Photo by Dr. Quintal & Associates

The world we live in is getting faster and faster.

Each week, a new AI model appears, a new tool for learning, another skill to acquire, and another opportunity that we are afraid to overlook. We are continually being advised to become more productive, more efficient, more competitive, and always a step ahead in some way.

And I think somewhere in all of this, it is becoming very easy to forget something simple:

We are likewise expected to take pleasure in the fact of being alive.

Not every hour needs to be productive. Not every hobby needs to turn into a side business. Every conversation doesn’t need to result in a network. Not every moment needs to be documented, optimized, measured, or turned into content.

Happy times can simply consist of sitting with the person you love and talking about nothing in particular.

That means drinking coffee without looking at your phone every two minutes, laughing at something foolish, walking without knowing where you’re going, listening to an old song and cooking with your family, and phoning someone you haven’t spoken to in a long time just because you enjoy it.

Technology gives us amazing capabilities, and artificial intelligence will likely make many aspects of our lives faster and simpler.

That’s not always true of speed.

If technology saves us an hour, the key question becomes what we do with that hour.

Should we immediately put a new task into it? Or do we sometimes use it to live a bit more?

I’m enthusiastic regarding AI and the potential of technology to assist us in our endeavors. At the same time, I believe that as our tools become more powerful, we must take greater care to protect those aspects of life that cannot be automated.

Friendship, family, being there, rest, curiosity, love, small celebrations, meaningless jokes, and quiet moments.

Perhaps advancement shouldn’t be judged merely by how much we can accomplish.

Perhaps it should be judged by the extra space we can create to enjoy the life we are building.