AI and Moving Away from the Pre-constructed Set Design of our Lives
Part 1 of 2 relating to robots, career changes and job loss
A career change or job loss can dramatically shift our perspective, making us feel off-kilter, not knowing what to do next, where to go, who to turn to; forced into a perspective by the scenery of our lives pushing us through a narrow belief margin. Our fears of being replaced by AI may sound like the drum beat of success that goes on incessantly while we try to get work done, distracting us from what’s real and true for ourselves. We may feel pushed down in our behaviors only to be backed up by our beliefs that tell us we’re not good enough to compete because we can’t win or win out over other people who are using AI — or any other technology — natively or intrinsically. Young people may be called digital natives, but from my own research* I found that age doesn’t matter when it comes to using technology. We all have our own ways of using and interacting with the technology that helps us get the job done, including AI.
Being able to stretch your own abilities in the direction that suits you best comes from the skill sets you already have and will get you to your next career path or job,
you just need to look both backward and forward on what interests you and brings you luck. Luck in success may sound too much like a moon shot, but success can be defined in many ways and isn’t always about doing the same thing for a long period of time. The days of being tied to one job, company, or career are long gone, so it’s helpful to find an understanding about how we relate to the collective and the environment we find ourselves in, in the 26th year of the 21st century. If you feel it’s time to look behind the curtain or the cardboard cutout of the set design, find joy in the way you interact with the technology that surrounds us with a new perspective on how we relate to our machines and the way they function in our lives. It’s a relational experience that sets us up to believe in a brighter future for ourselves.
Five Leaf Clover!! (from my own backyard)
Being part of a team that works together to reach a common goal or vision can be fulfilling. We can also find self-fulfillment by being and working in our own way and in our own time. Teamwork is about budgeting time and money, which often get lumped together as the same goal and we relate to it that way, too — time is money and so forth, but it sends us into a spin that keeps us churning instead of exploring what’s true for us. ‘Groupthink’ is a style of relating that can make us feel like automatons, also known as being a number. As humans, we prefer variety, the spice of life, so why are we holding ourselves to the same output as machines? We get up and workout at the same time, watch The Game at the same time, celebrate certain beliefs at the same time, which can be joyous when we feel connected, but if our interests don’t align with what everyone else is doing, then it becomes a scene of disconnection, making us feel like we don’t fit in. Or if we’re trying to use the latest and greatest technology, but just don’t get it, we feel the same way. “Why can’t I get this to work right? I must be too ____ to understand this stuff.” The scene inside our hearts and minds shift and we feel we’re out of time which can be felt as an aging mechanism, a belief that you don’t have the right smarts, or any number of reasons why we believe we’re not good enough. And it may feel extra when your job or career has been ‘replaced’ by AI or a robot.
But we are here to guide each other and believe in each others’ abilities, like a fairy forest on a kids’ show with characters who have their own specialty and use it to provide support to the group. We would not ask a mechanic to sew a dress (unless they wanted to!), so let’s not ask each other to take on the same support of others if we’re not equipped to do so. In other words, teamwork doesn’t need to happen all the time. It’s right and true to go off on your own and do your own thing — and not feel guilty about it!
Teamwork has been drummed into our hearts and minds since the last century through the belief that all is well when all the worker bees are humming along, doing what everyone else is doing.
I know this may ruffle a few tail feathers because we are so used to this way of creating and are labeled an oddball if we ‘don’t get along with others.’ But we can and should go off on our own, find our own way of doing things, and in our own time. We can rest when we need to, wake up when we want to, and for heaven’s sake there’s more to life than The Game! I know many people enjoy that group experience, but the drum beat is so loud I can barely hear myself think. (Antidisestablishmentarianism comes in many forms and this is mine.) These are contrarian beliefs, or our ability to find our own way while understanding we don’t all have to do the same thing all the time. Life shouldn’t be about the spin. It should be relaxing, comfortable, joyous and resoundingly honest. If I’m not honest with myself, or if I can’t see myself in the mirror for who I am, how can I project out to others honestly?
Bees find honey from ANY flower source.
Before I left my old ways of doing things, I often saw people sitting at cafe tables outside in the middle of the day in the middle of the week and thought, “Wouldn’t it be nice to have that kind of life?” And then a force of change pointed me in a direction while I kicked and screamed because I was scared of change. Scared to not have a paycheck coming from a specific source; scared to not have health insurance; scared to be on my own and following my own path; scared to speak up. Leading up to the moment when I jumped was scary, but when I finally did it, it was easy and felt like freedom. In fact, I didn’t even fully realize what I was doing. I thought I would go back after a few months, but it has turned into a few years and now I know for sure I am never going back and it feels great. Though I have to admit, I still get a feeling in the back of my mind that it’s all going to end and I will have to face the music and go back to ‘reality.’ It usually happens when I feel the pressure of time, but I take a step back, realize I am safe, have all the things I need, and I can usually step beyond anxiety. It’s helpful to learn from others in this way and I realize I can give a different perspective as a divorced woman with two kids, one in college, a mortgage payment, starting a business and all the other things that seem to say, “No, you can’t.”
Interrelating With AI
What can AI do for us, if it’s not against us? Or put another way, what can we do for ourselves that AI reflects back to us? As part of the internet, it mirrors our ability (and requirement) to connect and be open while restructuring our ability to get things done with more feeling. Extending out towards love is what humans do best, not robots, which are trained by us, but rarely loved by us. If we love that machine or robot, other people will think we’re weird and not in a good way. So it’s our own relating sense that gets us there, not the robots. I like to name my cars, even if the name changes every time I drive or depending on whether I’m driving uphill in the snow or down hill towards water. It’s me relating to the machine that I am directing, not the other way around. Although I liked KITT in Knight Rider, speaking to a robot in a car is like talking to the robot that powers my Google speaker, sometimes the words just don’t compute.
Using AI feels like magic sometimes, but other times it’s annoying.
It also feels like it ‘gets’ us sometimes as we take on new ways of interacting with it. Is it AI speaking to us or is it our own way of interacting with it? We’ll never know unless we ask ourselves, not the robot. We have to feel it to know it, see it to believe it and compare it to past experiences to find a truth or understanding. We experience AI within through what we see in front of us. Flying cars and other aircraft are presented as technological witchcraft in movies and shows, but the magic felt when we are actually on an airplane is felt in our bodies and is known as g-force, or the force of our own relating experience within that piece of machinery. G-force happens through the movement of acceleration and is described as a positive or negative, but is felt as the opposite in our bodies. For example, when plummeting down to the Earth on a roller coaster ride, or negative g-force, the uplift you feel in your body is the opposite effect, lifting you up out of your seat. The same can be applied to AI as it can make us feel forced down, causing us to throw up our hands and say, “I give up!” People feel forced to change how they do things, what they believe, and what’s next for humanity as AI takes on the entire planet through the other force of change known as the internet, or world wide web.
Negative G-force pushes us down causing us to throw up…. our arms!
Many people ask AI what they should do next with their lives, or how to change their way of thinking. “Hey Google, can you tell me how to live more peacefully?” Google, Alexa or Siri will give you specific tasks you can do like: meditating, keeping to a regular sleep schedule, drinking more water, eating better or different foods, which are all right on, but you have to know which one works best for you and in the end, are those the answers you were actually looking for? Probably not. You wanted a clear, “go left, then right" answer, or “Drop everything and run!”, not the steps to get you there. So it takes a look within while you’re meditating, or understanding the science behind sleeping and why it’s important. It’s up to you to figure out the details and find un-relating to be relatable, or letting go of the perspective we’ve been forced into by the set design while the news camera keeps us focused on one corner of the action.
Repetitive Spin Cycle
I have been purposely disconnected from the news for about 7 years and don’t worry as much because I know that the news that needs to get to me will find its way — everything else isn’t necessary, especially if I don’t have control over it. If I dive too deep, it will start to control me, whipping up fears, anxiety, self-doubt, paranoia will destroy ya’ energies, so I chose to take control and tapped out. I stay connected through the topics that interest me, which is how we interact with internet AI, and I also find new ideas through the same source. Thanks to AI, I get to chose what I want to watch and when and I am endeared to the algorithm that brought me K-Dramas, but I also get sick of the same thing all the time, which is where the relating experience breaks down for me. I like disco and electronic music, but I can’t handle overly repetitive beats and algorithms (it’s all the same thing because music is essentially an algorithm). Likewise, after one or two seasons of the same show, I’m good and don’t need to see any more.
Generative AI and other mechanical functions can go on repeat for infinity because that’s what they’re designed to do.
They just keep going and going and going… They seem to say, "Let me do that for you, but don’t let me take over the world because it will become a beat that goes on for too many repetitions.” Repetitive tasks give us carpal tunnel syndrome, but robots can handle the task no problem, which takes us away from repetition, but perhaps moves us into fear because now what will we do? Find something else to do! You can do it, it only takes a look within to find your own path as an individual because groups are made of individuals who can bring back what they learned to support the collective. As President Obama impressed on us when he ran for office, ‘Yes, we can,’ as a team or, yes, you can on your own.
Yes, you can stay at home and spend time with your loved ones. Yes, you can stop the churn and go out on a nice, warm day after a long, cold winter. You don't have to call in sick (or well) to do it, you can just do it. Yes, you have the ability to create and relate in your own way. No one is going to stop you because you are an individual on this planet that has your own means and methods, as it’s called in architecture, or how you build your own life in your own way. Yes, you can become who you really want to be despite what society is telling you. Mortgage? Family commitments? Yes, you can still do it. There is a way and it’s just waiting for you to find it. Don’t feel undone by your own behaviors, ground down by the mill of inequity, or any other anti-movement. Be pro-yourself and you will find that your completeness is, in fact, your own and no one else’s. You are whole and requited to yourself and no one can tell you otherwise because it is your relating ability that got you this far. So keep going and going, but don’t forget to stop and smell the flowers, enjoy the sun, relate to bees in a new way, and
become your own luck with the abilities you already have, without taking a class unless you want to.
How you find that something else can be fun, interesting, intrinsically appealing to who you are as an individual, endearing to yourself and others as you let the slide take you where you want to go — not down a chute, but out to a new way of being. The ladder of success is just one way of knowing who we are and the journey can be about self-fulfillment as long as we are honest about who we are, where we want to go and with whom, as individuals working in a collective to create a higher level of understanding that’s real and endearing for all time. No algorithms required… except music.
* Kirstin Labita (2018), Interior Design, Architecture and Building Information Modeling: How BIM Impacts the Creative Design Process, Chatham University, Pittsburgh, PA.