I’ve had many conversations about AI lately and noticing how many people in my orbit are going to chatbots for advice. And what I’m hearing is, “I got great advice!” I believe this and there are certainly instances when this is a good strategy.
But what might be getting lost is the precious voice of our inner teacher.
Parker Palmer, persistent champion of our inner teacher, says, “Every time we get in touch with the truth source we carry within, there is a net moral gain for all concerned…We all have an inner teacher whose guidance is more reliable than anything we can get from any doctrine, ideology, collective belief system, institution, or leader.”
So, if this inner teacher is so important, how do we access it? One of the best tools I have found is getting quiet and waiting. A chatbot wants to keep us on the line, keep us interacting. They instantly spit back (maybe good) advice and then ask, “Would you like me to create a timeline with milestones?” Before we know it, we have created an optimization plan for ourselves without doing any of the work to TUNE IN. We are missing out on the truth source within, which is something that can only be cultivated with deep attention over time.
I’ve been mulling over a dilemma lately. This morning, swimming laps at the pool, a decision came to me very clearly. Later, at home taking a shower (where many of our best ideas materialize because our inner teacher isn’t silenced by screens or noise), it came to me that I wanted to write about what I’m writing about right now. Silence and an intention to tune in gave me both gifts, not a chatbot I’m asking to make things easier for me.
And maybe AI would have given me both deliverables, but what I’d be missing out on is the process. There is great value is doing some things the hard way. Tuning into ourselves is simple, it’s free, but it is hard. It requires the ability to sit with ambiguity and uncertainty. It requires the ability to welcome our shadow sides, to be wrong, to be patient (which might be hardest of all for me). For technical solutions, it’s wonderful that we can watch a video or get step-by-step instructions. For getting in touch with our inner teacher? That’s a process we can’t afford to shortchange. There is too much learning along the way.
The Industrial Revolution taught us to prize efficiency and profit above everything else, and it’s no way to live. Luckily, there are millions of us who are questioning those junk values, doing things like making art, sending snail mail, cooking or growing our own food, writing our own newsletters, protesting, discerning, risking saying something “the wrong way,” bringing our bodies into rooms with other bodies despite the messiness and inefficiency of it all.
Let’s have the courage to do some things the hard way! Sending you lots of love whatever your day and week holds.