In this first episode of the 2026 Global Outlook trilogy, I trace the world’s journey into 2026 — a decade shaped by shocks, wars, inflation, political fragmentation, and the fastest technological acceleration in modern history.

From the pandemic and its economic aftershocks to the return of hard geopolitics in Ukraine, the Sahel, the Red Sea and the Indo-Pacific, we explore how the foundations of global stability shifted. We also examine the humanitarian devastation in Gaza, where the UN’s International Court of Justice ruled there is a “plausible risk of genocide,” and how this moment reshaped public opinion, alliances, and moral confidence across continents.

This episode connects the major forecasts from the World Bank, IMF, OECD, Morgan Stanley and The Economist with the deeper forces driving the decade: AI, energy transitions, climate volatility, inequality, demographics, and the widening generational divide.

The goal is simple: to understand the full picture — the economic, political, emotional, and structural realities that shape the world we are entering. Before we can navigate 2026, we must understand the ground beneath our feet.

What does it mean to be human in the age of machines?

In this final chapter of Becoming Ourselves, I close the trilogy by looking at where we stand — on the edge of the Intelligence Age — and ask one final, urgent question: what will it do to us?

When I first started Decoded by Mo, I thought I’d focus on technology — AI, strategy, innovation. But over time, I realized something deeper was happening. We aren’t just using new tools; we’re becoming new kinds of humans. Our physiology, our psychology, our relationships — everything is shifting.
That realization led to this trilogy: a journey through history, myth, and meaning — to understand not only how technology evolved, but how it changed us.

In Part 1: From Survival to Civilization, we traced humanity’s early chapters — the Extractive Age — when we learned to shape the earth, build societies, and master energy. We saw how our need to survive turned into our desire to control, and how each breakthrough carried its own cost.
In Part 2: Machines, Services, and Experiences, we entered the Industrial and Transformative ages. Factories, electricity, data, and platforms reshaped the world. We gained speed and connection, but lost stillness and presence. We built systems that promised freedom yet quietly trained our habits, our attention, and even our sense of self.

And now, in Part 3: The Intelligence Age, we arrive at the present — and perhaps the threshold of something greater, or more dangerous.
AI is not just another invention. It’s the first system we’ve built that thinks, learns, and decides. It’s not a continuation — it’s a rupture.

This episode starts with the haunting Qatsi Trilogy — films that show life out of balance, in transformation, and in conflict. Through those images, we see our own world reflected back: the rhythm of platforms, the liquid lives of gig workers, the invisible megamachines that organize billions of us every day.
But we also see resilience — the quiet, stubborn creativity that refuses to dissolve, even inside the algorithmic flow.

We explore how education is being rewired in the Intelligence Age — moving from memorization to judgment, from endurance to attention fitness, from test scores to meaningful creation.
We look at how teams and leadership are being redefined — not by hierarchy, but by trust, perspective, and shared values. Because even in a world of infinite automation, human connection remains the only true sanctuary.

And finally, we reflect on what all this means.
Each era — Extractive, Transformative, Intelligent — gave us new powers but asked for something in return.
We mastered the land but lost balance.
We mastered the machine but lost presence.
We mastered information but risk losing meaning.

Becoming Ourselves was never about reaching the next age.
It was about remembering who we are — and deciding who we still want to be.
Because the danger of this age isn’t that machines will stop understanding us; it’s that we’ll stop understanding ourselves.

Our responsibility now is not just to innovate, but to remember. To slow down, to connect, to teach the next generations that being human isn’t about knowing everything — it’s about caring deeply.
To hold on to empathy, curiosity, and meaning — before we outsource them, too.

This episode is both a reflection and a beginning.
While working on it, I realized that this question — how we become ourselves again in a world of artificial minds — deserves a deeper space. That’s why I’ve decided to write a book, Becoming Ourselves, continuing this journey into who we are, and who we are becoming.

Because the next era isn’t about machines becoming more like us.
It’s about us remembering how to be more like ourselves.

History isn’t only about kings, wars, or inventions — it’s about how humans transform. How our relationships, art, psychology, and even our bodies change when economies shift.

In this episode of Decoded by Mo, I’ll navigate from machinesto services to experiences — tracing how value creation evolved across the last two centuries, and how resilience kept reinventing itself along the way.

I begin with the Industrial Age, when coal, steam, and steelmultiplied human muscle. Cities like Manchester became “workshops of the world,” filled with factories, smoke, and new opportunities — but also poverty, disease, and child labor. Time itself was rewired: factory bells replaced seasons, railways created standardized time zones, and education trained children for industrial discipline.

Art became both mirror and critique. Dickens, Turner, Shelley, and Blake captured the hopes and horrors of industry, while futurists celebrated machines. War accelerated everything — from tanks and planes to nuclear bombs.Oil emerged as the fuel of modern power, shifting global wealth to the Middle East. Resilience in this era meant enduring disruption, adapting to machines, and surviving mechanized war.

Next, the Service Economy took shape. Once goods were abundant, value shifted to banks, insurance companies, hospitals, schools, and bureaucracies. White-collar work surpassed factory work. WWII logistics and Cold War systems showed that resilience meant organizational scale and institutional strength. Education expanded into universities and MBAs. Cultureindustrialized too: Hollywood, advertising, and pop music turned services into identities. But fragility appeared in overgrown bureaucracies and crises like the Great Depression or the oil shocks.

Then came the Experience Economy. Disneyland in 1955 sold fantasy, Starbucks turned coffee into identity, Apple built theaters of technology.

People no longer measured wealth only by goods or services, but by meaning and memory. Tourism became the largest industry on earth. Pop art, advertising, and music festivals blurred art and commerce. Even geopolitics became theater: the Cold War staged experiences through Olympics, propaganda, and the moon landing.

But experiences proved fragile. They depend on authenticity, trust, and stability. Over-commercialization, overcrowding, or crisis can collapse them overnight. COVID-19 revealed this fragility dramatically — yet resilience emerged digitally through streaming, virtual events, and online communities.

Across these three shifts, one lesson stands out: value keeps moving, and resilience keeps changing shape. Machines gave us productivity but alienation. Services gave us stability but bureaucracy. Experiences gave us meaning but fragility.

Understanding these transformations isn’t about nostalgia — it’s about preparing for what comes next. Because just as goods gave way to services, and services to experiences, we now stand at the threshold of platforms, data, and artificial intelligence.

This episode isn’t just about economics. It’s about how technology, war, art, and culture reshaped who we are. And it’s about how resilience — in body, mind, and society — remains the thread connecting past and future.