We Need More Emotional Intelligence (Not More Artificial Intelligence)

It's no secret that most of the things we invent are inspired by nature .

Yet all this AI we're obsessed with lately is, well, ... it’s artificial, so it’s not going to really improve the human condition. By gluing ourselves to our devices all day we're missing out on many opportunities that can accelerate our development far more than anything artificial can.

We don’t need more artificial intelligence to expand our horizons and capabilities - we need more emotional intelligence.

How can we know the difference between something being artificial or good for us? Here is the rule: the more it's inspired by nature - the better it is for our human development. The more it's based on something our ego comes up with on its own - the less beneficial it will be for us.

We don’t need more artificial intelligence to expand our horizons and capabilities - we need more emotional intelligence. Especially young people who are distracted by so many other things. We can only get this boost of EQ I'm always talking about by interacting in an optimal way with other humans -- who have genuine human emotions like we do. This is the only way we're going to actually learn about ourselves.

So as long as we're not heavily invested in boosting our emotional intelligence, we're seeing deterioration everywhere of our human capacities.

We're heading into the last week of mental health month and once again everyone is focused on increasing awareness of how harmful many aspects of our world are for our wellbeing. But apart from raising awareness what are we actually doing to make things better?

The human ego is growing and we're not doing anything to specifically counter this overload of ego we're all experiencing.

The human ego is growing and we're not doing anything to specifically counter this overload of ego we're all experiencing. And since we're not aware of this process that's part of our natural evolution, we're using these new powers in a negative way. We're using them to pump up our ego, instead of using them the way they were intended - to advance all of us together. And we're seeing the negative results all around us - people dropping out of the workplace, youngsters in the home dropping out of life basically - many people are losing their natural drive and motivation to thrive. They'd rather just focus on surviving from day to day, (or even worse, decide to take their own lives) which is really not conducive to our advancement to a higher level of consciousness. Which is really a lost opportunity because we humans (the highest layer in the system), are the only creatures with the capacity to enjoy acquiring an expanded and completely natural limitless type of perspective.

Sparks of Hope

I am optimistic as always though because every once in a while you come across a leader or a company who really get it. They may not have the full picture yet but they're clearly remaining active and in a positive direction - which is an amazing accomplishment considering all the changes in our world. We can at the very least start minimizing or eliminating things that are clearly harming our kids.

I love the way leaders are starting to speak openly now about how much social media and other online pastimes are harming us. And especially how our kids are so glued to their devices that they're missing out on so many opportunities to improve themselves. Here is an amazing example from Gabb.

Lance Black or Sir Lancelot as his colleagues call him, talks about these lost opportunities from minute 5:10 of his latest interview with Mark Giovino . How often do you hear a brand say they "don't want to wrongly influence a child?" I'll tell you - never. This is why they mainly market to parents, and build great products that kids talk about.

Here are some points he gets across so perfectly -

• Kids can become even better when they're not on their screen.
• A lot of progressive kids who recognize the challenges with tech, are early adopters of Gabb because they don't want to be glued to their screen.
• Kids with a Gabb phone spend 80% less time on screens.
• Study by Common Sense Media shows that 13-18 year olds have 8.5 hours of daily screen time - 4.5 months each year.
• When we hear 'safe tech' we think about inappropriate content which is serious - but this constant scrolling or addiction to screen time, cause considerable problems in our kids and teens.
• The opportunity cost that's lost on our children due to this screen time and addiction, instead of the things we could become, the hobbies and skills, and professional achievements we could achieve if we weren't spending so much time on these devices.
• Gabb wants to help kids become better: getting rid of all these distractions in their lives, and to have real connections instead of fake ones.

Instead of Putting Out Fires

Putting all our energy into trying to figure out how to deal with our "greatest challenges" such as fixing the planet, and now we have this new one called Artificial Intelligence -- won't change things for the better in our world. The only thing that will make our lives better is dealing with the human issues in the world, so we can develop into the amazing and better version of ourselves that will emerge from all this upheaval.