Mr Berkett then made a final $US1000 ($A1300) payment through Western Union late Thursday, court documents show.

How come the title isn't "Man uses Western Union to complete hire of hitman"?

It is pretty shameful reporting in my opinion, but it is par for the course in regards to how the media behaves in general, as they focus on what will grab attention and meet the expected stereotypes of the audience. It is all just clickbait nonsense, while what is actually important, is given no visibility.

I was just in a session with a client and we were talking about investing, something that she is interested in, but doesn't talk about often. In the average world, very few people talk about investing with their friends, family or colleagues - because it is not culturally appropriate to do so, let alone go into details about it. This is something that I find incredibly poor in culture, as monetary issues are something that affects pretty much all of us, especially the average, yet it has been made a taboo to discuss.

However, it is because of our unwillingness to talk about these kinds of things that stories such as these can exist in the first place as anyone who has a little bit of knowledge and critical thinking ability would realize that the detail of using Bitcoin is irrelevant to the article itself and is nothing more than an oddity of the circumstances, not a focus. Recognizing this makes it very apparent that the headline is to manipulate the audience into reading, again like I said in the article linked, attracting both the for and against sides of the equation.

But, what is really the shame about the lack of discussion is that many people miss out on the opportunity to be influenced positively by their peer group. Our peer groups are highly influential on our lives, which is why social proofing is so valuable for validating a product or idea, but most of what we discuss in our groups are trivialities that have very little impact on our lives, especially in the areas where we are suffering.

While I understand the urge to avoid discussing pain points, not discussing them lowers our abilities to find a solution, making our suffering enduring or worsening over time. Having some honest conversations around the topics that affect us, can go a long way in helping us improve our knowledge and our approach to coping with or dealing with them, using the wisdom and experience of others to drive progress.

Surrounding ourselves with conversations that avoid these areas effectively decreases our ability to deal with them and can leave us bitter, believing that the world is not fair because the neighbor has a new car while we are struggling to pay for groceries.

Perhaps the difference of willingness to have difficult discussions relates to whether we have a growth mindset or not and if we are truly interested in improving ourselves. Those who want to improve will seek out the information and skill development sources that can help them down the path, which includes assembling a reference group of peers who can support the growth and most likely, people who are also looking for support. This creates a not only a growth opportunity environment for the individual, but each individual adds to the value of the group, potentially compounding gains by combining experiences and some shared resources.

Of course, we in crypto are outliers in the discussions surrounding economy, finance and investment, with a lot of the reason because of the general mindset of transparency and accountability in the industry. As such, we as a group have also been instruments in building and supporting the growth of the industry in ways that allows us to be individual owners, as well as being able to pool our individual resources to be part of a peer group that compounds our values in various ways, as we are simultaneously both private and cooperative banks, as well as owners, investors, operators and consumers.

While the sparks fly in the media to attract attention, they are generally focusing on the irrelevant aspects of the industry, while what is valuable is the fire burning hot throughout the community, a fir that will consume much of the traditional economy in the coming decade or two. As attention around Bitcoin and crypto increases, more and more people will be introduced to not only the freedom of economy and currency, but also the freedom of discussion of these things publicly, in ways that the public has never done before and once this habit begins, a whole range of other topics are going to be brought into the fore and, many questions about the status quo problems are not only going to be raised, but be solved.

Just like with all of the people involved in building my house, where there are going to be communication errors and failures of various kinds, as timing, resources and communications misalign, the dramas and failures of crypto will smooth out eventually and the industry will come together and be ready to comfortably live in. But, if you want to have input into the design decisions, you have to have some skin in the game, otherwise just like most on the internet - it is all spark and no fire, while trapped on the wrong side of the wall.

Taraz [ Gen1: Hive ]