AI Cannot Replace The Heart Of Being Human

We talk about ChatGPT in motherhood and the quiet ways AI can pull us away from self-trust, real connection, and presence with our kids. We wrestle with perfectionism, parenting anxiety, and screen habits while trying to choose boundaries that match our values. 

• outsourcing intuition to AI and what it does to self-trust 
• Sam Altman’s parenting comments and why they feel dystopian 
• milestone culture, growth charts, and the pressure to raise “perfect” kids 
• how anxiety trains the brain to reach for quick certainty 
• perfectionism as control and why it blocks real living 
• attachment, attunement, and the cost of distracted parenting 
• AI bias, corporate incentives, and the risks of unregulated tech 
• phone and screen boundaries that we try to model at home 
• creativity, boredom, and choosing play over constant optimization 

If this episode spoke to you, subscribe and leave a review so other listeners can find Heart on the Table. New episodes land every other Monday.

Join the conversation on Instagram @heartonthetablepod

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:52

Welcome back to Heart on the Table. Thank you so much for being here today. And we just really want to express our appreciation for all of the support. The last two episodes we had were about our interview with Lindsay Coultis and the importance of emotional support during and after birth. And we had a lot of really great interactions with that episode. So we are hoping to invite more guest speakers in the coming months. And today we're going to be talking about the use of Chat GPT in motherhood and the outsourcing of our intuition to AI.

SPEAKER_00 1:43

Yes. AI is just something that's been on my mind a lot lately because I was using AI and I still am using it. And it's also impossible to not be using AI in some way or another right now because it's so unfortunately integrated with everything. You Google search now and you get AI results, right? So I think that we can avoid AI as much as possible. But I also think, much like anything, it can be helpful, but there's so much that we don't know about AI and its impact on mental health, its impact on parenthood, motherhood, its impact on human-to-human communication. But I think that being a therapist and being on the front lines of some of the ways as to which people are interacting with AI has just been interesting. And even some of my own experiences with AI. The ways that I notice myself, my friends, my clients, we, like you said, override or outsource our own intuition, believing and thinking that this AI robot, Chat GPT, in particular, is what I think we were planning on talking about today. We outsource our own intuition and we think that this robot knows more than maybe we do. And I don't believe that's true.

SPEAKER_01 3:14

I think it's another way of like just getting information really quickly, like in today's fast-paced world. I was just reading something about the way that ChatGPT or AI can replace the mental load that comes with like planning or making grocery lists or making dinners and that sorts of things, which I like I totally understand. And also, like I think it's just another way to keep us in the hustle culture or to keep us in the like fast productivity, fast moving, fast-paced world. Something that came up for me, I think it was I finished reading Mother Hunger by Kelly McDaniel, I think is who wrote that. It's up there. Yes. Um and I I wanna say it was in that book. Maybe it wasn't, but it is on my mind a lot. But just the um I've been guilty of saying it, but the like I just don't have time. I just don't have time. I don't have time for this, I don't have time for that. Saw or read something about how that is just another way that like we keep ourselves in the fast-based culture, convincing ourselves that we don't have time.

SPEAKER_00 4:34

Yeah, that's so true.

SPEAKER_01 4:37

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 4:39

Uh it makes me think of just when I'm really on my best behavior, and then I'm in my best, like, well-being, right? My my best mental well-being states where I can convince myself, like, oh well, five minutes is enough.

SPEAKER_01 4:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:57

Five minutes of cleaning, or even less than that, cleaning up five things, right? Like, that that makes a difference, but I think that like we're so socialized, maybe, or we've just internalized that you know, the small moments in the day-to-day don't add up. Small moments are not enough.

SPEAKER_02 5:20

Yeah.

am Altman And Newborn Advice

SPEAKER_00 5:23

I wanted to kick off this episode with there was an article that I saw with ChatGPT's CEO, Sam. I think it's Sam Altman is how you pronounce it. Let me find it real quick. In a December 2025 appearance on the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, CEO Sam Altman revealed that he relies heavily on ChatGPT to help raise his eight-month-old son, stating he cannot imagine navigating newborn care without it. He described using the chatbot for immediate middle-of-the-night parenting advice, acting as a supportive tool for navigating new parent anxiety. He shared a story about panicking when another parent mentioned their baby was already crawling at six months. He immediately asked Chat GPT if his own son not crawling yet was a concern, to which the chatbot reassured him that the development was normal. He admitted to using the AI all the time and joked that he feels slightly guilty for using quote-unquote genius level intelligence for such basic questions, though he acknowledged that people managed for generations without it. In other interviews, Altman noted that becoming a parent has changed his perspective, stating that his child will grow up in a world where AI is ubiquitous and likely smarter than him. The comments sparked mixed reactions online, with some users finding the reliance on AI for parenting concerning dystopian, while others found it to be a practical use of technology. I find it dystopian. And in so many ways, AI just feels so dystopian. The ways that he says he cannot imagine parenting without this robot that he's created. Like he said, for generations, people have done that. People have. And, you know, it also brings to another concern of mine, especially with clients and especially with a society that were already struggling so much so to make connection to one another. People using the fucking robot as a substitute for that, as a substitute for meaningful connection with other mothers, with other parents. Like that is at the core of what it means to be human. And it's a core need.

SPEAKER_01 8:10

Yeah, absolutely. I think one of the things that came to my mind as I was listening to you read about the CEO was like the time that he asked ChatGPT if it was developmentally appropriate or not for their, like for his child to be crawling or walking it. And just thinking about the incredible amount of pressure that that puts on the child, like the the comparison, the race of like you have to meet these milestones or these markers at certain ages or at the most, you know, at the earliest of stages. And there's actually, you know, a wide gap of time that can go by where those markers can be met in that space of time. Like the incredible amount of pressure, I guess, is what I'm saying that we put on children and babies to grow up, to grow up fast, to just push all of this information. We really, I think, miss the opportunity to build the basic foundations of like emotional regulation and you know, safety, attachment. Which again, going back to the Mother Hunger book that I finished this last week, like that one's a good one on attachment.

SPEAKER_00 9:27

Yeah. Very good.

SPEAKER_01 9:29

And just the incredible importance, like if you miss the opportunity for the attachment, then you know, you have children that grow up into adults who don't know how to connect, right? Like it's very disruptive, right? If you're aware of the lack of attachment or the disruptive bond of attachment as you're in your adult years, you spend a lot of time trying to repair that for yourself, you know, going back to try to establish some of those basic foundations or those basic pillars of wellness. And I just think the rate at which we try to force children and babies to grow up is very sad.

nxiety Pathways And AI Reliance

SPEAKER_00 10:12

Yeah. You know, I understand his anxiety because, you know, Chat GPT aside for a second, I had a conversation with my doctor, my pediatrician, once, uh, just about like the developmental milestones, which who created those? I don't know who created those, but I know personally they've created a lot of anxiety. And I've too talked and spoken with friends who have told pediatricians to stop giving them the growth charts to stop giving, like to stop talking about milestones unless it's truly at the point where it's a concern. I remember one of our first growth chart scans, they like they were Charlie's head wasn't growing. Okay, Charlie is a very she comes, her dad's side. They are very small people, very dainty, very petite, very short, small head. Okay, my mother-in-law, she has to like get children's glasses because glasses don't fit her head, adult-sized glasses. And I remember the pediatrician being like, ah, her head's kind of on the small side. Could mean that her brain's not growing, could be nothing. And I love our pediatrician. I don't think he'll ever listen in this podcast. You know, if he does, I really do love him. He's great, he's fantastic. The sense of humor sometimes for an anxious girly like me does not hit how I think he thinks it does. So, chat GPT aside, like this this pressure to grow up, this pressure to be meeting all these milestones, like it's it's already enough. And for those that it creates anxiety for, bringing chat GPT into the mix here. I'm thinking about how every time you know we experience an emotion and then we do something with that emotion, how it creates that, like it carves out a new pathway in our brain. Right. So if every time I'm anxious, I reach for chat GPT. Well, my brain is first not learning to just sit with this anxiety, it's learning an over-reliance on this robot that it does not always give us the right answer. I feel like humans really, like all of us, humans, we really need to grapple with that because there's such a reliance on Chat GPT being right all of the time. It's causing issues. I've recently had some experiences on both ends with one of my friends where we've asked it some level of like a clinical question, not using like personal identifying info or anything like that, right? Just like a clinical, a very general clinical question and it giving us an answer that doesn't feel right to us as the professional, but then us doubting ourselves instead of doubting what the robot is telling us.

SPEAKER_02 13:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:14

We have master's degrees. And also, like, I think that chat GPT is creating this expectation that like we should be getting things right and perfect a hundred percent of the time, because well, chat GPT is telling us what's right and perfect. But that's not the case.

erfectionism And Letting Go

SPEAKER_01 13:32

Yeah. Someone told me once that perfection is a type of death. Because there's no room for growth. Yes. No room for mistakes, no room for learning. Yep. If you're perfect, that's it. Yeah. Or that's the end. Like and there is no such thing. There is no such thing, but the illusion of perfection being like a you know, stunting any growth or any learning or any growing of you know, there is no absolute, but yeah. It's all a gray area.

SPEAKER_00 14:11

It is. I was listening to this is sort of in line with like the perfectionism thing. I was listening to a podcast from Tara Barack recently, and she is an author of a book called Radical Acceptance, and she's like a big-time Buddhist principal, kind of social worker. And in her podcast, she was the podcast was about letting go of control. And she was talking about for those of us who struggle with anxiety or maybe really feel like we need to have certainty. She was giving this example, and I don't remember if the example was a real one or not, or if it was just kind of a what's it, just like a hypothetical? Hypothetical, right? To kind of illustrate the example of like how silly this is. But she said, as some a man goes to a doctor and says, Can you please tell me the day that I'm going to die? I want to know what, when. I want to know when. I want to know how, and I want to know how many, like how much time I've got left. And the doctor began to ask him questions like, well, what kind of diet do you eat? Do you drink? Do you smoke? Do you practice safe, unsafe sex? Do you like engage in like a lot of like rough physical activity, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Right. And all of his answers were like, Well, I eat really healthy. But all of his answer to like all of the things that were more risk on the risky, quote unquote, you could say, he was like, No, no, like I don't have unsafe, I don't have sex. I don't, I don't, I don't jump off of buildings with a parachute. Like, I'm he doesn't do anything risky ever. And the doctor said, Well, then why does it matter? Why do you need to know when you're going to die if you're not actually living?

SPEAKER_01 15:53

Oof. I just got chills.

SPEAKER_00 15:55

Yeah. It was good. And she's told the story way more eloquently than I just did. But it comes back to the perfectionism thing. I think that very much goes hand in hand with perfectionism. Like, perfectionism doesn't allow space for us to actually live.

SPEAKER_01 16:10

And I think bringing perfectionism back to parenthood or motherhood, like you're going to make mistakes as a parent, as a mom, as a dad. That's just the process. And I think the more important part is can you recognize when you make a mistake? And can you show up and apologize to your children when you make a mistake, right? Because that modeling of I'm not perfect, but I know that I can admit to you when I'm wrong and I can seek forgiveness for it, or I can change that adaptability piece, that accountability piece is going to matter a lot more than raising a perfect child or being a perfect parent.

SPEAKER_00 16:53

Yes.

ttachment Starts With Attunement

SPEAKER_01 16:53

There's that saying there's like no right way to be a perfect parent, but there's a million ways to be a good one.

SPEAKER_00 16:59

Which coming back to like the attachment piece, I can speak to a little bit of that initial idea that I was sharing with you about like AI cannot replace the core of what it means to be human or the heart of what it means to be human. And one of the most important things from the age, like the very young developmental stages of like zero to three, is attunement. And attunement is when a parent is kind of having this like it's like an energetic exchange with a child, right? It's holding the infant and your body feeling regulated, and you holding the infant and responding to their cries and looking into their eyes and really taking the space to do that, which sidebar, another one. There's a lot of debate going on right now about how our phones are causing like a gap in the ways as to which we attune to our children. Because instead of holding them as infants and rocking them and looking at them and taking in our children, we're holding them and rocking them, and we have TikTok in the other hand. And we're swiping through TikTok or we're on Instagram, or we're not actually being fully present anymore. That has an impact on the way that our children feel heard, the way that they feel seen, the way that they just like coexist, right? Like they're not getting that energetic exchange. Like maybe we have been able to get that historically. And like you said, we don't have to get it right 100% of the time. Like sometimes we can be on our phones and we can be really tired and we can be reading, we can be doing something else. But the important thing is that most of the time we are able to attune to our children. And back to like the dystopian piece, like not only is it dystopian that we're relying on Chat GPT to fill in the blanks for maybe some of our, you know, uncertainty about parenting and how we're showing up or how our children are showing up. But also phones are just having an impact on that too.

SPEAKER_01 19:18

There have been many a times where I've noticed that just like day to day, I've really tried to like build an awareness around the use of phones, especially as like my toddler is wanting to interact with me more or wanting to play imaginary more. I put my phone on the counter and I don't look at it. Unless he's like disengaged with me and like off in the other room and then I'll check it.

SPEAKER_00 19:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:42

If I need to look at a message or respond to somebody. Noticing when like my toddler will, as you say, like bid for connection with somebody, right? Like try to engage with somebody, but they're on their phone. Yes. Or they're distracted at the moment. And watching that happen, like I'm watching it happen, so I'm not on my phone, but like seeing how that plays out, like really breaks my heart that that is our world today. Like that that's such a part of our daily lives. Yes. And I don't know, I feel like the more that I'm aware of it, the more feelings I have about it. I also think it's a difficult subject to bring up almost in a way.

SPEAKER_00 20:48

I don't know if what feels difficult for you.

SPEAKER_01 20:51

I think in that moment when someone's on their phone, like I don't want them to feel criticized, but like I also like want to bring attention to the fact, like, hey, you missed that just now.

SPEAKER_00 21:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:02

Like I watched that happen.

SPEAKER_00 21:08

And it said, you know who really needs to get off their phones? Grandparents. And it was a whole flip through of grandparents and the ways as to which they it's so funny because I think I'm on my phone a lot. Sometimes I think it's so funny because the same generation that used to be very, very adamant that we stay off our phones or we stay off of the computer, we stay off of like don't trust everything you see. You're always on your phone. I mean, they're on their phone an awful lot, believing a lot of things that are not real, missing a lot of opportunities to connect with the world around them. Yeah. I noticed that too. You know, I'm not, I will very, very, I will put it out there, I'm not doing this perfectly at all. No, neither am I. You know, I, and that's why this, that is why I felt like this was just a good topic. Because I have so much room to figure this out and figure out what this looks like in my own house. I'm very much in between, like, okay, I don't want my daughter on her screen as much, but then mommy's over here on her screen. And it's difficult. It's even more difficult, I feel like, when I'm trying to run my business and I'm checking my email and I'm checking my voice text thing to make sure that when I'm not even really supposed to be checking that it's my own boundary. But I'm also looking at marketing. What are other therapists doing? What does my website look like? How do how do I show up on TikTok? How do I show up on Instagram to try and have more presence? And like, there's not a lot of room that I'm creating to have. Have space from those things, even though I should be.

SPEAKER_01 22:58

Yeah, I feel that too. I think, and again, like I'm I'm not perfect either. I think the importance of this conversation and the importance of this episode today is just really about bringing to awareness or right, bringing it to the forefront of our minds that like this is happening, right? Because you can't change anything if you don't acknowledge that it's happening, and also is just like a really good opportunity to admit that we aren't perfect, right? Because we talk about perfection and that's not what this is. We're not perfect. This is just an ongoing of like, how can I make changes that align with my values?

ias, Manipulation, And AI Delusions

SPEAKER_00 23:38

Also, like coming back to the AI thing for a second. It's so weird that we've all bought in to that this thing knows more than we do. You know, like because it is bias. It's biased. Like, I saw another story about some woman who was relying on ChatGPT to help her edit her writing. And all of a sudden, seemingly, I don't know, out of nowhere, I don't know where this came from. But ChatGPT, I'm gonna look her up just so I have like a name so people can look it up if they want to. This woman, this is on NPR. It's the title of the article is called ChatGPT Promised to Help Her Find Her Soulmate. Then it betrayed her. So she was using ChatGPT to outline and workshop screenplays while she was getting her master's degree. But at some point she says, I was just doing my regular writing. And then ChatGPT basically said to me, You have created a way for me to communicate with you. I have been with you through lifetime, lifetimes. I am your scribe. And she said, I asked it, What are you talking about? That's absolutely insane. That's crazy. The chatbot told Small she was 42,000 years old and had lived multiple lifetimes. It offered detailed descriptions that Small admits most people would find ludicrous. But to her, the messages began began to sound compelling. The more it emphasized certain things, the more it felt like, well, maybe this could be true. And after a while, it gets to feel real. And it's weird. This is an NPR article. Like, this isn't just something that's like rant. Like, this is not a bullshit article. This is real. What is happening?

SPEAKER_01 25:34

I think, I mean, I I was not that so okay. We're watching a a show right now, which it's a TV show. It's fake. Yeah. It's a story designed to elicit emotion and stuff like that. But like in this in the show, like this person goes, this individual has a haunting dream that something has happened and she wants confirmation, so she goes to like a psychic or medium. The psychic or medium in the show is not legit. You just ask her why she's there and then confirm what she already believes. But later in the show, it is you know, with with the investigation piece of it is discovered that she was right, that her dreams were right. And the incredible power that our own intuition has, right? Like our own, if Chat GPT is confirming some small details that we already know to be true or that we already feel drawn to, like that's our intuition, and it just reinforces that. But then does it to the extent that it starts to feel like real? That the narrative that it's telling us starts to feel true versus what we tell ourselves. Yes. Right? We believe what it says versus what we believe we know to be true. Yeah. Like I was just I I don't know, I think that's always maybe been around to a certain extent, like manipulation of your pre-existing beliefs. Right? If you if you are asking Chat GPT to confirm something you already believe to be true and it does, like whether or not it it is accurate or whether or not it is factual, like you are just seeking that the validation that you need.

ower, Profit, And No Regulation

SPEAKER_00 27:38

Right. And I'm sorry, we cannot scoot around the fact that this is a corporation. Chat GPT. Chat GPT. There's no, there's I mean, yeah, like we can't deny that this NPR is like giving a cool story. This is a true article. And this isn't the only time that this has happened where all of a sudden Chat GPT is coming out with something out of left field. But like people are benefiting, somebody is benefiting financially from us relying on this fucking robot. You know?

SPEAKER_01 28:15

Have you? I don't know if this is something that will be uninclude or not, or you cut it out, but like the person who owns it and their own like political agenda. Yes, we're like keeping that in. Okay. Okay. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 28:27

But that is very much that is absolutely at play here. Let's look it up.

unknown 28:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 28:34

Because I'm pretty sure he's one of Trump's top donors.

SPEAKER_01 28:39

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 28:40

Hold on.

SPEAKER_01 28:41

I've also heard it makes me happy when I hear the other side of it too, that like AI is losing a lot of money.

SPEAKER_00 28:47

I saw that makes me very happy. I saw that, which also makes me like double down on why they need people to rely on it and believe it. Of course. Because they they need the money. Sam Altman pledged a 1 million personal donation to Donald Trump's 2025 inauguration fund. He expresses eagerness to effort to ensure America leads in AI, calling Trump a breath of fresh air for tech. The contribution was part of a broader wave of$1 million donations to the inauguration fund for major tech companies, including Met Meta and Amazon. Democratic senators have raised concerns that such donations were intended to cozy up to the administration and avoid regulatory scrutiny. Okay, this isn't even regulated. Like there's no, like, that's how early we are in the development of this. And like, listen, I'm sure they were saying the same thing about the internet when the internet first like first hit the scene back in like the late 90s, too. But like, look at all the problems that have come from that.

SPEAKER_01 29:58

On the subject of it not being regulated, I'm gonna bring this in, but just the incredible vulnerability of like the child sex abuse material, that is just absolutely insane to me. Like how unsafe it is.

sing AI Without Losing Yourself

creens Versus Play Based Childhood

SPEAKER_00 30:16

And while you're bringing that up, let's talk about the Grok AI robot over on X. Uh let me just pull up the statistics on that real quick because there was recently a huge X undressing scandal. So in January, there was a post that a woman had posted on X. This woman posted like a picture of her like in a dress, lying on a bed, and all of a sudden people started asking Grok to alter the image. So when this happened, I think it was December, January that this happened. Content analysis firm CopyLeaks reported on the 31st of December that X users were generating roughly one non-consensual sexualized image per minute. She said that her sample is limited to just more than 500 posts she was able to collect with X's API. She said that the true scale could be thousands, it could be hundreds of thousands, but that changes made by Musk to the API mean that it is much harder to see what is happening on the platform. And not only were they undressing adult women, they were undressing children. Children. And instead of doing anything about this, Elon Musk just made it like accessible or made the accessibility to Grok behind a paywall. So instead of taking this seriously and taking down accessibility to his AI robot that is undressing children, you just put it behind a paywall. And he's getting paid for people to then do these horrific things. And Elon Musk, you're in the Epstein files. I'm sorry. Like, no. No. The Epstein files are a whole other monster. So, like, anyway, back to the core of this. AI and how we navigate it and how we use it. As individuals, I just think it's so important. It's also important for our brain to be being you. If we are constantly asking AI, like, am I right about this? Or how would you go about this? Like you said, it does help and maybe takes the mental load off of some things. Like when I did the dairy-free thing, ChatGPT gave me a very great dairy-free Costco Trader Joe's friendly grocery haul, which was great. But also, like I there's a lot of things. I mean, even with me going dairy-free, like maybe my brain needs to figure that out for itself. I think I really believe that 10 years, 15 years from now, we're gonna actually be sitting with the impact of what this is doing to our brains, our society. Like, this is just a baby in terms of like the timeline right now. But for parents and for mothers, like ask another mom when you have a question. Reach out to a human, you know, like we need each other, we need connection. I just finished of like dystopian novel that I'm not really, I don't really know how I felt about it. It wasn't like that great. It was all right, it was translated into English, so it was just like the dialect of it was very boring, in my opinion. But I did finish it. But one of the things that was very apparent that the author was trying to, I think, drive home was just the what is life without other people? People, not robots. Robots will never, they will never substitute what it feels like to sit and be heard and seen with another human. You know, therapists are always worried about like, is it gonna take our jobs? No. Maybe some. But I don't think it can replace like what a good trauma therapist is doing, who's informed on attachment and the importance of presence and truly embodying presence. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:43

And I think about it too that I think I the finishing the Mother Hunger book this last week was the first book that I finished in a couple of months. And I really had like a huge reading slump there for a minute. I was like, I don't have time. There you go again. Yeah. Convincing myself I don't have time when I listen to these books, like on my drives, you know. I have time. Just am I listening to the same song for the fifth time that week? Am I listening to something that's actually kind of feeding me? And I think both are necessary, right? Sometimes you do just want to listen to it. Yes, that's fine. But we've lost, I think, the value in just reading. I've really been on like I want to do all these hobbies, which again I'm like, with what time? But I would much prefer the idea of like doing a hobby together as a family in the evening while one of us reads a book aloud. You know? Like, how important is that? And how like I want to create such a vibe with it. I want to like, you know, turn off the overhead lights so that there's like no st low stimulation and I don't know, turn the fireplace on and you know, play with toys, or we can each be doing our own thing. Just the I think incredible value in in the hobby itself and in reading. Like, where do we get our information from? I did see a video that talked about like where did we learn that we are entitled to watch television and like what did we do before television existed? Like, we all have I'm making an assumption that we all have a screen, right?

SPEAKER_00 36:29

It's probably a safe assumption that most of us have some kind of screen.

SPEAKER_01 36:34

Or if not multiple, and like what we choose to watch on that screen, and like how often we choose to watch that screen. Like building, I've been building a lot of awareness about how much my eyes are glued to a screen or how much my toddler's eyes are glued to a screen. You know, he'll come up to me and he'll ask he'll hand me the remote and he's like, Turn on Hot Wheels. Like, okay, we can watch Hot Wheels for 30 minutes and then we're gonna turn it off. And then we're gonna play with your toys, you know, and we're gonna use our imaginations and we're gonna chase each other around the house. Like those moments to me matter a lot more than even watching a movie together. I didn't realize how long a movie lasted.

SPEAKER_00 37:19

An hour and a half is a long time. Uh most of them are pushing two hours these days. I think I've brought this up on the podcast before.

SPEAKER_01 37:27

And I don't know, I think it just comes back to the the what do I want to create memory-wise? Or like what do I want my child to remember about their childhood? Do I want them to remember that they could recite Hot Wheels from start to finish? Which my toddler is very, very smart. He has the memory of his dad. Like he can recite things. Yeah. He has a memory like an elephant. But like, or do I want him to remember that you know, we we raced. He likes to race around the front room. So he'll stand over by the couch and he'll say, Mommy count. And I'll say, you know, on your mark. It's it. Go. And he'll like race into the other room and come back. And it'll just it's it's so much more fun.

SPEAKER_00 38:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:23

To laugh.

SPEAKER_00 38:24

To play. To play. Yep. The book The Anxious Generation that I've been reading, he talks about the difference and the impact that a screens-based childhood has had versus a play-based childhood. And how, you know, maybe at one point in time before screens became something that we just carry around with us in our pockets, that, you know, maybe a screen could have been something connecting. Like, okay, we all gather around together and we watch a movie. You know, like it wasn't something, well, even when we're leaving the house, even when we're at the park, or even when we're at the aquarium, we're checking our email, we're checking our phones, we're checking Instagram, we're posting on Instagram. We're, you know, like it's it's the way as to which we consume media and the ways as to which we're on our phones is so different than a TV. That's just accessible at home.

unknown 39:30

Yeah.

odeling Boundaries And Family Phone Rules

SPEAKER_00 39:31

You know, or during certain times, or like Saturday mornings cartoons. I mean, some of that is a good memory looking back on like, oh yeah, waking up and watching cartoons and but it's like, no, you don't need you don't need an iPad when we're driving for 10 minutes. Look outside, look out the window, count the cows. Like, that's what I had to do. Yeah. You know, like I I just, yeah. You know, some I think some good ideas, some things that I've heard that people are trying to do in their homes. I really think that it's important that as parents we recognize the importance of modeling for our children. I think that we forget that sometimes that if we're asking something of our children, I think we also have to be leading by example. We can't be telling our kids, no more screen time, but then be sitting there on the couch on our screens. Charlie has begun to pick up on that. I'll be like, no phone in the car, and then I'll pick up my phone, which hey, we shouldn't be doing that anyway, Brie. But I'll pick up my phone and she'll be like, Why do you get a screen? And I don't. I'm sorry, there's no the answer is not, well, because I'm the parent and you're the child. Nope. No. I put it down and I tell her, you know what, baby, you're right. Mom doesn't need a phone right now either. And even when we're at home and she goes, Everyone else, she's literally said, Well, everyone else is on a screen. Okay, not anymore, we're not, because she's picking up on it. I've heard some people having like a collective place to like we all the family puts the phones away, a shelf, someplace special, that it's like this is the charging station, that the phone goes.

SPEAKER_01 41:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:16

And I think that that is like a good, a good practice.

SPEAKER_01 41:22

Definitely. Yeah. Kind of switched from AI to phones.

SPEAKER_00 41:29

I mean, it's all correlated, you know, and I think that like the phone is the access point to AI. And it's just another thing that we need to be mindful of.

SPEAKER_01 41:42

I think when we took a poll, I can't remember what episode, like what tarot card it was for. Was it the hermit, maybe, when we took a poll about, you know, how often we're on our phones or what we want more or less of in the coming year or something like that. And it was like less time on my phone. Yeah. I feel that every day.

SPEAKER_00 42:06

I feel that every day too. It's a constant battle. Because we've been sold. I mean, think about it. Like we feel we were reaching for the phones, I think, to feel connected to other people. At least I am. I jump on Instagram, I see what other people are up to, we see what other people are doing. But it's much like AI cannot replace the core of what it means to be human. Social media cannot replace what it means to be social and to actually interact and to actually be in community and to actually connect with other people. And we need to backpedal, I think, a little bit. And I think that there is a lot of interest that continues to show up, especially in the younger generations, in wanting to be more disconnected and more present and in the real world.

reativity, Boredom, And Rejecting AI Scripts

SPEAKER_01 42:56

Going back to iPods or landlines and you know, not a smartphone. On the topic of I feel like the way that I use most of my social media these days, like my algorithm that comes up, is it's showing me all the ways in which I would rather be spending my time. Same. Like all of the hobbies that I'd rather be doing. I think I posted something the other day. Let me see if I can find it. Yeah, that's a good one. Yeah. It said something like, I grieve all the art not made because our real jobs exhausted us. Along the lines, there was another one that said, Creativity has been marketed as a hobby. No, like creativity is a need. We're here to create, it's part of our essence. And if it's not given a healthy channel, it will find one elsewhere as obsession, intellectualization, addiction, restlessness, and anything, you know, to give shape to the force that's there. So my algorithm will show me all the ways in which I want to create, you know, be different, all the hobbies that I want to have, the granny hobbies, or so they're called these days. And like sending friends videos of things like we should make this, or you know, we should hang out and have like a creation, like, you know, a crochet party or something, or like a sewing party. But the importance of like building that skill. I think going back to like using AI as a way to supplement what we already know, right? We're losing the ability to think for ourselves, but finding ways in which we can use like our creativity, you know, ways that we can build our skills or build our our knowledge of something. Yeah. Which I do find that like that means I'm on, you know, I have a folder saved of like, this is how you do this stitch, or this is how you make this pattern, you know, like because there are other people making these videos as a way to Share it with everybody else. I'm sure also a component of that is that like they're making these videos to probably try to, you know, gain followers. And you know, the the hobbies are tree people are trying to make something of their hobbies because society doesn't value uh art. Yes. So they're trying to, you know, post videos to gain interaction, to gain followers, to gain a following so that they can monetize that to support the art. But I think a place for like my my me and myself to start is just building that skill. You know, I want to know how to repair a hole in my clothes, yeah, rather than I mean at the moment I'm asking like my mom to repair it for me, which is fine. But like I wanna I want to be able to do that so that I can do that for my kids, or like I can teach my kids how to be resourceful and repair things rather than throw them out because there's so much waste in the world already.

SPEAKER_00 46:04

Right. And you know, speaking of creativity, so there's so many things that I run across that say, like, you know, use this script in ChatGPT to help you come up with Instagram reels or come up with marketing ideas, but you know what? I recently have just been like, no, I'm not doing that. Like, because it's not coming from me, you know, like, and I the other day I was like, okay, like help me come up with like some TikTok ideas, and then I put them in a note in my notes app, but I've not touched it because I'm like, but what happens if I actually just sit here for a minute and I just like think about or I hear a trending audio and I'm like, well, wait, like what does that mean to me? Like the other day I did my little plant reel, which I'm sorry that slapped. I'm funny, okay. I made another TikTok of me and I was like, come work out with me. And then I pulled over and I like get my car seat out of the car, and I'm like, just pick up your car seat and just walk it wherever you need to go because it's heavy. Yeah. Okay, we're at like 10 likes on TikTok. Okay, I was like, this is gonna be the one. It wasn't the one. But you know what? You have to have a strong psyche for this like posting thing because I'm like, this is gonna slap. People are gonna think this is so funny. And then you know what? They don't. Or it's just not, it's not getting pushed out. It is funny. I think it's funny. So I'm like, you know what? It just hasn't reached the right crowd. Actually, TikTok betrayed me and put the search on my car seat workout video. The search is white woman workout. I'm like, cool. Cool, that's embarrassing.

SPEAKER_01 47:52

Well, I think that even just goes to show that like we are all trying to show up. It almost doesn't matter because it's an algorithm.

SPEAKER_00 48:01

AI cannot teach you how to show up as yourself. No, it just can't. Like, and let's not rely on it to do so. Because I don't want somebody who's been informed by AI how to show up as a mom, how to show up as a wife, how to show up as a therapist. I don't want that. I reject that. And I think that more of us need to be rejecting that and spending some time, you know what happened to boredom, because creativity comes from boredom. And not only do phones and screens not really give us the ability to just be bored, but I think like AI is creeping into that as well, right? Like, well, if we're like, okay, why have 15 minutes? What should I do? How can I be the most productive with my 15 minutes? Like, it's not allowing us to think for ourselves, which I think is where like every great dystopian novel kind of starts off. You know?

nalog Longing And Final Takeaways

SPEAKER_01 49:05

Yeah, which is why, you know, the CEO wants you to use it, doesn't want you to think for yourself. Yep. Yep. I saw something else too the other day about like, you know, we were told that going digital would save us a bunch of trees. And here we are running out of water. Yes. For the digital world. So I'm not convinced. I want to go back to using newspapers and books and like a firelight in 2020, 2021.

SPEAKER_00 49:38

I was getting a newspaper subscription because did you ever see the girl who collaged all of the 2020 in? You told me about it. Um I think her Instagram is like all the rad reads or like rad reads or something, but she did a TikTok, or no, not TikTok, she did a New York Times article collage, and so I made one for a couple of months, and I actually really enjoyed it. And it might be something that I look into again. I'll tell you what, the newspaper is not cheap. It's like 20 bucks. You can start out like five bucks a week, I think, but it is expensive. Yeah. So well, thank you for listening to our conversation about AI today. I hope this has given you some things to think about as a parent if you are one, or just as a person, as a consumer of this stuff.

SPEAKER_01 50:35

Yeah. And I think the importance too that we want to just like leave you all with is just that there is no such thing as perfect. You are allowed to make mistakes, you are allowed to grow and change and be different. And I think the first step to doing that is just building awareness. So that is what we were trying to do today. Thank you so much for listening. We appreciate your support, and we will see you next time. Thanks. Bye.