Beyond Task Automation: Using AI as a Coaching Tool for Strategic Thinkers

So what is holding you back?

Despite the title, the answer is not AI! Or at least not directly. You can't yet perceive what is holding you back. If you could, you would have removed it already!

These are patterns of behaviour, driven by deeply held beliefs that no longer serve you. They are unconscious but influence your every action.

I used to 'play it small' for decades. This was a defensive behaviour that arose from a mugging experience when I was 17. I developed this unconscious belief to keep me safe from mugging. I had no idea that this had happened but once it came to the surface I was determined to change this behaviour. I spent 37 years reigning in my potential, limiting my possibilities. Imagine what impact I could have had without this belief.

Most of us carry these small traumas that impact our lives. Unpleasant experiences that we see as just part of life an not particularly exceptional. Unaware that they can cast a long shadow way beyond the original experience.

Anything that can help give you X-ray specs or superpowered self-perception that will help you notice unhelpful patterns of behaviour will be transformative.

This is one reason why people employ coaches.

And that is where AI (with appropriate caution, training of the AI and oversight by a human) can help.

It's not all good.

AI is resource hungry like you've never seen before. And the modern world consumes resources at an ever faster rate.

I support people who want to make an impact on their own life, their communities and the world at large. Ignoring the reality of AI's impact is not something I support.

Respect your nature

This boils down to respecting your nature and the natural world. Biomimicry tells us that

Life creates conditions conducive to life

If you are using AI to support you to express your nature and to realize your full potential and unimagined possibilities I think that's a good use of this technology.

In fact it is very aligned to this principle of life creating conditions conducive to life.

The modern world encourages us to be passive consumers. To comply quietly. Nature wants us to be unapologetically ourselves.

To live a vivid life.

The famous quote from Mary Oliver's the Summer Day summarises it well:

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

I often find people ignore me or pretend they haven't heard when I suggest such things. Perhaps it's a strategy to continue compliance; to avoid disappointment having no idea how such a thing would be possible and even less idea of what it might mean for them.

I invite you to allow the idea that you might pursue such a vision. Starting now, not later when you have earnt enough money to have financial freedom. Or other excuses that are just ways of distracting us from prioritising ourselves. As if being a smaller, lesser version of yourself is somehow an indulgence or a selfish act.

So consider for just a few minutes before you move on - what it might mean to be yourself without any apologies.

Does it feel exciting?

Are you overwhelmed?

It doesn't need to be overwhelming. There are no quick wins. It is just a process, allowing nature to take its course.

As I said to myself one day in the office;

I just need to follow the laws of nature

5 years later and I am still following those laws knowing the process and how to embody it in my life.

After all, we are nature. We are not separate.

Artificial Intelligence can help with this.

A conversation with ChatGPT reminded me to be unapologetically myself which lead to the writing of this article.

I will share the article I wrote with ChatGPT to expand on this idea in a few days.