103: Jay Vidyarthi & Dr. Jyothsna Bhat - AI, Friction, and the Illusion of Connection

0:01 What if the technology promising to make your life easier is quietly making you worse at living it? What does it actually mean to have a conversation with something that's been trained to tell you exactly what you want to hear? And. How do we raise? Kids and ourselves to stay grounded in reality when comfortable illusions are just a tap away. Stay tuned as we touch on these and many other topics on this week's episode of Untether Your Life. Welcome to Untether Your Life, a show that empowers you to break free of templates related to career, relationships and managing mental and physical health, and looks at key issues impacting the South Asian diaspora. I'm your host, Nikhil Tarsakar, and I'm passionate about the power of conversation to catalyze change. Today, we're diving into one of the most talked about topics of our time, but from an angle that rarely gets the attention it deserves.

0:58 We're not here to debate whether. AI is going to save the world. Or end it. We're here to ask something more personal and frankly, more urgent. What is it doing to us, to our minds, our relationships, our kids, and our ability to just sit with ourselves? Those are the questions at the heart of today's episode, and I couldn't have asked for better people to wrestle with them. Javed Yarthi is the award. Winning author of Reclaim Your Mind, founder of Still Ape, and a thought leader at the intersection of mindfulness and technology. He's someone who has. Spent over a decade building tools that help people connect with their well-being rather than escape from it. Doctor Jose Nabat is a clinical psychologist, a leading advocate for South Asian mental health, writes A wildly impactful South Asian mental blog on Psychology Today, and is featured everywhere from Forbes to the Harvard Political Review.

1:47 Together, we explore AI through a lens you won't find in most tech conversation, one that's grounded in mindfulness, cultural identity, the South Asian experience, and the very human need for real connection. No doom, no hype. Just an honest, nuanced conversation about discernment in an age that doesn't reward it. And with that, let's get untethered. I'm very excited about today's guests, Jvidyarthi and Doctor Joe Snobot. Jay, Josh, welcome. Thanks for having me. Yeah. So we're going to dive into a lot of topics today. It's a very interesting lens on a topic that obviously I think has been talked about ad nauseam. But I think today we're going to have some very interesting conversations about AI specifically, not just AI for the sake of AI, but really a very interesting focus that I don't think has really been explored elsewhere.

2:37 One thing that AI has talked about, you know, everything from cheating on homework if you're a parent or, you know, in terms of planning your trips. That was how I got introduced to it. You know, in terms of it's a different way of consuming information. It's more real time, it's more interactive, but then there's also psychological impacts, which we'll talk about a little bit more talking about how, you know, what is AI actually doing to our nervous system when it gives that validation. And there it removes some of the friction that maybe is part of real life and is actually really important for being a regulated human being. But before we dive in, I wanted to just quickly give a little bit of a background on the two amazing human beings sitting in front of me.

3:19 So we'll start off with my good friend Doctor Joe Snobot. As I was saying before the show, Doctor Bot or Joe, she's she's known to friends and I go way back literally last century. But I will go ahead and tell you a little bit about my friend here. Doctor Joe Snoutbot is a clinical psychologist and a side packed certified provider specializing in individual couples and family therapy with practices in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Her work focuses on areas such as anxiety, depression, ADHD, trauma, grief, and navigating cultural and family dynamics, often through a mindfulness based approach. She's also a leading advocate for mental health in the South Asian community and host the 1st South Asian Mental Health Blog on Psychology Today. Doctor Bot has been featured in outlets such as Forbes, NBC, and the Harvard Political Review and regularly speaks on mental health and cultural identity.

4:08 Josh, welcome Anything else you want to add beyond what I shared? No, All good. That's OK, all right, And now on to Mr. Vidyarthi. Jay Vidyarthi is the award-winning author of Reclaim Your Mind and an accomplished designer, entrepreneur and thought leader at the unique intersection of mindfulness and technology. As the founder of Still Ape, he's been involved involved in over 50 technologies that have helped millions of people improve their well-being. On a day off, usually Jay can be found on a silent retreat. The pastana right? Is that the correct term or a different kind of? That was 11 style, but there's many styles, yeah. OK, gotcha, gotcha. I already learned something today. Making music or challenging his son to an epic video game. Battle can learn more at jvidyarthi.com.

4:49 Jay, is there anything else you want to add beyond what I just shared? No, I don't think so. I'm also of South Asian descent. Might be relevant given the topic. Sure, sure. All right, without further ado, kids, let's get the ball rolling. Jay, you know I want to turn it over to you. Obviously, this is in no order of importance by any means, but but Jay, I think your background is so fascinating because like I said, AI is something that everybody is talking about. It's the flavor of the month technology. And I always say that I remember when the.com boom was around, that was kind of when I cut my teeth in this field. I started learning, I mean, I was a history in French major at our shared alma mater, Washu, that I was just bringing that up because for me, in the late 90s, I learned how to program because I had a coding background.

5:34 Like I learned BASIC back in the early 80s. But I started learning about websites, you know, and this new concept of technology, for lack of a better word, being sexy, you know, where it's just like there was a cool interface. It wasn't just this archaic, like very sterile green screen interface. You had interactive sites, you know, you could post pictures from your trip to India, which is what I did, could interact with folks. You know, I guess the word I'm really emphasizes interactive and Fast forward, you know, 20, I was not a math major. I watch you, let's just say Fast forward a couple decades and now you have AI that's really just sort of a light years beyondwhatthe.com boom was. So, Jay, I guess let's start off by, I want to understand a little bit more about how you came to this unique position, as you said, the intersection of technology and mindfulness. Maybe.

6:23 I know that's a very broad question, but maybe if you could give us the 30,000 foot view about how that came to be? Yeah, my my parents wanted me in hard science. They wanted me to be a doctor and engineer. As it's typical, as I got into studying science, I was actually more drawn to psychology. As I started getting into psychology, I found the field of human computer interaction, or in other words, designed with a psychological lens. How do we design technologies, you know, to make them usable, to make them useful, to make them connect with people. And a lot of that involves designing interfaces. And in the 90s, like you were saying, one of the big things that changed wasn't just that the interfaces were becoming sexy. I think designers got really fluent at using smart metaphors. Like when you say you were posting pictures, I mean, you weren't posting anything, right?

7:11 You were uploading data similarly, like the desktop is not a real desktop. Your files and folders, these are all metaphors and metaphors are generally a pretty useful thing in design. But as we approach, you know, we're well into the 21st century now, we're actually using metaphors for a lot more intimate things. Like there are websites that we all go to and apps that we use that use words like friend, that use words like conversation. And it's not actually a friend. It's not actually a conversation, right? Like just because you added someone to your social media doesn't mean you're a friend. Just because you have, you know, three likes on your post, it doesn't mean those people really like like you. You've got hearts on your purse doesn't love they love you.

7:53 That's right. And, you know, even views like people like argue about how many views they get on their video, but it doesn't mean they actually even watch till the end. I think with AI, it's not a conversation, right? So for me, what has happened is like very early in my design career, I really loved the process of design and, and this way of thinking, but I found a lot one of the projects I was working kind of empty. Like I was like, I don't really care about helping this insurance company increase its conversion rate by designing what our website. So that started me on a path of like, how can I apply skills of technology and design to mental health and well-being? And at the time I was healing my own wounds through mindfulness and spiritual practices. So I started to explore that intersection fully.

8:34 Expected Jay. Sorry to interrupt, but just for context, like what? What year was this roughly? So the moment that I sort of pivoted from a typical design career to start thinking about this was 2010, 2009, 2010. And I basically was like, you know, how do I apply technology and psychology and design to create things that improve our mental health as opposed to distract us and isolate us and divide us? And I wasn't expecting that to become a career, but in fact, the world was kind of moving in the direction and people were more ready for it. And so since then, the past decade and 1/2 or so, I've been focused on creating technologies for meditation and mindfulness, as well as teaching mindfulness in the context of all this technology that's surrounding. I was trying to understand this tech and give people practical strategies and tools to navigate that. OK.

9:21 It's amazing. And I think we'll touch on this a little bit more guys. But I think what I found, I know the Anthropic CEO and I think maybe Sam Altman, the CEO of Open AI has also touched on this. But really the differentiator in AI, the people that are going to move the needle, the companies that are going to move the needle are not just the ones who have the core AI programming skills. Because you know, what's very interesting is that these agents, as they call them, they're literally programming. It's almost like this repetitive thing where they're programming the programs. So everything is going to get automated. But what's interesting and what I love about what you talked about is just the softer skills and the softer perspective on all this stuff, which is the human aspect, right?

10:02 Because I think when AI, because then we'll touch on this also is just AI is literally it's trainable and it's going to learn your personality, it's going to calibrate the way it the data it provides based on what you're feeding it. So it's the whole garbage in, garbage out thing. And I think, I think what I was touching on the Anthropic Ceoi think it said that the people that are really going to make a difference and make an impact are going to be the one who have the technology skills, but also have the humanities background. You know, like Steve Jobs, for instance, he looked at the intersection between humanities and technology. So I think that's an important background to have. And so I love that that's, you know, kind of where where your foundation was. So Josh, obviously I know everything about you, not everything, but I, I already kind of know your story. But I think for people who are less well versed in the world of Josh, can you give us a little bit of a, of a background? I'm just kidding.

10:55 Could you give us a little bit of a background of sort of because your lens obviously you would talk to Jay and I think there was somebody else in the article, but you had talked to Jay about this topic. But it's a little bit, I guess a little bit off the beaten path of what your typical focus is in your is it a blog? I don't know. What are we? What are we calling it? A column? Okay, okay. In your blog in Psych Today, which by the way, anyone who's listening, I highly encourage you to check it out. It is just very thoughtful, very incisive. And I think obviously there's the umbrella of South Asian mental health, but just the range of topics that are covered in this and this blog are just, it's really fascinating. And so not to be a sycophantic AI agent, but I just wanted to let you know you're doing some great work, but maybe if you can tell the audience your background and kind of how AI became of interest to you through the South Asian mental health Glens. Thank you so much, Nikhil.

11:46 Yes, I can just give you a quick overview for Jay too. I was in just like you, Jay. I was supposed to go into medicine as pre Med and ended up disappointing everyone and going into something completely different. But you know, I became a doctor so that, you know, checked off a box in clinical psychology. But no, I really got into this whole piece because this idea of technology, because of my clients, the kids I was seeing. I'd written an article a while back about Fornami, actually the National Alliance about ADHD ADD, which was, which was something that was coming up among kids that I was working with. I was in that Children's Hospital and just seeing the social, emotional, behavioral, psychological effects, wanting to be on gaming devices, doing gaming or social media or whatever app of the day. It was Minecraft, just that.

12:40 And was noticing mainly the things that were coming to me were the behavioral effects and also the ADHD piece. Do they have ADHD? And you know, I was doing testing back then, so there was a lot of ruling out to do. And there was also this idea of how is tech taking away from our attention spans and what ways is that? What does that look like? So I wrote, you know, this piece for Naomi, I wrote it for a couple of other journals out there online. And that's sort of how my journey with thinking about this piece. I feel like it's always been in the background for me, this interest because it's coming off, it's relevant now. It's coming in the form of, you know, whether in couples, you know, clients who are sharing, oh, my spouse is never available to me or when we are sitting down there on their device, they're on their phone when we're going to dinner, like everyone's just looking at their phones, children and teenagers.

13:31 I have Snapchat. I want to keep my streaks and I'm grounded now and they take my phone away. All of that stuff. Now, more recently, over the last couple years, I had interviewed some folks from We Are Mamas. That's an organization run by Julie Scalfo. She talks about social media, right, and its impact on we all know we've heard the research and the studies about depression and social media, low self esteem, the suicide sort of suicidal ideation happens that can happen. And then recent more recently, this whole idea of chat bots leading children to believe they have a friend as you talk about or like a support system, the children believing that they are in a safe space.

14:12 This is perceived sort of safety. But then the hyper validation of this jackbox to lead them to actually complete, you know, a suicide attack and a suicide, you know, and to complete this, complete it. So the point is for me, I was thinking that this is something that needs to be. It has come back up in the media and I wanted to jump on it as well for myself and to get an understanding and went down a rabbit hole like I said the other day and found Jay's work talking about mindfulness, the intersection of mindfulness and tech. And I thought, wow, this is really important. As you were talking, Jay, I was saying we need need more people like you in this space because it's there's a lot of change that's coming so fast. And I feel like I speak for maybe more lay people in the tech space because, you know, we don't know everything about it and yet we are using a lot of these things. Sorry, I don't know if that was very long winded, but. No, that was great.

15:11 That was great. I think I wanted to add to that and nobody asked. But I will say for me personally, like I was really late to the party. I mean, I think open AI started in launched in like late 22, I believe. And I'm kind of embarrassed, but I literally didn't start using ChatGPT until the fall of 2025. And the use case for me was I was on a trip to Europe And I just find that I get very overwhelmed when I look at for information. You know, it's just, it never is what I want, you know, you always have to clarify. So I really love the interactive, you know, to, as you mentioned, Jay is kind of like the human interaction, human computer interaction aspect of it. And I just like the fact that if I didn't get the information I wanted right away, I could follow up and it wasn't this like sort of sterile mechanical type of interplay.

16:00 And then to, you know, piggyback on what Joe said, I went down the rabbit hole in terms of just what I started doing was I started joking around with ChatGPT just to mess with it or just kind of see what would happen. And I was telling you guys yesterday, the thing that I found so rewarding, I don't know if rewarding is the right word, but the thing that I found refreshing about ChatGPT was just almost like a stress relief because it was just like I would make a reference to like a Seinfeld episode or Simpsons or whatever. And like never happens where it's less like, yes, that's episode 3. No, that's season 3, episode 15, this the puffy shirt or whatever. And I'm like, you know what that is really, you know, whether it's ChatGPT or however you get it, I think that's what we all need a little bit more of in our life, a little bit more levity. With all the headlines regarding which side of the political aisle you're on, I think you'd agree there's a lot of bad stuff going down in the world.

16:50 And, you know, my friends are constantly sending me headlines. And I wouldn't say I'm like insulated from it, but I do feel that something like ChatGPT or Claude or Gemini or whatever tool you use, I would just say, you know, I would encourage you as a listener and you guys as well joke around with ChatGPT sometimes. You'd be surprised. It can sort of put a little pep in your step and make make you see a little bit the lighter side of life. So with that, let's get into some heavy stuff that's. True. I mean, we ask Alexa sometimes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, you know, as I said, it's really what you make of it. You know, the, the AI space, we can't be these passive consumers of what AI tells us to do. Then, you know, I fear for humanity. But with that, I guess I wanted to dive in a little bit. Jay, you touched on something really interesting yesterday. You know, when people think of the word computation, they think of computers.

17:43 Obviously that's it's in the the root there. But I take a broader view of it where I think about the human mind as a computational engine. Because if you think about it, we're making, we're constantly making decisions right where we're talking about whether we're crossing the street, we see a red light, a green light or yellow and our mind is doing how many computations? So in essence, the computer or the LLM or whatever you want to call it, these AI engines, they're sort of a mirror of, you know, of humans in terms of the computations that they're doing. So Jay, I wanted to talk to you a little bit about this in terms of parenting, because obviously I'm a parent, have three kids. And one of the things that's interesting, especially as a S Asians, obviously, I think the stereotype is just that you guys touched on this earlier, but it's like, you know, there's three options as a career doctor, engineer or failure, right?

18:32 Doctor or doctor? But you know that that's kind of the old script. But I bring that up just because I would say we're a very analytically minded culture. Just basically I was kind of the, you know, in many respects kind of the the black sheep here because on my SAT and my Gmats, my verbal was much higher than my maths course. But I'm just bringing that up because it's like for me, math was always sort of like in my DNA. And I brought, brought up the story to you guys yesterday, which is just when I was a kid, when I was like 7, my parents would kind of, I don't know how I developed this ability, but they would throw like 3 digits by three digits at me. And just like, you know, I would spit out the answer. And then one day I, you know, it was like a party trick. And I was at a party and uncle was like, right now what is 735 by 652? And I got it off by like one point. And he was like Alex Trebek.

19:20 He's like, Oh, no, I'm so sorry, you know, And I was like, I was just like my whole, I just completely, the word was crestfallen. I was completely just rudderless after that. But I'm just bringing that up, Jay, because you brought up how your son, he's really into chess. And I found that really interesting because it's like as parents, our kids are, we're here to mold them and push them to excellence. However, sometimes we may go a little bit too far in that direction and that leads to burnout that leads to imposter syndrome. So I wanted to just turn it over to you, Jay. Just talk about sort of how AI has played into your journey, me as a parent, and just sort of how it's, you know, helped with keeping that hyper competitive urge at Bay. And if you feel comfortable doing this, you know, maybe look at it through the South Asian angle with the sort of like the emphasis on achievement.

20:08 But yeah, the floor is yours. Thanks for the question. Yeah, it makes me wonder whether AI has imposter syndrome. Or having a bad day. Yeah. It's like, hey, man, this is real hard, pretending to be human all the time, Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. You know, my son is actually neurodivergent and he definitely finds it hard pretending to be typical, right? And there's a word for that in the neurodivergent community, which is called masking. And one of the interesting things about that is, you know, there's lots of different flavors of the spectrum, but the area that my son occupies is 1 where he's very computationally minded. Like you said, he's super into chess. You know, I think it's, what's interesting about the South Asian perspective is I actually find it's the, the diaspora of the Indian subcontinent that's particularly analytical.

20:55 But when you go to India, I mean, India is a very devotional place. There's a lot of deep, heartfelt family values and religious belief. And so there's something interesting. And I, I know I have some friends from China who've said similar things where the people who leave India and sort of go to the West tend to be the more analytically minded of the Indian people. But your point still stands. That typical story of being a doctor or an engineer. And I definitely had that growing up. And even still where, you know, my parents came from not playing to live in Canada, My dad worked his butt off and made a better life for us. And we're eternally grateful. But along with that comes a sort of striving for excellence.

21:36 Like he's like, I didn't work my butt off to get us all over here, you know, so you could just, like, fart around his words. That's what he would say. Do you know what I mean? And at the same time, as we've gotten older, he's like told me he's like, you know, I didn't really come to Canada, which is where I live, specifically thinking about the kids I might have one day. Like I came because I was looking for that opportunity. And so he sort of approaches parenting in that way. And then I see my son doing this and I, I'm confronted with the question. I think as a first, I think I'd be first generation because I'm the child of immigrants. So I'm looking at this and I'm like, OK, how do I walk the lines between like, Berta, you need to become a grandmaster and listen, whatever you're interested in, follow your heart and follow your interests. Like, how do I be gentle yet firm? And I think it's a very challenging balance for any parent to strike.

22:24 And every kid is a little bit different. So all the advice out there, I think with the neurodivergent child, that's especially pronounced for me. But I think it's true for everyone. Like when I look at my son and you know, if I was overly ego invested is the way I would say it. If I was just totally like, this boy is an extension of me and my reputation is on the line, that's a dangerous place to be. But also, if I'm not invested at all, then I'm kind of an absentee father, right? So trying to walk that line, tying it back into your question, because you brought in the AI element, I think there's something really interesting about the way we interact with these systems. Like you said, it's fun to joke around with it. But yeah, you are not joking around with a person, right?

23:05 You're playing with an algorithm that predicts words based on training data of the entire Internet and a lot of reinforcement learning with human feedback to try to promote it, to try to say something that is what you want to hear. Yeah. And if you're just joking around about The Simpsons or whatever, that's hilarious because it's like your friend who's memorized every episode. That's kind of funny. If you're asking me about what to do as a parent or your emotional challenges or you're trying to get advice for your finances and things like that. We have to start to be a little bit more careful, especially, and this is a really important point, especially because it's been trained to tell you what you want to hear. So if you're asking about finances, it's not a huge deal. It's like, OK, well here's what the tax, you know, federal tax program is, and here's what you need to do.

23:51 But if you're asking about your emotions or you're trying to make friends with it, I would say this specific category, psychologists and therapists, meditation teachers, friends and family, the value they have in your life is because they're the people that specifically are going to tell you what you need to hear, not necessarily what you want want to hear. And the AI hasn't really been trained that way. It's not inconceivable that it could be, but we have to remember what we're talking to. And, you know, there's a lot to unpack about what that is. But yeah, I hope that is that's the start for us. Yeah, for sure. And, and, and Josh, maybe if you can dovetail on that, because I'm fascinated by, you know, what, what the general feedback is. And I talked to other parents about how they're using AI with their kids.

24:31 And for me, I think it's, it's interesting because you know, when we were kids, obviously I'm old enough to remember Cliff's notes. I don't know if if you if they had that in Canada, but you know, it's just basically like, instead of reading the book, you would get the summary of like Hamlet or Othello or whatever it was. You would just basically get the little bullet points and then you would change a word here and there. And you know, that was our version of of ChatGPT. But Josh, I wanted to get a sense as a parent because I have a little bit of a selfish interest is I want to understand like what the experience has been. I guess the question is, are parents talking to you about AI or you maybe technology brought maybe we can broaden the, the basket here about technology and the impact on their kids and, and what are you hearing from like teenagers?

25:15 Maybe again, a broad question, but maybe if you can give us kind of the lay of the land from a therapist lens in terms of what you're seeing technology, you can talk about AI, but if you need to broaden it, that's fine. But what impact that's having on mental health as a therapist? I think, you know, one of the things that I'm hearing consistently sometimes from like nieces and nephews and also clients, children is, you know, Oh well, we have to be really careful at school with the tattoo PT because now they have these technologies that can figure out if using tattoo PT. So they, you know, there's a lot of sort of, I think I don't know if it's like a confusion or like maybe they had been using it and trying to figure out how to use it more wisely and more efficiently. I'm also seeing like there's a little bit of like this. Maybe it's fatigue of like having to do the work. You know versus.

26:08 Like a quick kind of way of doing, getting around work and doing work, like showing your work, doing the work. That's changing, I think a lot of times even in classrooms, I think they're even teaching stuff nowadays. You might know better both of you with your kids. But so some of that sort of dis unsettlement is, you know, feeling unsettled around some of those issues. And then the the general feeling with the, you know, the AI thing is it's fun to use. I'm enjoying, you know, like asking quick questions. You know, I was telling you guys yesterday, I think somebody, one of my clients using Doctor Chad PT for like a very difficult medical diagnosis. Now that's more adult, but it's being used just at various levels. For some people, it is gratifying in the sense I got a quick answer from Chachi PT about what I should do about my boyfriend or like, what about this situation? But I don't think people are left feeling empowered. I don't think they've, they're left feeling like, OK, I feel like it takes away a little bit of that thinking through issues. And I know this is probably not your question, but I'm adding my two cents about why that might be a little problematic of just relying on, you know, the AI, you know, as far as like thinking through issues, waiting on answers. This is going to get into a little bit of the idea of delayed gratification.

27:29 But, you know, one of the, you know, spiritual principles in Hinduism that I recall, you know, growing up was this idea of waiting. You know, and I think it's called Shreyas, is the idea if there's a desire that you have, right? Can and it's an attachment. Can we give it a pause, give it time before acting on that wrapping it And the you know, the other idea is when we do let it go, finally, when we do sort of give that time and that pause and that reflection is that is that desire still needed? Does it fall off on its own in some ways? And I'm a little concerned that, you know, we're not getting that opportunity as much anymore, not to be skirt full, not coming from a skirt, even just becoming from a psychological emotional lens around, you know, this idea of I need my my needs met now.

28:20 And I need. And when I don't get my needs met now, what's happening to me internally? What is the tension that's building up? How does that affect my mood, my relationships? You know, we talked about this in the article. When people are in some kind of a disagreement together, or they're, you know, one person wants to sort of talk through things and the other person is just not necessarily there. That's, that makes it very difficult to come back together to, to work through something. And so because the other partner may feel that I'm not ready for this conversation. So I'm going to go ahead and disappear into take an avoidant approach and disappear into something that's very gratifying, the immediate sort of rewards.

29:03 And that's my device. And that could be a chat bot, that could be social media, could be some other kind of application. So it's unfolding in a lot of places. It's and that's why I'm here today because also I wanted to talk about it from, you know, both ends here. Like this is a reality for us, and it's like, how do we navigate this in the healthiest way? Well, I think you bring up a great point because I think the danger that I see again, and this is for people who don't maybe don't have the awareness or maybe kind of what I always say is broaden the lens, widen the lens and not just look at the interaction in the here and now and whatever problem you're trying to solve or whatever it you're trying to scratch, which is just basically like that immediate gratification. But I'm just bringing that up because with chatbot, my friend, and she was a podcast guest also Priya Nelkor, she had an article in Psych Today talking about one of the dangers. And I apologize, Priya, if you're listening, if, if I misquoted you here, but one of the dangers with AI is just that there is no friction.

30:03 There's literally like you ask a question and sometimes I've had this happen where it'll just kind of it, it, it'll just kind of glitch on me and then it'll either cut out midstream or, you know, but by and large, it's like if you ask it a question, you'll get that little black box. And I kind of calibrate my breathing while I'm, you know, absorbing the information, you know, I breathe in, breathe out. But the bottom line is you're going to get an answer really quickly. And the problem is, I think people get so accustomed to that. And that's not how real life is. And so I think the lot of time when there's that frictionless experience that doesn't exist in the real world, you know, someone is probably in the middle of 10 different things. They're got, you know, they're responding to texts, they've got emails, they've got to pick up their kid from soccer. It, it would kind of scare me if you did get that real time response.

30:49 There's always some type of delay. I think Coca-Cola had a slogan, the pause that refreshes. And I think that's pretty apropos here because that pause can be refreshing. It's just kind of like, right, I mean, what's that? So. Thank you. The healthiest drink? Coca. Cola. Yeah, of course. Coke. Yeah, Sponsored by? No, But I was just saying that because it's like that. That is what scares the hell out of me. I'll be honest because I tell you, there are so many, especially teens when their brains are still forming, they don't have those lessons yet about the rules of engagement, the rules of the road. And so what's to stop them from saying like, let's say they're in a relationship and they don't get that instant gratification. Maybe they're, you know, their boyfriend is, is at the gym or they're not able to respond and they're like, screw it, I'm just going to start, you know, getting, I don't want to say promiscuous, but you know what I mean?

31:38 Just kind of like more Willy nilly starting relationships with whoever because they get that gratification. So that, that, to be honest, is my, my big concern is that we're, we're sort of using that sense of delayed gratification and we're, we're just going to look for that quick fix because we're already dopamine addicted as a society. And I think AI is just, you know, the quote, Spinal Tap, it takes it to 11 there. It just takes it just amps that up and that, that can be very dangerous, especially with with kids. If there's anything else you guys want to contribute to that 11. I think with a lot of the things we're talking about, whether it's using AI or being promiscuous, it's like there are contacts. I'm interested. This Yeah, there are confidence within which this is a perfectly fine thing to do. It's fine to do, right?

32:23 Yeah, yeah. We're not out here to judge anyone for their choices. I think the challenge becomes like, none of these issues are so black and white. And I think that's why this is harm. We can't just be like, AI is bad and a problem and we can't be like, it's good and no problem. Same with being promiscuous or, you know, any of the other types of conversations. The fact that our technology has gotten so advanced that it's a part of that conversation is really kind of interesting, which we can kind of shelf for now. The part that I think I wanted to add, this is kind of where the issue becomes a little spiritual for me because in my half as a meditator, you know, there's a couple of really deep things that I've learned from the process of meditation. But like, you know, I'm no guru, but if I had to stab one thing, that might be a recipe for a happy life with for people in general. My best guess would be like learning to befriend discomfort, like being comfortable with being uncomfortable, which includes being comfortable with pain and being comfortable with not knowing and being comfortable with confusion and all the challenging emotions you know that we might face in our human lives.

33:27 The way that our technology has shaped itself in the past 20-30 years is it has served up comfortable illusions for us in almost every area of life. Right. Porn is a comfortable illusion of sex. You know the YouTube podcasts are like a comfortable illusion of hanging out with your friends. AI is a comfortable illusion of a conversation. Social media can give you a comfortable illusion of being popular and engaged. You know, games give you a comfortable illusion of play, but you don't actually have to negotiate the play or figure out the rules and deal with conflict. And So what tends to happen is that the deeper someone goes into these worlds, the harder it becomes when they collide with the realities of actual, real life. And so it's totally fine to engage in all of these technologies.

34:12 There's no problem. But the thing that we have to monitor from an almost spiritual lens. But if you're not a spiritual person that at least from the lens of mindfulness and awareness and like groundedness and reality is like this technology is, it's influencing my ability to exist in the real world, influencing my ability to wait. I think, Josh, that was a great example, right? That is a perfect, perfect example of this at play, which is you can use this technology fine, but the more you use it, you might find it way hard to wait for things. And as a parent, I see that with my kid, if he plays video games first thing in the morning, the rest of his day feels super boring. But if the end of the day, we have a great time and it's joyful. And I've had like some amazing connection moments playing classic NES games from the 90s with him. Him showing me some of the games that he's playing, He's like showing off his farm in Stardew Valley. And I think it would be a mistake to just like let him play all day and find life boring. But I also think it would be a mistake to become like a brutal dictator of a father and be like, you're not allowed to enjoy video games because I love video games too. And I think it's the same thing with promiscuity or using AI to have a conversation with friends. Like it's unfortunately, you know, I wish I wrote, I wrote something like this in my book.

35:24 Like, I wish it were not the case that we had to be this vigilant, you know, around the technology that is ubiquitous in our lives. But as far as I'm concerned, unless something dramatically changes in the incentives of our economy and tech companies and the way this works, it is simply the price of admission for the 21st century. If you care about your well-being, that you have to be aware and mindful about the impact these technologies are having on you. But you can't turn into the like opposite, which is that like, fun is bad. And none of this can be fun. And like, you shouldn't be kids, you shouldn't be playing video games. You should never talk to AI. You should never use AI to help you with your homework. There's ways to use AI to deepen your learning, obviously, right? So this is the nuance that we're all struggling with collectively, I think.

36:05 Yeah. And, and I think we have to be creative too, because one of the things that I'm really passionate about is language. So mom and Dad, you can feel better that you got a good ROI on your investment in getting a a degree in French literature. Sure. Sorry, I just had to throw. That something so cuddles are not that like framing of parenting with an ROI that just feels so apro yeah, but. I know they're listening, but The thing is, love you mom and dad. But The thing is, no. I just bring that up because for me, I find so fascinating because of the lack of limits, you know, with, with linguistics, because I mean, this thing literally knows every language. It's even better than Duolingo. Sorry, Duolingo.

36:47 But The thing is, there's like Duolingo, I, I don't know if you guys are aware of this, but I was trying to learn Tagalog just because I, I deal with a lot of folks who are Filipino speaking. Duolingo doesn't have Tagalog. I mean, what, what the, what right. So I'm just bringing that up because that's a use case that I found to be very enriching for me because there's the whole notion of neuroplastic, right? And I think when you do a new skill, whether it's learning a new instrument or learning how to cook, or in my case, learning a foreign language, it's like you can feel the neurons, right? You can say, what is it? The neurons that fire together, wire together. That's something that I find fascinating is the implications for of AI on neuroplasticity. Because again, if we're using it as a tool, I think about it like a knife, right? I mean, a knife can be used to cut vegetables to feed your family or some more sinister topics that we don't need to go into here.

37:36 But the point is, AI is just like that. I mean, it's just, and for me, like my son is really into soccer, right? And so one thing I love about that is it's such a global sport. And, you know, he wants, and I'm encouraging him in this, he wants to play for Barcelona when he grows up, reaching for the stars, trying to keep his feet on the ground. But the point is, I'm like to get better at soccer to make it a more rich experience. I think it would be helpful to learn Spanish. And so like when he's watching the games, he can understand the commentary because they're speaking 20 million miles a minute is like the only thing it can understand is gold. But then it's like, so one of the things that I got out of my, my agent is we started talking in Spanish. I had Evan in the car with me and I would ask him, you know, I was like, oh, Preguntalaya, open AI, blah, blah, blah. And so he was a little nervous at first, but he started getting a little bit more comfortable because, you know, again, open AI kind of calibrates based on what you're feeding it. So I would say, yeah, I, I think you're 100% right, Jay, in terms of not not taking this black or white perspective and, and really just sort of doing everything with discernment and just seeing open AI as a tool.

38:43 Because I have friends, like I have a good friend of mine. He's a, he's a writer. I won't say the the outlet he's with because I don't want to shame him. But the point is, I asked him about open AI, just AI in general. I said, because, you know, obviously each one has different purposes or use cases. I don't know if you guys have heard this as well, but everyone who's in writing, they said that Claude is really more is better suited to that. So I don't know if you guys have heard that Claude AI, but I brought it up and he literally he gave him the word is apoplectic. Like he literally just started frothing at the mouth saying open eye is terrible, blah, blah, blah. And I just think that that black or white thinking where it's just like, oh, this stuff is the end of humanity. And, you know, we're basically going to this Orwellian hellscape. That's that's Cray Cray.

39:28 Yeah, the, the irony is that a lot of a lot of tech is polarizing conversations like that. But I can put a quick finer point on this, which is so I helped start and I'm an advisor and my brother is a founder of a company called Feel Good Games. And we have a product that's called Little Magic Stories and it's an AI product for kids. It's very, very early, but you can play it for free right now. But it's an example that anyone could go with your kid an experience. Like it's all about the context. So as a designer, what I've been really interested in around this project is like, can we design A context? Like because if you just send your kid to ChatGPT unsupervised, that's a little bit dicey. But if you can design A context and I think we're targeting like 7 to 9 year olds, like maybe 5 to 10 year olds some, somewhere in that range right now. And it's like the idea would be like, let's design A-frame where the guardrails are very clear and appropriate for this age where the context isn't just ask anything. It's like an imagination.

40:23 Good story, use your imagination. Let's aim it to promote literacy. Let's calibrate to reading level. Let's target the stories to help build imagination. Let's gamify the more creative and kind and brave prompts that people are offering. And we're seeing kids engage with this. And it's a very positive interaction with AI. We just had a research session yesterday where the parent came in with exactly that tone like this AI is bad for humanity. I'm really skeptical about this product that we're about to try. And then Fast forward 20 minutes later and they're sitting with their kid and the kid is laughing and they're laughing and they're kind of realizing, oh, like, you know, if you put the constraints on, actually this can be really powerful. And I think it's exactly what we're talking about. Like the general way we're thinking is like, oh, AI, this amorphous technology we created is bad, right? But that would be like saying like GPS satellites are bad. It's.

41:13 Like cars are bad because. If you're using them to spy on people, that's not good. And if you're using them to help you get to your family's house, then that's good, right? So how are we using this technology is really a big question. And of course, how are we creating it, which is a big part of a conversation too, right? So there are clear examples of building that context directly into the system, which I think these tech companies need to be thinking a little bit more. I just want to say I appreciate that this is like a, it sounds like it's like a parent and child type of interactive. I think that is really special. I think I feel like not to get really deep and morbid and you know, in this, but I feel like these, you know, platforms sometimes take us into a very solo sort of play solo life, you know, individualism and sort of takes us away from sometimes reality, right? Sometimes an escape, like you said, sometimes it's a beautiful escape.

42:04 Sometimes it's just something to procrastinate with, whatever that is. No judgement. I get it, we all do it. But I think there's something to be said about we are starting to see people kind of wanting to be siloing off a little bit. You know, you kind of see it even in like the dating world and stuff. I see it with some of my clients who are, you know, trying to date and things and like it's like, oh, maybe not. Maybe I'll just be a solo, you know, parent and that's fine or solo partner or whatever. That is all that's fine. But it's just interesting to me, you know, not needing a reliance is the end of this at some point. Not me. I mean, reliance on anyone. That's the extreme level. I my mind just goes there or went there. That's, that's fear, right? Like it's what we're talking about before. Like, I think a lot of people, they, the technology can give you this opportunity to turn inward and give in to the fear of how hard it is to put yourself out there.

42:53 And it's like, there are definitely people who want to be alone and there's good reasons for that. But now there's these reasons, which is like, I'm just going to talk to my AI girlfriend because talking to real women is hard. And that's just tragic. It's like the movie. Was that movie her? Wasn't there a movie? Spike Jones, Yeah. Yeah, yeah, Talking to each other is hard. It always has been. It's not anyone's fault. But like hiding away in your AI bot, like, you know, it's not, it's not necessarily going to lead to that lasting fulfillment. Sometimes you have to climb a mountain to feel the feeling at the top of it, and you can live a neutral life where you're not feeling the peak of the mountain or the valley. I just don't, you know, I think the ship is made to be sailed, right? And that's why I appreciate if there's, you know, the apps that you're talking about or the, you know, the one that you're building, working on.

43:36 And that sort of promotes even like more of that family, you know, kind of dynamic for parents and kids, at least at the very least, or like spout, you know, couples or relationships, something you can do with a friend. I think that would be very fascinating to me. I feel that also promotes that psychological well-being of attunement with each other. We're going together. That's really important, right? With human connection is that oxytocin moment coming together, serotonin, whatever it is, those feel good sort of chemicals that come when we're with someone doing something together. I think like if that's some of the future of AI, think that's really be really positive too. Yeah. I feel like in that lens, I mean, maybe we want to promote more promiscuity.

44:20 You got to promise you to on the brain, man. I just thought it was funny that you brought it up. Yeah, well, I, no, I mean, just to in all seriousness, I do think it's a concern because it's just like, you know, when you, when you are so used to getting what you want and you're so used to that gratification, real life sucks. I mean, real life really friggin sucks because it's just like, you know, you're not giving me the answer I need in interactions with friends or family sometimes, like I'll, I'm, I'm pretty terse in my texts. I don't know if it's because I'm an empath or whatever the label is, but it's just like, I don't want to bombard somebody with my shit. You know, I just like basically, you know, so, so I don't overload them, but you know, if they want a response, I'll be, I'll keep my responses very short and sweet just because I I don't want to, if it's going to be a more prolonged discussion, pick up the phone or let's do a zoom or whatever. But my point is ChatGPT doesn't roll that way. ChatGPT for somebody who needs that constant response. And, you know, this is a this is an episode. So in and of itself, it would be interesting maybe in a couple years to see what the rates of narcissism are in the world after ChatGPT.

45:27 Am I right? Because it's like, if you think about it, if you're somebody who needs validation, if you're somebody who needs to be told going back to the sycophantic angle that you're the shit, you know, you're a visionary, you're whatever you're going to take over the world. Yeah. I mean, ChatGPT will give you that all day long, right. So anyways, that's that's one of those, you know, sort of bookmark it. We can. We can return to it later. I I think double double clicking on that just dead. Hey, there's metaphors. I was just you literally, Jake, you're in my head. Literally when you talked about metaphors, double clicking is the one you know you're talking about desktop. Yeah, go ahead. Sorry, I got really excited. Yeah. You know, the sycophantic AI, which I know we talked about yesterday, but just to to sort of it's, it's related to that RLHF when these things are. And you read my mind again.

46:11 Literally. I was going to ask you that next. I love that it came up organically. Sorry. I'll shut up now. Go ahead. You know, people think of AI as like, you know, but somehow it's trained on the Internet, really, it has been fed certain data, not all data, and it has then been meticulously trained often by people in the global S to tell you what you want to hear. And so, like Josh, if we take the example you gave of like, you know, a teenage girl talking about whether about their boyfriend, right? It's like you just asked me one question. You know, I think my boyfriend is is a real jerk. Like what do you think? And it's going to give you this advice immediately. And, but and that feels like a, a real interaction, but it's not right. You're actually interacting with a algorithm that was trained on the conceptual data of the human Internet, which does not include a lot of human data, consciousness, love, kindness, awareness.

47:01 That's not in the training data. Also, it's been tuned to tell that girl exactly what she wants to hear. So if you actually asked that girl to have a multi part conversation, it might sound something like, Hey, you know, I think my boyfriend is a real jerk. Like, what do you think? And then they'll be like, you're right, he's a jerk, you're amazing. You shouldn't spend time with this guy. You should dump his ass and then she might reply and say, well, he actually he's not a jerk, though. He's like a nice guy. And then they I'll be like great point Actually. You should stay with him and you should marry him. And like, that's kind of what I mean by sycophantic AI. It's because it's if a real human behave like that, like if I came on this podcast today and you're like, what do you think of this question?

47:41 That's just a wonderful question. Here you are. What an absolute question. What a brilliant podcast host you are. This is just the greatest thing ever. And it's just you. That's what AI is doing to us. And so I think they're that narcissism is a real concern. And you know, people always talk about kids. I also worry about the elderly who get trapped into these loops and have no one to talk to. But fundamentally, you know, again, it's about how you use the AI and how we find real connection in life. And I've been recently writing a post on this, which I'll probably post next week, probably in time for this episode to go live. But I've been thinking about the word soul as a part of like the framework through which we might evaluate how we use AI. And I use it not necessarily in the way a guru or a pastor might, more the way a musician might.

48:24 Like I'm a musician and I think about soul music and music that is like from the heart. Sure, right? Like people can make all kinds of fun dance music for a party and that's great. But I've always been drawn to music that feels like you're hearing someone's story. And I think when we use AI and also for my peers and technology, when we build AI, we need some sort of lens upon like how do we decide what's worth building? Because now we can just snap our fingers and build anything. So what I'm kind of coming around, especially in the categories that we're talking about, can we evaluate this use of AI, whether it's going to deepen a heart to heart human connection or whether it's going to read more distance. And I'll give you a really simple example. You're talking about texting people or emailing people, right? If I use AI to just be like write an e-mail to Nikhil thanking him for having me on this podcast and it just spits out a reply and I send it to you. First of all, the fact that I spent less time generating that, then it's going to take you to read that is like a red flag because I'm asking you basically to cipher through this vague noise full of M dashes and weird metaphors and dash and try to like find me in it.

49:27 And you're probably, you're not going to find me in it and it's going to create distance between them. Interesting. But that doesn't mean we should never use AI. If I say, hey, what are like a few things that I should say to Nikhil in my thank you e-mail? And it gives me a few bullet points and I copy paste them and I edit them and I take some time to turn that into an e-mail that's you're probably still going to find me in that. And it's going to draw some connection, take it even further. And this is what I've been doing kind of with AI is like, what if I hit record and record a voice note and you can kind of hear my voice and the AI you a bit of a summary of that. But there's like the human piece, you know, there's ways we can use this technology to deepen connection. And I think that sole idea goes to the things we create as well. If you're creating a therapy bot like Josh, you've probably been thinking about this.

50:11 I'd love to hear your thoughts on AI therapy, like therapists or AI. But it's like there's a version where that AI is supposed to be replacing you, which I feel like is not a good idea. It's bringing more distance between us. But there's a version where it's sending people to you, right? There's a version where it's helping people, people find the resources that you and your peers have created in clarifying a message. And that feels like it has more soul in it to me. So I've been playing around with this because I don't think it's necessarily impossible for us to avoid Nikhil's your, your narcissistic feature state. But you know, I don't see the incentives lined up to, to fix that anytime soon. But I don't think it's necessarily impossible for us to use AI more skillfully. Well, one thing, one thing, if I may, I, I think sometimes what can be helpful is sort of taking the other extreme of the, the side of, of the spectrum.

50:59 When I, what I mean by that is because AI is so tech heavy and it's so frictionless, something I've been doing is actually intentionally increasing the friction and how I consume things like music. So, you know, back in college or, you know, I have a lot of friends, they have vinyl records. I mean, vinyl's cool, but first of all, it's, you know, you get like 4 songs on one side and it's like, I ain't nobody got time for that. So what I've done is I've actually gotten CD players and I'm listening to CD's and I find that that's honestly, I know that's I'm, I'm sounding like a boomer, but work, work with me here. So The thing is, I'm thinking of like there's a album Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers, right? That's like one of my favorite albums. And I'm just thinking about the concept of consuming it on Spotify. Now, obviously I can just get all the songs Spotify will generate like a playlist based on that. It'll throw in some doors, it'll sew in some Van Morrison, whatever.

51:51 But the point is with ACD, I'm very confined to it. So sometimes I'll walk around the block with like my Discman, listen to that album and I'll just take a trip down memory lane. You know, I'm thinking about this song Moonlight Mile. I'm thinking about, you know, back in Ohio shoveling snow. I don't see that stuff anymore because I'm in San Diego, ha ha. But the point is it's like I just encourage people to take a more intentional and deliberate use of things that we take for granted because it's just like, you know, books are a prime example. I don't think I've heard like CDs are CD players are hard to find. Like I had to do some real to go to a lot of thrift stores and I think I got this one off Amazon. But my point is, I encourage anyone who's listening just to go the other extreme that will train your muscles or your gratification, delayed gratification muscles.

52:36 So you're you're not sort of this slave to AI. Does that make sense? I don't know what your guys thoughts are on that I. Mean it it does. It's a hard sell. Yeah, it's not for everyone. I agree. Disk man. Yeah, man, I'm I'm old school. I'm an uncle. What do you want from me? Yeah, I mean, it's it that's a hard one. I mean, the delayed gratification piece, people don't even know they're going through that. That's yeah, there's no presence with it. It's just happening. It's like autopilot, like, oh, Yep, even for me, like, oh, my computer's not working. What the heck? You know, this is, I've paid this, this amount of money for it Yesterday. It wasn't charging fast enough. Had a mini meltdown, you know, before our recall yesterday. So it's just, you know, we have these new and higher expectations. You're right, we should be bringing awareness to this. And I think that's what one of these these conversations are about, right?

53:27 But everyone has to kind of, I guess, realize that for yourself to, to recognize how that's playing into your relationships. How is it playing into how you interface with technology, with AI? And I think it kind of goes to the idea of when do we know when like tech or AI or something is sort of interfering with like growth or interfering with Peace of Mind, whatever it is. And I think it's Jay's absolutely right. Like these tools are here to be used with some our own discretion. And that's why kids it's you don't just release them to ChatGPT world. They have to have some sort of parental supervision or some kind of support around it.

54:09 Guardrails. Yeah. And so The thing is it, it we're kind of, this is hindsight's 2020, I feel, because everybody's in it now. And it's like, how do we pull back? From it, yeah, Jay, how, how do you to, to that van, how do you, how do you sort of regulate that? What are some best practices you can recommend just to sort of contain the spread of AI and sort of overtaking your mind basically? What are some obviously you mentioned like meditation, but maybe if you can maybe either double click on that or some other techniques? The whole the whole thing that I've been bringing is actually bringing it in a more nuanced way, bringing the skills that meditation and mindfulness teach to these different areas. And So what I hear when you're talking about your disk man and in general, what we're talking about, even with little magic stories as an example, compared to just the open field of, of ChatGPT versus a more, you know, contained experience.

55:00 I think of this idea of constraint, right? Which is like as a creative person, I know that constraint breeds creativity. I like to play the Blues sometimes because it's the same exact progression every time. And you really have to be creative within that, which is really fun and can create some very interesting music. Similarly, as a designer, setting constraints when I'm doing a creative workshop is really, really, really key. Here's the thing. I think there's a lot of people out there who are just using technology without thinking at all about the impacts it's having. And for those people, like when they come across my office, the conversation is really about just like, let's just find some constraints here. We need to set some boundaries. But the challenges, and this is true, this is a kind of undercurrent of our whole conversation today so far is like, we don't need the guilt and the shame to be a part of this conversation. We don't need to be guilting ourselves for using our phones or for getting mad because our computer didn't work. Like those are emotions.

55:53 It's frustrating and it's OK that it's frustrating. We don't have to guilt ourselves. And certainly we don't have to shame our kids for loving video games or wanting to be on social media with their friends. They don't need more shame, right? I think what we really want to find a way is to set the boundaries smartly, but with a positive frame. And the concept that I kind of invoke for this in the book is ritual, which is like ritual is a positive reframe around constraints and boundaries. So I'll give you an example of a ritual I have. So I only watch one show or movie per day. That's just something I've decided is good for me to not just like, you know, watch 12 episodes straight or just like lose myself in TV in the middle of the day. Yeah, things like that.

56:33 But I don't just set it like a kind of paternal limit, paternalistic limit on myself. I treat it as an opportunity to also enjoy the ritual of it. So I also think, how can I make that one episode or movie I watch like more fun, right? So how can I be really intentional about what I choose to watch? How can I like, put my, the distractions away, pop some popcorns, invite my wife to join me and make it a kind of magic moment, a beautiful ritual. In our evening, we finished putting our son to bed. We go watch a show. We got some popcorn, we're chatting, we're hanging out. And it actually catches some of that magic that I had. Like I actually, well, my first job was at a movie theater and we got to watch the early Cannes, like when they would send the projections.

57:14 I remember Gladiator specifically. When you say Cannes you mean like pre pre production? Oh OK I got you. I thought you meant the Cannes, the Cannes Film Festival. Sorry. OK, Gotcha. Gotcha. OK. No, no. No, no, I was not a Cannes Film Festival as a child, that would be. Cool. That would be cool. Yeah, go ahead. Sorry. So they they basically send the film canisters on the Wednesday and the and the release date is Friday. And so when we got them early on Thursday, we would have like an internal staff party and we'd all get to watch Gladiator before it came out. And it was like a magic fun moment. And it's like an example of the feeling that I now get when I pop that popcorn and I kind of watch my one show for the day. And the same can be true about AI and social media and games and checking your work e-mail and all the things that can stress us out. It's like, how can we set those constraints? But like your disk man, you've chosen The Rolling Stones, going for a walk with the technology you had when you were younger, and you're getting some of this feeling. So it's not that jokes, you have to go get a disk man. I think it's the deeper principle of like, what are the different categories of technology where we can build in some positive rituals that really, you know, simultaneously set boundaries around the problematic aspects while rekindling the like love and joy that we can experience with technology, The meaning, the purpose, the connection. I think where it gets dangerous is to use the mountain metaphor from before.

58:29 A lot of these technologies are like putting on AVR headset where you can be at the top of the mountain even though you're not really there. And a lot of people would are, are basically out there being like, why would I climb the mountain when I can just put this VR headset on? That's a spiritual misunderstanding about what makes humans. Humans are happy when they put the work into climbing the mountain and they earn it. And I think a lot of people are struggling because they're getting all this pleasure, this instant gratification without really earning it. And therefore, the, the the enjoyment is very fleeting. The connection, the meaning, the purpose doesn't come the way they hope it would because they're not actually connecting with people. They're not actually accomplishing the things they say they are. Yeah. It's just all a big illusion. And that's, I think, what we all have to be careful about. Yeah, well, no, that's you make a great point. I love that mountain concept because to you know, again, I'm I'm sort of making these mental bookmarks about things that I want to follow up on in five years. So I'm my future self is going to tell me something interesting.

59:23 But what would also be interesting to see is the satisfaction rates of trips, you know, around the world because I felt this myself because I went to Japan a year ago. My son is obsessed with Japanese culture and this was a trip of a lifetime for him. But I to be honest, I mean, at the time it was, I was going through some massive burnout and just life was just kind of kicking my ass. So that played into it a little bit. But part of me was just like, OK, you know, I can, I can go to this beautiful temple in Kyoto. I can spend the time and blah, blah, blah, I just pull it up on my, on my iPad and I'm just like, what's, what's the difference? You know, I'm just bringing that up because it's like, it would really be interesting because when I had travelled, I think back in 99 when I went to India and we had to like Aurangabad, Ajanta, Laura, all these places. I was, my mind was just blown because it was like when you think about technology at that time, it was very primitive. You had dial up, you had that you've got mail bullshit from AOL, right Where it's just like, you know, they. Friggin movie of Tom Hanks.

1:00:22 And but like the point is, it's like technology was just kind of this quaint thing. It was this curiosity, right? And now it's become so ubiquitous where it's just like it's it's in every facet of everything we do. Friggin QR codes have replaced menus. That's that sucks, right? I mean, there's something nice about a menu, right? Sorry to be like a crank crotchety old boomer. But the point is, going back to what I was saying, that is something that's going to be an interesting downstream like trend to look at is just what are people satisfaction rates with before it? Hold on one second. I'm going to grab something. So I don't know if you guys can see this is travel is the only thing you buy that makes you richer. If you guys, and this is a plug for my friend, his name is Freeman Fung. He was a guest on the show.

1:01:07 He wrote a book called Travel to transform. And I'm just bringing all that up because it's like travel is really, that's something you can't simulate through AI where it's just like, or VR, whatever you want to say. Because it's like, that is such a personal experience. The sights, the sounds, the smells, and someone like me who's really into languages. I mean, there's there's nothing to replicate that. There's certain melting pots like Queens or certain towns where there are like lots of different cultures. I'm just bringing that up. It would be very interesting to see like if we've removed the friction of something like travel where you just have to get like a triptych from AAA. Remember those things, those folding maps now it's just so frictionless that what is the satisfaction rate for immersive experiences like traveling to Japan or going to or something like that when it can be simulated? So yeah, a lot of a lot of things we got to circle back on in five years.

1:01:57 I really like this. And what you're saying, I think is really alive. And it's not even just about travel. Like, I think this is where one of the things that I think I've most taken from being a meditation person and just like, being that guy who just like, hey, I'm gonna go away for a week and people expect that to mean you're gonna go get fucked up on a beach. And I'm like, actually, I'm going to a monastery. Yeah, right in silence for seven days. Monks don't have much of A tolerance, right? People are just like, why would you do that? And I always like for anyone who's listening is like, why would you do that? I always say whatever you think is going to be the challenge with that is probably true for day one. So like if you think it's going to be really boring or you can't even imagine just sitting alone with your thoughts, you're right.

1:02:42 That's going to be the hardest part on day one, sure. But day 2 and onward, things are going to change because as a human being, you're adaptable. And so you're not just going to spend seven days or 10 days or whatever just sitting there being like, I'm bored, I'm bored, I'm bored. You're something's going to happen. And there's only one way to find out. So that's my little plug for retreats for people. But going back to my my .1 of the things that I've taken away is that, you know, and I think the Zen tradition I've, I've done a lot of practices in a lot of traditions, but I think the Zen tradition, particularly Rinzai Zen, in my opinion, are the most articulate on the matter of like non conceptual reality. There is almost this, it's truly a oneness, but there's this duality we most experience between the conceptual mind of language and ideas.

1:03:26 And then like the actual physical and sensory experience of like that we we can't even talk about, right? We can't even put words to it. I don't know what you want to call it. Call it consciousness awareness. You call it God, right? Whatever you want to call it, the minute you put a word on it, you're not it anymore, right? And that's the whole idea. But I think what you're talking about with that travel, whether you're traveling to Japan or frankly the corner store right there is the possibility for you to be in a non conceptual space. That non conceptual space does not exist online. It does not exist on a screen. AI has not no access to it has never been trained on. AI is a fully conceptual reality. So as long as the same way we learn in meditation to befriend our thoughts like early meditators.

1:04:11 One of the biggest challenges when I'm teaching meditation is beginners are like, I can't get my thoughts to shut up. And I'm always like, that's not the goal. The goal is not to get. The goal is to befriend your thoughts, to recognize your thoughts aren't true in any objective sense. They are just a voice that. You're here and you're. Just how strange, how curious, not it's the enemy go away. How curious. So similarly with AI, it's like it's just an interesting conceptual thought experiment, but it is not reality. That picture of the philosopher's walk in Kyoto is not the actual philosopher's walk. Me talking about my trip to Japan is not going to Japan. The VR of the top of the mountain is not the top of the mountain. And as long as we can stay true to that, I think we're going to be OK with all this technology.

1:04:54 But the problem is it's actually extremely hard to stay true to that. And it's a skill that we have to train. And This is why I've been devoting my kind of professional life to bringing the concepts of mindfulness to the technology conversation, because we cannot lose track of that as we are losing track of it. Things are really falling apart in certain ways. And, you know, I don't think we're too far gone. I think there is, it is not a coincidence that there is growing interest in mental health and awareness and mindfulness and these types of ranches because everyone out there is feeling it every day and they're like, I need something to keep my feet on the ground, the way you put it. So yeah, that's my rant. So that you said how, you know, even just our approach to looking at AI and and the judgment that we immediately might have right of something unknown. Because I do know people in the extreme camps that are like, hell no, never, not today, not ever with AI. And then the people that are like, I'm totally into it and I don't even know anything about anything else at this point. I'm just an AI bought at bought myself. I'm a vessel for the AM.

1:05:58 Yeah, So there's something to be said about like, if you truly want to, for anybody who's not really into the, you know, the tech world but is just in it right now, I'm feeling like, oh, I don't know where I stand with this. I think that first step of just taking a step back for a moment and saying like, you know, seeing it for what it is and not shaming or blaming. That's a big one. Not inducing, not putting guilt on ourselves for using it or being interested in in it and bringing that sort of piece into, you know, your use of, you know, AI or technology in whatever way that looks bringing, you know, there's a way to sort of bring a more mindful, intentional approach to it. And also, yeah, I think the minute we say I hate or I don't like this or we put a judgement on it, I think that's where you talk about mindfulness, right?

1:06:45 That's that's kind of the opposite of that. And that's not unfortunately that's going to make it harder for you. The minute you can just keep more of a a neutral open stance, I think is going to be help you in just in navigating this because it is going to continue to increase and continue to, you know, be a part of our everyday reality whether we like it or not. I was just going to say, I think we've talked about so many amazing topics probably on this show. I mean, all my guests are great, but I think we've just touched on a lot of things that, you know, we've opened a lot of doors that have just kind of turned over a lot of stones that haven't been really looked at, which I think is, you know, part of the exciting thing about hosting this podcast is just the, as I talked about in the tagline, it's just the power of conversation to catalyze change. I think for all of us, I came away with a lot of really pretty powerful aha moments.

1:07:40 You guys have shared some really interesting insights. So I want to, you know, thank you guys both for for joining and I want to turn it back to you guys in no particular order. Well, I started with Jay, so I'm going to turn it over to Josh. But Josh, is there anything either talked about on the show earlier that you want to circle back on or maybe clarify or maybe expand on? Is there anything you talked about earlier that maybe you want to circle back and maybe just to use Jay's metaphor, double click on, maybe go a little bit further in depth? Yeah, I think the main thing is just probably we didn't touch really too much about like AI empathy versus like human empathy. There is, you know, this mumbling or murmurs around that that's going to come too. And I'm sure to that more.

1:08:20 But you know, I think right now it's important for us to recognize that like just continuing to realize that human empathy is coming from more of that attunement, right? That lived experience. Someone can sit right in front of you and and relate and give reciprocal understanding and emotion. There's a real feeling on the other and whereas an AI person or a person just this body is not agent. Thank you just already giving it a character. This AI agent has no it's experience is going to be from the algorithm like, oh, let me go back and see what somebody in Georgia said and that's just not it. That's that's and for us to remember that parents for to remember that to help to help with, you know, working with their kids or seems to remember that when they're turning to developing relationships.

1:09:10 I know Jay had mentioned quickly about chatbot relationships, right? We didn't even go there with that this conversation, but that's a whole thing, right? There's this idea of in a human relationship, you have that mutual sort of nervous systems connecting even there's more of a chance for a live connection, right versus just on the computer, even though some people rather keep their relationship online. That's a whole nother. I don't judge. That's another way of being, but you're not going to, I feel like if it's another person on the habit of line that's that's more interesting to me rather than an AI agent. But you're not you're, you know, you're going to be getting more valid. Like we talked about the whole validation and reassurance versus someone who's going to challenge you.

1:09:53 Right the way. Constructive. Someone who sees you, knows your intent, knows where you're coming from a little bit more than and and is willing to get in the trenches with you in difficult conversations or when the chips are down. I mean, obviously those are more serious relationships, but I'm just giving a taste of the difference right between that and something that you're looking for, that we're looking for in an AI who may just be able to give you great banter maybe and maybe and again give you that validation, but may not are not necessarily looking out for your highest and. Jay. Yeah. Jay, what about you? Anything. Anything you want to dive back into? Yeah.

1:10:33 Promise. Promiscuity is cool, but yeah, this is a. Strong advocate for everyone to be more. Yeah, that's right. That's what this song has. PSA for promiscuity right here. That's right. And for your life and be promiscuous. That's finale's. Promiscuity. Promiscuity reimagined. Yeah. Two pointing. OK, I will pick that up real quick, which is, you know, I think it, it's true that we talked about AI being sycophantic and it not being a real person, but it's also true that it can be incredibly deep and useful. Like you can talk to it about personal issues and get real insights. You can talk to it about your meditation practice. And so both can be true.

1:11:17 And that's why the level of discernment is so important. But the thing that I really want to kind of leave here with is for, I think for a lot of people, I certainly see this with the people I work with. I think for a lot of people this is all just extremely overwhelming. There's just too much happening. These giant corporations are talking about hundreds of billions of dollars there. It's just all out there somewhere. And I am just a victim. And I think the thing I kind of want to leave is that we are not powerless victims, that in fact, all of the interactions we're having with this technology are in the intimate spaces of our lives, in our pockets, on our desks, in our bedrooms. Our children are playing with these technologies in our houses, right?

1:11:58 Like we are not powerless to bring more intention and awareness to the choices we make. You don't have to understand everything to bring clarity to say which technologies are serving me and which ones are serving me illusions. Which technologies are helping me find more of that soul connection, even though I'm talking to a but it's helping me build the confidence to go out in the world and talk to real people. It's fine, there's no problem. But like which ones are serving my deepest intentions and which ones are creating more distance between me and the person I want to be? Which one Which ones are like bringing joy and connection like like I gave you that example of little magic stories like a mother and child having connection and joy together with AI. Which ones are like the kid is locked in his room in a rabbit hole with a right.

1:12:42 So for one family, AI could be a positive source of joy. For another family, it could be a problem that we need to eradicate. And the only way we can tell the difference is with awareness, self-awareness and awareness of what's going on in our lives. And so I think the thing that I would leave people with if they've listened this far would be discernment and awareness. No judgement and shame required, no guilt required. You are not powerless. All of that can be happening out there. But if mindfulness has taught me one thing in all these years, it's that you always have a choice in how you relate to what you're experiencing. Yeah. Well, very well said, both of you. I again, extremely grateful to both of you. Josh, obviously a long standing friend and, you know, rock star in the South Asian mental health space.

1:13:28 Thank you for facilitating this. And Jay, it's, it's such a privilege, as I said to you before, it's such a privilege to be connected. I, I really value both of your perspectives. I think the audience is going to go go away with a lot of I think they're going to be not to be too schmaltzy, but I think they're going to be better people for having listened to this. Think they're going to have a little bit more clarity and I think a little bit more of a new who wants perspective on what can as, to use the word you mentioned before, be a very polarizing topic. So I want to thank you both for volunteering your time and to the audience. I just want to say thanks for hanging in there with us on this very weighty discussion. And until the next time we meet, stay untethered. Thanks so much for listening and I hope you enjoyed that episode. For more of these types of conversations, please visit us at Untether Your Life dot CEO.

1:14:17 You can also find us on Instagram and Untether Your Life, as well as on Apple, Spotify, and other platforms by searching for Untether Your Life. And if you did enjoy this episode, please leave us a review or share it with someone who might also benefit. Thanks. And until the next time we meet, stay untethered.