The Way It's Always Been

The event held last week went amazingly well and the enthusiasm it has generated throughout the organization has been contagious. Even those who tend to be more the complainer rather than offering solutions, are excitedly taking things forward. It is pretty motivating to see and I think that it has put me more on the ball too. And, based on the feedback from pretty much everyone, a new standard has been set, expectations adjusted and, the paradigm shifted.

Next year is going to be difficult to plan.

But, this is the case with many traditions, where while some just fade into obscurity, others are changed through a relatively rapid process, with something stepping in and essentially killing the past overnight. It doesn't mean that the past goes quietly, quite the opposite, but there can be monumental shifts in relatively short timeframes when there is the right drive of support behind it.

One piece of good news I heard today from Australia, is the legalization for psychiatrists to prescribe MDMA and Psilocybin for some forms of depression and PTSD - a step in the right direction. The more this happens, the more normalized this kind of treatment becomes and the wider the adoption.

The biggest thing that has held these and things like marijuana medications back, are social stigmas from people who do not have the experience to make these kinds of decisions. This is also the case with cryptocurrencies too, where the majority of people don't possess the knowledge required, but are still making decisions based on what they know, or don't know.

For example, in Lisbon the other week I had trouble paying with a bank card, as a change at the Finnish banks at the turn of the year required approving transactions outside of the country. I couldn't do this from the app. One of my friends joked, "if only you could pay here Bitcoin", as if I couldn't. I told them I can and they looked at me like I was insane.

I don't know how many years it has been possible to spend BTC through cards like Wirex and Crypto.com, but still people don't seem to know. But, at that point, my friends had a paradigm shift, as they realized they are not quite as learned as they thought themselves and the information they are currying is a handful of years old at best. For people working in the tech industry, that is an eternity.

But, while they still don't understand thew value propositions now or the potential in the future, they are starting to recognize that the arguments they have had are starting to dissolve in their minds, breaking down the barriers that have held them back from dipping into the industry. And, as one mental block is removed, they discover that the next one is not nearly as difficult to get over as the last, so the dominoes fall - one by one.

All technology that challenges the status quo goes through this process of changing the cultural paradigms and as the changeover happens, development of the industry quickens alongside it, as more people want to participate and, there is a growing market-base to cater for, with evolving demands.

Just like these meetings where many of my colleagues have been to several prior and had certain expectations, when something comes along that breaks their paradigm positively, they can jump in enthusiastically and start exploring a world they thought they knew, with fresh eyes and renewed vigor. And the solutions they find and suggest bring them into the fold and get them emotionally invested in taking next steps toward new outcomes. And when they see and especially start to feel the benefits, they double-down further.

There are always going to be naysayers who will say "it can't be done" at every step of the way, while it is being done. There will always be those who do not see the steps of progression, because it isn't yet perfect. But, at the end of the day, change is a constant, but the rate of change is affected by the conditions and catalysts applied. When it comes to the shift in crypto, the pendulum is swinging and the paradigm shifting. At some point, it will seem like it has just always been the way.

Taraz [ Gen1: Hive ]