#85 No I don't want your AI workflow guide

I recently found listening to jazz helps me think more clearly. It’s a genre of music that I’ve had zero connection with, if only via Big and Carrie having a fully dedicated Sex and the City episode about her meeting a new crush (“Jazz man”) after her and Big had a night out at a jazz club as “just friends.”

Carrie doesn’t know a thing about jazz and neither do I, but what I do know is it does something to my brain. It’s soft, and kinda random, but not so random and scattered it pulls you out of your thoughts.

I definitely prefer the really slow, mellow, lounge kinda jazz that you almost forget it’s there, and definitely not the energetic kind that makes you feel out of breath just listening to it. Like those you’ll find on YouTube with comments like this:

It has definitely helped me through some late hours of working, writing, and thinking, and I found myself reaching for my trusted EDM, house, and random remix playlist a lot less; instead grounding myself with slower, calmer music. What I feel in my head during that time is kinda like this soft light shining through our bedroom window.

I don’t know about you, but because of my work, I get regular daily doses of just this really erratic, sometimes antagonising, content where everyone’s trying to be faster, more productive, more automated. Everyone’s trying to build the next best AI agent to replace an entire department (a lot of times this also comes from founders who don’t even have these departments yet) or build something that does cold outreach en masse to avoid having quality conversations.

Well, I know—they’d say it’s not to avoid quality conversations, it’s just a numbers game to get to those quality conversations in the first place.

But either way, if I have to be in this world, I find myself gravitating to those that build more consciously, those who genuinely want to solve a problem or to handle something they’ve struggled with but now can outsource to an agentic workflow so they can preserve more of their energy and brain power to be their best selves in another capacity.

I kinda feel it too. Gravitating towards tangible, creative, human things, while letting the technology do the cold, mechanic things. I’ve gone back to just using a written daily journal because I always put far too much in if I use a digital tool and it stressed me out. Writing with a pen just hits different, I do believe it does something (good) to your brain, compared to just adding tons of tasks using your keyboard.

This kinda leads me to the conversation I had with Siobhan, a local designer. Well, I say local—she does, indeed, live local to me but she’s also fairly well known for her stunning maximalist style.

I was doing a random project of my own, when I came across this enormously large sofa in one of the property listings I just had to share with her.

But it wasn’t for Siobhan’s talented designer eye that I met with her. I was actually doing (yet another) personal project where I photograph (mostly) women and their cats, and I saw that she has a little floofball so I asked her if she’d be up for it.

Turns out her floof, Benji, is just the most adorable senior. He’s 17 (!). I wouldn’t say he was too impressed on the day but he did grace us with his presence in Siobhan’s dressing room, hallway, and downstairs bedroom.

You can see more of the shoot here in my photo journal.

What I enjoyed the most from our shoot (besides her stunning home that is) was having actual normal human conversations that don’t revolve around AI or anything.

We actually just talked about our businesses, the boring side of it, the fun side of it. As well as 4-day work week, the local cafe I told her she has to go for a breakfast date, how Benji almost escaped via roof terrace, about putting away Christmas decorations, and tons of random things.

I don’t know if this was Siobhan’s effect or not, but I had been inspired to get a new throw for our sofa, one that actually looks and feels nice, and is good quality. So I got this blue one from an online store based in Poland.

It took a while to arrive but it’s ssoooo nice. And warm, and cosy. The hardest part is keeping it away from our cat who likes to dig his nails in, especially if something’s a really nice fabric.

So, obviously—inevitably—I had to do something with it. Having spent far too much time recently doing work or thinking about work (and then the rest of the time feeling tired from work), I knew it’s a good push to get me shooting again.

I sometimes do this thing where I wait for the perfect feeling, the perfect day, to shoot but I realise that’s not realistic. What’s realistic is being conscious about your creative practice.

Plan it in. Stick it in your calendar or journal. You might already know what you’ll want to create or you might not, but it’s more about having that dedicated time for it. If you’re busy, you can’t leave things to chance.

We both know the chance of randomly doing something creative during a busy week is slim. So, if it has to be this way, treat it as your actual job. Set that Out of Office slot in your calendar if you’re a busy bee or just plan it around your deadlines and tasks.

By the way, if it makes you feel better, I’ve had this newsletter on my to-do list for about a week or so.

And going with the colourful theme, I did a quick one after staring at our bedroom lamp too long. I usually have it on the sunset setting where it kinda moves between yellows, oranges, and reds, but this time I set it to pure red and just tried something to see what happens.

As always, I’ll leave you with a ‘what have you been putting off recently?’

What’s something you can do today, tomorrow, or plan later in the week, something totally unrelated to your work, something that can help you switch off?

That’s all from me this week—if you enjoyed this newsletter issue and haven’t subscribed yet, you can click the button below. I’d love to have you here! Hopefully, catch you next week.✨