We live in an era where r/Wallstreetbets has made it into the headlines and our textbooks, a community that espouses the goal of “Get rich or die trying” with hundreds of thousands of dollars being won or lost within the span of hours. This way of life makes sense because the modern American lifestyle of high debt, high stress and low livelihood has reached a breaking point. Here are some numbers to consider:
• The average American student debt is $32,731 for an undergraduate degree
• American medical debt totaled at least $195 billion in 2019
• Average annual cost of health insurance in the US is $7,470 for an individual and $21,342 for a family
• Average bank checking account interest rate is 0.03%, 0.06% for a savings account
• 30% of American adults have insomnia
We live in a time where everyone has a “side hustle”, nobody can sleep and many of us owe Uncle Sam one of our kidneys (worth about $262,000 in 2019). Enter the modern phenomenon of cryptocurrency. With cryptocurrency, any regular Joe or Jane can contribute computing power to mine new coins, turn their gaming skills into income with play-to-earn, and generate passive income by providing liquidity on exchanges. The APY on cryptocurrency are returns that we only ever dreamed of with fiat, from 5% on BTC with Celsius.network to upwards of 200% on various coin pairings with Harvest.finance. Finally, the common person has access to rates of return previously only available to the very financially elite of the world.
I think of alternative and traditional medicines as being in the same vein as cryptocurrency. Herbology and dietetics were the first human medicines, the materials were wide spread and only required practical knowledge in order to benefit individuals and their groups. Modern medicine is amazing, it saves, extends and betters lives every day. However, modern medicine has many high barriers for average people to access or benefit from it, much like the high-flying fiat interest rates that are outside of our reach. Modern medicine can save your life with emergency surgeries or cancer treatment to pull you back from the edge of death. However, for the millions of people that cannot afford insurance or cannot afford the necessary procedures that insurance companies do not cover, the promise of relief can lay just out of reach. Here is where traditional, herb and food based, medicines can open the door back to health. Food and herbs are usable by anyone with access to the internet, to research what to eat or what tea to make, and to order it to your doorstep. Then there is a step further where individuals can learn from more experienced people who can teach how and where to locate and identify the local plants that can be used in the kitchen, making medicine even more accessible.
When medicine is separated from the hospitals and doctors offices that we look to for aid in our most difficult time, we can take our health into our own hands. When we do this, we have the opportunity to reduce the amount of time and money we spend on fixing long-term problems that can be relieved and often reversed by deliberate healthy eating and intentional inclusion of herbal medicines. In the same way, cryptocurrency offers an escape hatch from the constant cycle of debt-overwork-medical emergency that wears down our bodies and our wallets. Cryptocurrency returns the tools for financial freedom back into the hands of the average Jane and Joe through the common medium of the internet just as herbalism returns the tools for health via the common medium of nature. Because cryptocurrency and herbalism are so accessible, why not use both to better our lives?
How have you seen the accessibility of cryptocurrency change lives? Do you think the same changes can happen with herbal medicine? Leave a comment!
My links:
My Blog: https://bowtieacupuncture.blogspot.com/
My read.cash: https://read.cash/@Casper00/three-tips-for-success-in-traditional-chinese-medicine-school-4b9c01ea
Hive: https://hive.blog/@casper0-0/posts
CoinMarketCap: https://coinmarketcap.com/invite?ref=TRHEZLDU
Celsius: https://celsiusnetwork.app.link/1666125f73
Splinterlands: https://splinterlands.com?ref=casper0-0
Upland: https://r.upland.me/fRJy
Rollercoin: https://rollercoin.com/?r=kpctij29
Gods Unchained: Sign up using with my referral code: JLYYIMSpPH on the website here https://godsunchained.com/account/register?referral=JLYYIMSpPH
