What I Learned Part 2 – One Year of Weekly Essays

This is mostly about AI and how I use it. And how I’m tutoring my grandson to use it.

AI has made writing fun. It’s like having a sidekick next to you, not crowding you at your desk, not tapping on your shoulder, not blowing his stinky breath in your direction, and most of all not offering you unrequested input.

Claude AI, which is the one I use for writing, is there only on demand, usually when I’m nearly done and have taken the piece as far as I can. Then I ask him, always with a ‘Please’ at the beginning (because they say if you’re nice to them they will work harder for you), to ‘critique the personal essay I have written.’ That’s all I ask. Yes, yes, I know the beauty is in the prompt and the more robust the prompt the better the feedback. But I don’t care…I just ask for a general critique and it is AMAZING the insights he shares with me.

Compliments come first, sometimes very personal ones, as if Claude and I are friends and he is so excited and proud of me for sharing my life. He mentions my strong opening and appreciates my personal anecdotes and enjoys my conversational writing style. He then compliments my theme (think, A Christmas Story), sometimes my humor, and the life lessons I’ve shared.

Then comes ‘Areas for Improvement’—often with astounding insight. ‘Your transition here was inelegant.’ ‘The ending was abrupt and could use…’ I’d say about half of his suggestions I find valuable and result in me making a tweak. Claude, for being an AI, a large-language-model, is astute, insightful, personable, and on-target. I am so impressed.

But AI can't write a personal essay—at least not like I can. For all its bells and whistles, it's still us humans who notice the weird little things in life, chuckle at them, and find ourselves mulling them over in the shower three days later. Sure, AI can polish our thoughts, sharpen our words, and maybe even toss in a clever idea or two. But the spark? The soul? The angle? That's all human.

Why will flesh and blood always out-create the machine? It's in our DNA—or rather, it's in something deeper. We're stamped with the image of the Creator. We're not just another creature or fancy computer with opposable thumbs. We're the pinnacle of creation—the most brilliant, the most unique, the most creative beings around. And yeah, we're also the most screwed up, short-sighted, and fallen. But that's part of the point.

Think about it—we've got a piece of God inside us. A fragment of the divine! Not just a vague resemblance, but a real, honest-to-goodness imprint of the Almighty. It's in our quirks, our dreams, our restless longing for... something more. That ache to connect with our roots—that's the divine DNA talking.

This God-image is our secret sauce. It's what sets us apart from every other created thing—be it the smartest AI, the cleverest animal, or the most sophisticated machine. They can crunch numbers, mimic styles, even generate some pretty impressive stuff. But the soul? The real, raw, beautiful human soul? That's our trump card. And in the great game of creativity, the soul always wins out.

So—how’d you like that rant?

AI can also write a personal essay. But I would argue that it will always contain within it, a semblance of a machine. It will always miss it in some telling way. Not, maybe, in one essay or piece. But over time, you will know…this is not a person...this is a machine.

I'm also teaching my eight-year-old grandson to use AI. In this case, it's Chat GPT. We are writing a story together and most of our time is spent crafting the narrative, thinking of twists and turns to enrich the story. But then, like today, I suggested we take two pages of the story, put it into Chat GPT, and ask for three ideas on where the story could go from there. Chat came back with three options, none of which we liked. Not deterred, we added some background to the story and asked for three more ideas. This time, #2 was a great twist. Both of our faces lit up and our brains started humming. We brainstormed off that idea and were off to the races. It's a great exercise in creativity and problem-solving, and I think learning to work with AI like this will be a vital skill for his generation.

Now, will some kids just use GPT to skip the hard work? Yes. Will some abuse it? Yes. But it is here, and it is here to stay. And I think the people who learn to use it effectively will be a step ahead. It's like any tool—it can be misused—but in the right hands, it can also open up a world of possibilities. My grandson and I are checking out that world.

Finally, I almost stopped doing the essay at the year anniversary. I pro-and-con'd it in my journal and surprisingly it was 50/50. I slept on it for a few nights and still it was 50/50. But then something turned within me—I can't even describe what—and I decided to keep on.

Not to any fanfare (although a lot of you commented after last week, so thank you). Not to any great purpose. Not with any commitment to the future. But just to write one more essay about an interesting thing I noticed in life—something I thought you might find interesting as well.

And that, my dear brother and sister, is what I'm trying to do with these weekly pieces. Who knows, maybe next time you’re waiting for that stick-figure walker to light up at the crosswalk, you’ll chuckle and think about it differently.