Navigating Emotional Challenges During 68 Days of Growth

Welcome to day 12 and 13 of the 68 Days, Election Day, and the day that I come clean and tell you the truth about something I recently posted. Let’s go…

Physical

Yesterday started out as a pretty dark day for me emotionally. I’m not sure if I can blame it on the time-change (why are we still doing this) but I’ll just say it was dark. So, I didn’t workout and didn’t pray. I hate typing that but it is what it is. We all have those days, right? Shake it off and step up.

Today, I woke up at 4:05, yep, my body is still on the old time (no, really, why are we still doing this!?). I couldn’t go back to sleep so I decided to get started. I worked through my apex workout to level 6 and back down. I didn’t time myself, but it certainly felt faster than Sunday’s level 6. I’ll try to remember to time myself tomorrow.

Spiritual

Monday – see above failure lapse.

Today I dove right into the readings for the day, the Office of Readings, and Morning Prayer. I also prayed a series of prayers I created almost 10 years ago that I call The Chaplet of Redemptive Suffering. It’s a meditation on the sufferings of Christ and Mary and an attempt to unite my sufferings with theirs. It helped clear my mind and find a place to park all of the anxiety, stress, and darkness that I’ve been experiencing lately. I guess it’s a way to “offer up” both physical and mental suffering. It was very helpful for me. I may share this at some point in the future.

Emotional

Monday started off very dark but about mid-morning I found some hope in a most unusual place. Before I reveal the place or cause of this change of mindset, I highly recommend you listen to the podcast I recommended yesterday that focuses on my journey and writings. Even if you simply listen to the first 5 – 8 minutes, you find something very interesting…

Okay, the reveal is… the podcast that I posted a link to yesterday, a review of my website and writings, is what changed my attitude. It made me feel like I was truly doing something good in life and helping others or at least that potential is there. It made me feel good about myself and my mindset shifted…a little. Why just a little? Well, you see, the podcast I linked to isn’t real. I mean it’s real in the sense that you and I can listen to it but the entire thing is completely, totally, 99.8% A.I. generated. From the content, which was gleaned from the pages I told A.I. to look at to the voices, story line, conversation, etc. All of it was “produced” within about 3 minutes.

To do this, I entered in 4 pages from my site into Google’s Notebook LM program, hit create, and waited. I was amazed and terrified by the result. If you haven’t listened, I highly recommend doing so now. It is amazing in it’s scope, story, and presentation. It truly sounds like real people having a conversation complete with laughter, stuttering, and human pauses in the conversation.

This brings about some ethical dilemmas that I need to think more about. Is it right to allow A.I. to create such things? How could this be used for nefarious purposes; calling my mom with my voice to ask for money? Gaining access – stealing accounts? Prank calls or worse? I’m also pondering my reaction to the podcast. Should I be emotionally influenced by computers? Could this be used for good things, like therapy? Could it be used for bad things, like telling someone to end their life?

There’s so much here to unpack but I’m truly fascinated by it all and this coming from a man who would rather live of the land, toss his “smart” phone, and live a much simpler life. I’m sure I’ll be writing about this more in the future!

Tuesday started well and continued on through the day. Yes, I do see the connection of sticking to my prayers and workouts and how it affects my emotional state. It’s certainly easier to recognize and keep in mind than to do but I’ll keep fighting to make it happen for my own sanity and for my family. This pattern also brings to mind my usual Confession pattern that I see clearly, but like St. Paul, I continue to the bad I do not want to do! I hate it but I’m also consoled in a weird way knowing that it’s the pattern of human beings; forget about God, fall into sin, suffer, cry out for help, receive help, forget about God,.. rinse and repeat. If you don’t believe me that this is a common pattern, read or re-read Genesis, Exodus, or the entire Old Testament!

Intellectual

I’m counting my dabbling in A.I. as something of an intellectual pursuit. I’m excited to continue reading from the Summa of the Summa because I know that St. Thomas Aquinas will have some sort of insight into the issue even though he lived a few years before ChatGPT and other systems…

Spanish continues to go well for me and I’m gaining confidence in reading but not in speaking. I’ll keep after it though. Just like anything else, no one starts as an expert so I’ll continue to test, probe, and push my neuroplasticity!

My left-handed cursive, no it’s not slang from the Urban Dictionary, is going well. I’m feeling more confident. My capital E’s are actually legible and dare I say elegant!

Election Day: Bonus

Today is the day. I’m thankful that I can vote without threat of violence to myself or my family. I’m thankful that the poll workers are neighbors and fellow parishioners who are respectful and cordial. I’m thank that I live in a country where I can safely voice my opinion without fear or censorship. However, my question is this: Why is Election Day not a Federal Holiday? I believe it should be. It is an important day, a day where we the people make our voices known. It should be a day where every eligible person has a chance to vote in person should they chose to do so. We should take our children with us so that we can discuss the process. Could there be a better civics field trip than this?

Thanks for reading and making it this far. As I’ve stated before, this is really a record of my journey and thinking over the 68 days and so some posts may be longer than others.

What about you? Did you vote? How was your day(s)? Progress? Set backs? Let me know in the comments! Feel free to subscribe if you don’t want to miss any of my rambling posts.

A.I. Title & Image

I’m actually content with the image and title A.I. generated for today’s post. The only thing in the image I noticed that isn’t quite right is the woman’s fingers, of course. It’s not bad, just and odd looking pointer finger. I am a bit surprise that it chose to create this image considering how much I spoke about A.I. generation. It probably thought, “I’m not touching that. Better lay low…”