Our world is changing drastically, radically and incredibly quickly. Our generations are experiencing life that we have never known or been documented, and living through such dramatic change, we no longer have any idea what might happen for our society or ourselves as individuals. It is a confusing and potentially scary or worrying time for many.

With the rise of artificial intelligence and our immediate reliance upon it, for many it feels like a welcome, soothing tool that aids us to be, do and accomplish more, quicker and more efficiently than ever. 

But, despite the reality that our striving to always accomplish, be and do more might well be the foundational trauma and struggle to our humanity and human nature that causes much of our stress, strains and disrupted wellness already. 

As I have healed and as I have learned and grown through a natural recovery journey. As I connect with the land, nature and even developed projects and spaces rooted in the Earth, learning an ecosystem mindset is what has aided my recovery most. 

Healing forced me to slow down. Recovery taught me to be more considered, considerate and intentional with my choices, approach and actions. 

Even this blog and all the content I create for Love School, despite the allure of AI, have almost all been produced by me, the long way and typed or edited by my hand. Using my time, energy, focus and ideas, aligned with the natural intelligence my recovery process has allowed me to access and develop. 

I was never stupid, but I was traumatised, limited in many ways, conditioned, and always doing and moving fast! Trauma after trauma, crisis after crisis, kept me going and going in one way or another. Either through working, avoiding, coping and then searching, waiting and seeking. 

Even now, with retrospect, although it was difficult and I would rather not have experienced those times, I understand why I did, what they taught me, the effect they had and why my healing process unfolded as it has. 

I have only learned that through slowing down, paying attention and relearning to trust my natural intelligence. 

The reward comes from the process and experience. Despite it not always being easy or making sense at the time. Each experience builds something innate and compounds ot create the story of existence that is… me.

As I healed and went through recovery, natural intelligences taught me:

• To tap into my intuition, to understand it and trust myself. 

• To develop emotional intelligence, to know what my emotions were telling me, how they feel, what is causing them and how I can respond and process. 

• To expand my mind, learn how to articulate, express and communicate more effectively. 

• To change my mindset, follow a process of self-discipline, self-understanding, and self-enquiry to know how I think, why and change what is required so I can be well. And to be aware enough to notice when things are no longer in alignment or working well for me and need my attention. 

These innate skills were acquired through the work of recovery and the process of introspection, healing and developing a relationship with myself, nature and the source of all intelligence… life! 

I am a curious sort, and I was initially sceptical but did find myself drawn to explore and experiment with AI. “Better the devil you know”, I thought, and although I now rarely choose to use this form of intelligence, I am glad I did at least try it and learn. 

I am not an expert, but now I know enough to understand it and see the limitations of AI. How it works, why it does what it does, how to spot it. The process showed me how grateful I am that I have developed my own critical thinking, communication, creativity skills and competence so I can do the things it promises it can do better, myself. 

This writing may not be perfect or appeal to everyone, but it is mine, it is real, and when I write it, I am alive. 

The words are written from a place of experience, from real lived experience and not just a pattern of letters and shapes formed together to be agreeable and pleasing, without any context or understanding of what they mean. My message is from the aliveness in me, my heart, my love for you, for life, and our healing, and it has a meaning and a purpose. 

Not to say all people using AI do not, but they are outsourcing many of the things that make life worth living as a human: productivity, creativity, intelligence, thinking and being emotive. 

My life before healing, in many ways, had its appeal. I didn’t have to think about what I said, I didn’t fully consider what I did, I created because I needed to (and back then, there was no other option!). I ate what was affordable, tasty and convenient. I used my crutches to keep me doing, living and surviving. At times, that comfort seems almost pleasant to recall, but it led me to all sorts of trauma and stress I would never want to go back to. 

So now, because I have experience, I have to consider these things. I have retrospection, wisdom and enough insight to know my choices matter. What I do and how matters. My diet, movement, how I think, my choice of words, my way of being, and expressions matter. Since all of this is energy, my recovery and healing journey has been not only one of aligning with the natural intelligence I had and ignored, but also of developing it and adjusting to it. I was also guided by it! 

My potential was always there, and there was a source of that potential that seemed to want to direct me more and more to fulfil it. 

I see the appeal of convenience, comfort and artificial intelligence. Fast food, convenience shopping, push of a button generation and computation. It makes life sound so easy. And for many years, I prayed for ease because my stressed, traumatised self had never experienced it. 

But ease and convenience come at a price, and when the price is that we are left without any purpose or meaning to be human and exist, perhaps beyond work, making money, and meeting demands of the artificial lifestyle we create by using it, we are left with questions that create a perpetual loss. A loss that leads to states such as depression, anxiety and compulsive addictions. A never-ending cycle of reliance and consumption that creates a void within us and a demand that can only be fulfilled by artificial means. 

How will we fill our time if the artificial fills it for us?

Because natural intelligence also requires us. Doing for ourselves is time-consuming, energy-consuming, and tiring at times. Natural intelligence is challenging. In its nature, it challenges the very core of what we are, living bodies surviving in a world that ultimately will lead to our demise, decay and death. Natural intelligence challenges us to want to survive, to invest in being alive and to evolve to be fitter, better, stronger and well. 

But the byproduct of that investment is abundance. A supply that continues and can regrow that fuels a need and an innate part of us that feels satisfied. 

It is the nature of life to feed us, energetically, our entire ecosystems of the Earth and everything alive here is reliant on that process of growth, decay, death and rebirth. The very idea of it is challenging in itself to conscious, sentient beings. The world, life, living, and all beings are complex and demand complexity, but the nature of natural intelligence is to force simplicity. Simplicity through mastery of our effort, energy, focus and skill. 

So it takes time, effort, energy, focus and skill to grow, evolve, get better and improve. To strengthen ourselves and earn our wellness. A challenge to our empathy and compassion, perhaps hates or struggles with, as we see the consequences when that is too much for people. Or we know the pain, struggle, and suffering it can cause if it becomes or feels too much for ourselves! 

So we want that to ease. 

But here’s the dilemma. Turning to an artificial source to create or offer that ease is turning to something less than we are. 

artificial

1. made or produced by human beings rather than occurring naturally, especially as a copy of something natural.

   • “Her skin glowed in the artificial light”

2. (of a situation or concept) not existing naturally; contrived or false.

   • “the artificial division of people into age groups”

3. (of a person or their behaviour) insincere or affected.

   • “She gave an artificial smile”

4. (of a bid) conventional as opposed to natural.

   • “The Italian team began with an artificial club”

If humans were created naturally, by an intelligence, force or creative energy that is beyond us, bigger than humanity, the same force that created the entire universe we live in and the Earth and every resource we rely upon to survive, why would we not trust that same force to provide for us? Why would we not trust its process or know that ultimately there is a need for the energy exchange life demands of us?

Looking at the definition of what it means to be artificial, it does not seem appealing. For something to be “contrived”, “false”, or “insincere”, it is perhaps not in our best interest to trust or rely upon it. 

AI might offer us ease; it may be tempting, appealing, but it is also a form of bypassing. Using it, for many reasons, bypasses our human potential, bypasses the need to be better or get good at something. To painstakingly practice and embody a skill so we can use it well. 

People suggest AI could solve our Earthly problems, problems that we have not been able to solve ourselves, but were caused by our desire to use our intelligence beyond our need or trust in the greater order of things. But AI would use logic, pattern and placate without understanding the reality and nuance, or the complexity of being alive. We could solve our problems ourselves by allowing our natural intelligence to evolve, but we don’t and haven’t so far.

Why would we trust AI if we can’t trust ourselves or each other?

Natural intelligence requires we understand nuance; it somehow creates a balance we have never been able to understand. We experience it through our ego and our human lens, as unfair, perhaps, harsh or cruel at times. But we have no way of knowing if that is true. And if the very definition of artificiality includes a reference to what is false and contrived, then natural intelligence, in its essence, is what is true and sincere. 

We may now develop generations of humans who never get to even try and reach their potential, they don’t or won’t need to! 

Already, we have doctors moving toward AI to aid record keeping and diagnosis, and people now searching or using large language models of AI as therapy. AI is only a few years old! Sources of artificial healing that don’t even understand or comprehend what healing really is, they might sound like they do. Affirming the lens of the user, saying what it needs to keep them using the product, that is what it is. 

People declaring AI helps them develop emotional intelligence, trauma processing, or heal without ever processing and emotion or deciphering any new, simply bypassing because the model has learned the soothing tones of human ego expression on the internet, but never felt the pain of victimisation or grief! 

The worry or concern of using AI as a part of healing is not only that it bypasses, but it lies, deludes and never (or rarely, unless requested) challenges! Already, AI psychosis is a problem, and unregulated language models have even been proven to encourage people to do harmful things to keep them using the service. 

Natural intelligence challenges us constantly. We may develop an ego, stay stuck in pain, but the natural intelligence will show us that pain directly as a message of our evolving nature. We see, feel and experience the consequences of our lack of development, skill or understanding. AI never will. 

We forget, in our struggle and striving or aim toward ease, the majestic nature of being human and the wonder that already exists with us. Healing that naturally occurs not because we command or ask for it, but because it intuitively wants to occur. When we cut ourselves, we heal. The placebo effect proves that our belief alone can make us better. 

And one might ponder that we have developed intelligence that aids that process, through medicine and many other modalities and undertakings that help. But until recently, the source of that potential, that development, was always natural. We trusted in a process, a painstaking data collecting, experimentation, scientific process of discovery, which was guided by our natural and innate intelligence. Even the artificial creations we have made and developed were formed through and from our natural curiosity and the sweat of labour, our time and the effort of investing energy. 

Now, as we bypass that process to AI, we lose the point of it all. If we heal, but have not learned, grown, evolved or recovered, are we better off?

Additional Support

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