I’ve been using AI to help me draft and edit content lately (not this though! 🤖) and it’s saved me hours brainstorming, writing, and editing. I've even used it to meal plan! And it’s got me thinking about how much collective time AI is going to save.

Forbes estimates that 40% of working time will be augmented or automated by AI which is a huge percentage. So I’ve been wondering ‘how will we spend all this time we’ve saved?’

We’ve seen huge leaps in technology before. I’ve been thinking about this like a 1950s home. All of a sudden there are appliances that are automating work used to do by hand - like washing clothes. So we freed up all this time and it should have made our lives easier. Instead the expectations shifted to keep ourselves busy. Dinner parties, lipstick on and hair curled at the end of the day, pressed napkins. We filled the time. Well - capitalism filled the time.

In a society that is chronically over worked and over stressed - we know there are implications to this. We know, medically, that too much stress can acutely give us insomnia, migraines, digestive issues, depression, anxiety - the list goes on. And long term can lead to heart problems, high blood pressure and diabetes. But we’re still working ourselves sick.

We have the option for AI to solve this problem. Technology could give us a gift of the only thing we can’t get more of - Time. Now will we take the gift and help ourselves? Or will we succumb to the temptation that more time = more profits and we should fill that time with more work?

As owners of businesses, as leaders in our industries and our communities, I encourage you to think about the possibility of what this next leap in technology could look like. And perhaps, could you lead by example and choose a little bit of balance, nature, connection and reflection?

Some ideas for how you could spend those moments:

• Go outside and put your feet in the grass. Take a deep breath.
• Call someone you love
• Go for a walk or workout
• Spend time with someone little and play!
• Take up a tactile hobby that will leave you with something real - knitting, gardening, crochet, pottery
• Journal

What ideas do you have about how AI could work for you instead of against you?