Embracing Change in the AI Age: Choosing Your Response

How can we be chill embracing change in the AI Age? Keeping anxiety over AI as chill as a cucumber isn’t an easy task. However, there’s a simple thing you can do to lower your anxiety levels at work while seeing automation growing around you.

Focus on what you can control

You can’t dictate the trajectory of AI or the societal shifts it brings about, including its impact on the job market. But hey, that’s alright. There are so many things that are in your control.

You have control over how you level up your skills. You get to call the shots on your next steps in life. You decide what news you consume and from which sources. You choose your favorite music and where you buy your avocados. And you certainly get to decide how you respond to changes. The bottom line is you’re not a passenger but the driver.

If your first knee-jerk reaction to hearing your company’s planning to use AI to automate some tasks (which might impact your role) is a moment of pure panic, let me tell you, that’s normal. It’s human. But remember, you get to decide how you respond and what you do next. Can you level up your skills and shift into a new role within the company? Can you play to your human strengths and offer something an AI can’t? If management offers a different role where you need to learn new things, don’t shut the door. Grab that opportunity with both hands!

And what if you do lose your job to AI? Let me introduce you to Emily (@emilyhanley69), a copywriter who shared her story on social media. Her company replaced her with AI as a more cost-effective alternative. What did she do? She pivoted and landed a job training AI to do her job! Yep, it’s a tad ironic, but it’s also clever. Now, she’s in a prime position to be a consultant for marketing firms using AI.

You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.
(Maya Angelou)

The control freak’s ultimate anti-AI anxiety list!

Choose your news outlets wisely. (For example, choose the MIT news section and avoid gossip outlets showing you the end of the world).
Use journaling or meditation to explore your feelings. Don’t run from difficult feelings! Understand them.
Use AI so you can see it’s not the axis of evil. Create a ChatGPT account and try to ask it some questions.
Upskill and open your mind to new job opportunities out there if you’re worried about your job.
Don’t watch doomsday scenario movies with Terminators and Cylons in them… Stop catastrophizing by fueling your imagination with more apocalyptic scenarios.
Consider a technology detox. What about visiting a tiny house next to the sea or in the woods to connect with nature on the weekend?
Be more present for the little things. When was the last time you mindfully enjoyed something you were doing and the company you were with?
Take a different take on human value. Inaccuracy is what makes us unique. Embrace those!