Can AI Be Your Therapist?

The Work Within Podcast

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and readability

John Lin: Imagine two people having a conversation. It could be a husband and wife, two friends, coworkers. It doesn’t really matter. The first person brings up the subject of AI, and the second person rolls their eyes and thinks, not this again.

Which person do you identify with more? If I’m honest, I see myself in both. My wife would probably say I bring it up a lot. On one hand, there are times when I feel overwhelmed by how much attention is given to AI and I just want the noise to stop for a second. On the other hand, I use AI tools all the time, and I’m fascinated by both the possibilities and the dangers.

So in today’s conversation we want to look at how AI is impacting mental health, and we’ll do it in two ways. First, what unique anxieties is living in an AI world creating? And second, how is AI specifically affecting the way people engage in mental health care?

As an aside, I do want to promise you that the voices you’re hearing today belong to real people. Just needed to get that out there.

My name is John Lin, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts Laura Harrison and Ly Tran. Both are licensed professional counselors, and I’d characterize you both as AI-forward. I don’t know if you’d agree with that.

Laura Harrison, LPC-S: I’d definitely say we’re both early adopters.

John: Before we jump in, two quick invitations. First, if you’d like help finding a clinically trained Christian therapist, we would love to help with that. And second, if after this show you could take a second to leave us a rating or review, that really does mean a lot. It helps the show get into the hands of more people. Thanks in advance.

All right, let’s start here. As early adopters, what’s one way you’ve used AI recently that our listeners might not expect?

Laura: I don’t know about not expect, but I definitely use it a lot. Even this morning, my son and I were talking. He’s signing up for a certificate program to become a certified nursing assistant, and we were wondering what the next steps are after that, because he wants to go on and get more certifications. So I typed it into Claude: here’s what he’s signing up for now, what would the next steps be? And it pulled up all the information.

In some ways it can be like a glorified Google, but way faster and way more personal. And in other ways it can really automate a lot of things for you, which I’ve used it for as well.

John: Ly, what about you?

Ly Tran, LPC-S: I’ve used it for education purposes as well, working on my kids’ education plan. Both of my girls and my son are just starting homeschool, and in that kind of environment there are a lot of unknowns and variables. So we use AI quite a bit to help with their education planning.

But most recently, in a way you would not expect: I used to DJ back in my college years. My kids like to make fun of me about that. My nickname in college was DJ Click, because I used a computer for DJing. So I created an AI image of me DJing, and they got a laugh out of that.

John: DJ Click. I didn’t know about that. The man of mystery continues to grow.

Laura: A drift car and a DJ.

Ly: Right. Back in my street racing days. There’s a whole other life there you guys don’t know about.

John: In our practice, we’ve talked a lot about the implications of AI on the field of mental health, and Ly, you have not shied away from that, I think because you see that it’s already here and already changing things.

So I did some research on usage stats around AI and mental health. Here’s what I found. In a survey of about 1,800 U.S. adults, 35% said they were turning to an AI tool at least once a week for mental health support. Once a week. And another 28% who had an actual therapist said they noticed they were seeing that therapist less now because of their use of AI tools.

As therapists, are you surprised by those numbers? How are you seeing AI affect the way people engage in mental health care?

Ly: It’s not surprising. I actually did a recent survey of my own caseload, clients I’ve seen in the last year, and the numbers look pretty similar. A little over a third, anywhere from a third to a half, have been using AI in their own mental health journey.

I got curious about it because they’d been bringing it up in therapy more. “I talked with chat about this,” or “I used chat for that.” They’re openly talking about it, and it made me curious about the capacity and the ways they were using it. So these numbers don’t surprise me at all. And I have plenty of thoughts and feelings about it. Not all bad. I think there are some positives I’d like to get into.

Laura: It doesn’t surprise me either. People are comfortable with technology, it’s handy, it’s fast, and it’s personable, especially the models that will just talk back and forth with you. Both Claude and ChatGPT have that feature where it’s like you’re talking to somebody.

Although I do find it often doesn’t track as well as you’d want it to. It misunderstands you a lot. So while it can be helpful, it can also be frustrating once you get into those conversations.

John: Ly, you mentioned you have some feelings about this that aren’t all negative. Let’s flesh that out.

Ly: I’m sure we’ll get into the negative impacts more later, so I’ll talk about what I think the benefits are.

Like Laura said, access at two in the morning is helpful. I’ve had clients having a difficult time regulating, maybe in the middle of an anxiety attack at two o’clock in the morning. Having quick access when a therapist wouldn’t be available is really helpful.

I also think it helps process work. I’ve got a number of clients who will cover something in therapy, then go back and talk with their chatbot about it and develop it further. I’ve seen them come back with some pretty amazing things in terms of the continuation of the work. As a therapist, I find that compelling, because getting clients to engage with work outside the session is one of the hardest parts of the job. When you’re in the room, you’re doing the work. It’s hard to get back into it on your own. But if they’re willing to talk to an AI chatbot, it helps unfold the work more and advance it faster. I’ve found that really interesting.

Laura: I’d agree with that. I think it can be a really good use when they’re in crisis. The problem is, does AI recognize the crisis? Or the extent of the crisis? That’s where you get into the question of whether we can trust it with real human emotions and expect it to interpret them properly. I don’t think we can at this point. Maybe one day.

I’ve been using it pretty regularly for a year, year and a half now, and testing it with those kinds of things, putting in emotional situations and seeing how it handles them. It’s gotten better at saying, “hey, you probably need to talk to a professional,” or “I am not a lawyer, I am not a doctor, I am not a therapist.” But that’s only been recently, and probably because they got into a little bit of trouble.

John: That’s right. Early on there were some really horrific stories of chatbots encouraging people to do awful things while they were looking for help in a very vulnerable state. So it’s good to see those protections come in.

I suspect that for a lot of people in the field, the assumption is that therapists see AI tools as a threat to their profession, because people are turning to these tools instead of a human therapist. As AI-forward therapists, do you share that fear, or is your perspective different?

Ly: That’s probably a general statement for everyone right now. Everyone is having some of that anxiety of, is my job replaceable? So I don’t think therapists are unique in that. None of us really know fully what it can do or what it will be able to do. A year ago we could say, “well, AI can’t do that.” It can now. So there’s an overall collective anxiety about what AI is and what the implications are.

If we look specifically at the mental health field, there’s a similar question. AI is able to do certain parts. Everyone listening to this can probably think of parts of their job that could be done by AI, and a good chunk that couldn’t. So I think it’s actually leading to a healthy discussion among therapists, and in every other industry, about what makes our jobs uniquely human. What uniquely positions us to provide something AI never will be able to.

That’s an increasingly hard question to ask, but it’s an important one. And I’ll add this: from a mental health standpoint, that question has a lot of implications, because it gets at the heart of what gives me meaning and purpose in life. What are we here for? If we start stripping away elements of our work, and those elements can be replaced, it really highlights the question of what gives us value and meaning. Which I think is a deeply spiritual question, and one worth asking.

Laura: I’m a big believer in energy and the way it feels to be in the room with someone. That’s one of the reasons I don’t necessarily like virtual therapy. I would prefer to do therapy in person, because you don’t get the same feel, the same intensity, the same energy on Zoom.

It’s really apparent if you have a client you’ve done sessions with both in person and online. In person you can read their body language better. That’s the thing AI can’t do: notice their body language, notice when their words and their body don’t match each other, notice the energy they bring into the room, the little sighs and things that are tells.

Maybe down the road it might be able to pick up on those things. But it will never have a heartbeat. It will never have that soul connection. In therapy, and in any hands-on caring profession, that’s the thing you wouldn’t really want to replace. You may be able to see your therapist less because you can fill in some of those gaps. But that connection, that deep empathetic understanding, I don’t know that AI can get to that point. I think it can simulate it.

Ly: Laura, you bring up a good point, because it goes directly to what makes us uniquely human in a way AI could never replace. I’ve thought about this question a lot, and time and again I’d say that in therapy, so much of the work we do has to do with understanding the human condition. What it means to feel broken. To feel inadequate. To feel loss, and a sense of disconnection, and relational wounds. Those are uniquely human experiences that an AI can maybe simulate understanding.

But here’s the thing. For a lot of the work we do in therapy, people’s wounds occur within the context of human connection. And that means healing has to happen in the context of human connection. AI can go pretty far. But at the end of the day, being able to sit with another human being, and to know that person understands what it means to feel the things you’re feeling and to struggle with those things — that’s it.

John: I love how you’re both highlighting that unique aspect. It makes me think about the irreducible minimum of healing. What I hear you saying is that human-to-human connection is the irreducible minimum. In my church we use the phrase “soul-to-soul connection” to talk about community.

Theologically or philosophically, if we believe that human flourishing and formation and healing have to happen in soul-to-soul connection, then there’s something truly irreplaceable about that human therapist relationship. Like every other human connection, AI can mimic it at certain levels but never truly replace it. Even as I say it and listen to you both, it brings a level of comfort and grounding. That’s the truth we stand on: we’re formed for real soul-to-soul connection.

I was also thinking about the fact that AI tends to aggregate. It gives you the average. What’s missing is spiritual discernment. Maybe you could speak to this, because you might hear someone’s story and think, okay, there are very similar themes with other clients facing the same disorder or clinical condition. And at the same time, each of you brings a discernment where you think, this person’s story is unique, and I need to call out this particular aspect of it.

I don’t think AI can do that. It can’t exercise spiritual judgment, or the discernment to say, this is what I need to really hone in on in this person’s story, versus just the average of their story. Does that make sense?

Ly: It does. What you’re talking about is that in an AI, the response would be somewhat randomized. It analyzes the range of possible responses and picks a way to respond. And I’ll say, as a therapist, there are a number of different responses I could take with a client too.

But that spiritual discernment piece, I think of that as the Holy Spirit speaking to my heart. I hear someone’s story, I think about the number of ways I could respond, and there’s a prompting in my heart that I believe is from the Spirit, telling me this is the truth that hits harder, that cuts deeper, that speaks to something more meaningful. And it’s because I’ve experienced the same condition. So as the Spirit speaks to me, I speak it out to a client.

Anything you respond with can be valuable. But there’s something about knowing that this person needs this word right now, or this biblical attribute, because it anchors in a different way. It hits me as a believer, and I believe it will hit them. That’s a subtle nuance.

Laura: There’s also the question of how often and how completely you use a model, and how well it actually knows you. In therapy, I always want my clients to come weekly for at least six to eight weeks so I can really get to know them. Even then, that’s only hours of time talking about them, understanding how they see the world and how their worldview was shaped.

Unless you’re extremely intensive with your AI, it’s not going to get to know you like that. It doesn’t have full context, and it isn’t going to be able to draw patterns over time.

One of the questions you’ll often ask in therapy is, when have you felt that way before? Or: I’ve noticed that the way you’re feeling now is similar to how you felt in the story you told me six weeks ago. So let’s see, is there a connection we need to be aware of? What’s the reason those two things feel so similar? What’s happening in your brain?

That’s a leap AI is going to have a hard time making, at least at this point. One, because there may not be consistency in the model they’re using. And two, I don’t know that it’s working in a way that makes those types of connections, that builds a deeper understanding of why I see the world the way I see it.

And if it’s looking at averages over people, there is no average when it comes to how a person sees the world. There are themes, and there are groups of people you could push together, but each one of those people is completely unique within that theme and group.

Ly: Can I take a moment and cut the other edge of this one for a second? I know we’re talking right now about the limitations of AI. But this is something I observe in conversations with colleagues, and with people in general: there’s a certain level of copium out there. “But it can’t do this. But it can’t do that.”

The more I observe it and its trajectory, the more I find that it can’t do those things right now, but it’s moving really fast. On one end there’s this posture of “it’s not going to be able to do that.” I think we have to take a hard look at what it will be able to do, or what it can do, and how we handle that responsibly.

My concern for a lot of my clients, and for us as a society, is that if you ignore that or put your head in the sand, it will just cause more difficulty down the line.

John: That’s good, Ly. Let me say one more thing and then let’s get to that question of how to use it responsibly.

Another limitation that came to mind, Laura, as you were sharing: AI requires self-disclosure. It requires the client to be aware of themselves and then upload that into AI, at least at this point.

What I imagine you’re both able to do in the room is this. When you ask a question and someone hesitates to share, because they feel ashamed or embarrassed or they’re not ready to process it, you as a clinician know: do I give them space here? Do I lean into that and invite more self-disclosure? You can actively respond to them in that moment. It’s much more dynamic, and I’d imagine much more accurate, because it’s a living conversation. AI has to rely on what you’re willing to share with it.

Laura: As the voice-to-voice models develop, AI can close that gap a bit. But think about text. If we’re typing into it and it’s typing back, you’re missing the nuance of, I had to pause right there. I wasn’t sure. It doesn’t know why you’re pausing. It could be because you’re getting a drink of water. It could be because you’re crying. It doesn’t know.

I kind of equate the interaction to a text message, where you don’t get as much nuance out of it. Whereas with voice-to-voice, as I’m talking to AI, I notice it picks up more. And the more I use the same model, the more it threads together what it knows about me from all of our conversations.

John: Right. So eventually you put on the Meta glasses and you’ve got your Oura Ring, and it’s tracking your heart rate and your tears and all of that.

But let’s talk about what you were saying, Ly. It’s here, and we don’t want to stick our heads in the sand. Let’s name the fact that historically, whenever a new technology has come along, the church and people of faith have usually been several steps behind on adoption. Eventually they adopt it, but the first reaction is usually fear and concern.

So what guidelines or recommendations would you give to people who are listening, who are engaged in therapy, about using AI responsibly and wisely?

Ly: My first thought is that the last major iteration of this, at least in my mind, was social media. It came so fast and changed so much of the social fabric in terms of how we connect. I was a late adopter of Facebook. I didn’t get on until maybe eight years ago.

Laura: And then barely.

Ly: And then barely. And then not even anymore.

John: And was your handle DJ Click?

Ly: That was my burner account.

Laura: I’m going to talk to your kids about hacking your Facebook and changing it to DJ Click.

Ly: The reason I stopped is that I know the dangers. There are pros and cons for sure, but it’s not until we really use something that we understand it. That’s the dilemma we’re in.

If I could push a button and nuke AI and be done with it, I would do that in a heartbeat. But it’s not going anywhere. It’s here. So I feel like we’re compelled to use it, to understand it, to be wiser with it.

I take that same approach with my own family. We need to be informed, and to know what to use. And with my clients: okay, if you’re using it, let’s be informed. Let’s understand what you’re using it for, how you’re using it, and where the limitations and dangers are.

I’ll say this, and it’s been a minute since I used chat, but chat tends to have a pretty sycophantic posture, at least in my memory. Other models are a little better.

My preference for my clients is that I’d like to know which one they’re using, and for them to have it write a report for me on what they’ve been talking about, so I’m aware of how it’s being used. For the most part my clients are completely fine with that. They would rather I be informed.

So in my mind, responsible use of an AI tool for mental health purposes integrates and involves your therapist. Your therapist is informed, but also potentially directing and leading it. “Hey, go back and talk with your AI about this specific thing and explore it. Come back next week and we’ll talk about it.” Or in two weeks.

This is where I see the trend going, back to that study. Maybe clients come in less. Maybe not every week, but every other week, and they’re using their AI a little bit more, but under the direction of the therapist. That’s going to be the key thing. We can get better value from using AI as support, but always linked with the professional.

Laura: I definitely see that as well. When they’re using one model consistently, it gets to know them better, and when they bring that into session and we talk about it, we’re able to notice things. Sometimes AI brings up really good ideas and good thoughts. It gives us more of a launching pad, and I think it can improve the work.

I don’t know that I would nuke it. I also tend to be a little bit more on the glass-half-full side of these things than Ly does.

Ly: Just wait until Skynet comes after you, Laura.

Laura: I did name my Roomba HAL when we first got it, if any of you know that reference.

There’s definitely an opportunity for it to go off the rails. But that plays to somebody’s advantage. Think about the companies developing this. They kind of want you to be afraid of it. That works to their advantage.

So it comes down to knowing what you can control and what you can’t. I can’t stop AI from coming. I can’t do anything about that. What I can control is how it impacts my life, how much I expose myself to it, and how I inform my clients and my family about it.

John: So, two very practical takeaways. Maybe three.

One: don’t be afraid of using it. It could actually enhance your work.

Two: if you are going to use it, make sure you’re using it under the care of a real-life person. Practically, you can ask AI to create summaries. Ly, I’m guessing you’d like succinct summaries. Don’t write a five-page report on what you talked about.

Ly: I’m just going to stick it in AI and ask it to summarize.

John: Right. So either do it for the therapist, or know that it’s going to happen. Create a summary of what you talked about and pass it along. Now you’re creating an open dialogue. That sounds really helpful.

And three: if you have people under your care, if you have kids, if you work with teens or children, have the conversations now. Even if you’re not sure what all the guidelines ought to be. So many people got caught off guard by social media. It came like a tsunami, everybody was using it, and then it was, oh no, we need some good boundaries around this.

Laura: And you may have noticed that a lot of schools are pulling technology out of the classroom and going back to handwriting and to reading an actual textbook, because they were noticing our inability to absorb language and information as well when we’re taking it in such snippets.

I think another important thing, when you’re talking about tips, is to not give it a hundred percent trust. It absolutely does make mistakes. It absolutely can misunderstand you. Use it as, “well, that’s an interesting thought, let me see how that fits.” Rather than, “this is the truth God gave me through AI.”

John: Let’s pivot a little and look more macro at how AI is affecting people’s anxieties and concerns today.

I haven’t read about this recently, but earlier on there were all those news reports of CEOs getting AI psychosis, people having breakdowns. Our group just talked about this recently too, about the anxieties people are feeling around AI. There’s so much unknown and uncertainty, particularly around jobs. That’s a huge one.

What impact are you seeing AI have on the anxieties of the people coming in, and the people around you?

Ly: I’ll go first. There’s so much here.

On the vocation front, there’s a real question around the ability to provide for your family, and job security. But even deeper, there’s purpose and identity attached to work. Those are all things that feed this underlying anxiety of, well, am I going to be replaced? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard that from clients. “Maybe my job gets replaced.”

I also think the psychosis part doesn’t have to do with just CEOs. It’s probably true for a lot of people who are using it. Honestly, I can feel it. It’s similar to the social media effect, but there’s a bit of a dopamine hit people get when they have that type of interaction on tap. I’ll say it this way: I’m neurodivergent, ADHD, and it’s like an ADHD person’s dream come true. Any thought that comes into your head, you put it in there and you talk about whatever. At two o’clock in the morning.

But if you cycle on that, it creates a looping effect, and it’s hard to regulate. There’s a danger there we have to consider in terms of how we use it, because it can have an addictive quality.

The next biggest anxiety I sense is how it’s impacting the future. That’s with regard to your kids and their future, but also how it affects our community right now. There’s a lot of discussion about data centers. There’s a lot of communal anxiety around the implications, how fast it’s moving, and how much uncertainty there is. So on a personal level it’s that identity piece, and on a macro level it’s, what is this going to mean for the world? What does it mean for my kid in the future? There are others in there too, but those are the two biggest ones I observe as real impacts.

Laura: You have people saying it’s going to take over the world and eventually eliminate humans, because we’re ineffective and inefficient and we don’t really work toward the goal of preserving the world. And then you have people saying no, it’ll never get there, we’ll be able to control it. Way fewer people on that side, I would say.

When I think about the anxiety that comes with it, a lot of it is around: what are my kids going to do? How is this going to impact my kids? And for a lot of people, even, should I have kids? I don’t know if it’s safe to have kids anymore.

I would argue that it’s probably never been safe to have kids. If you look back in history, when has there been a time when futures were assured? It never has been.

So look at it more like: what’s the purpose of investing in life, and in relationships, and in family? It’s maybe not so much about making sure everybody is safe and happy. I’d encourage people that if your concern about starting a family is based on whether your kids are going to be safe and happy, they’re probably not always going to be safe and happy. Doing it because there’s value in the relationship, doing it because there’s value in the community, doing it because there are values you want to make sure get pushed forward into the world, is way more important than whether or not AI is going to take over and do away with all of us. All the I, Robot stuff.

John: As mental health professionals, as therapists, and as Christians, what is the work then? What message would you like to share with people who are feeling a ton of fear about this? Maybe they’re newly married and wondering, do we even have kids? Do we bring people into this mess?

There are a lot of reasons for those questions, but let’s say a big piece of it is driven by fear and the unknown. What is the work, and what is the message you’d like to share?

Ly: I like Laura’s perspective that this is not anything new. There’s nothing new under the sun. What gives people a lot of anxiety is the speed at which it’s happening.

These discussions have always been here. Every generation has thought, hey, the future does not look good. And it’s interesting, because Laura, you mentioned this in another discussion, we’ve never been in a more prosperous season of life either. That’s the irony of this entire conversation.

But as we get closer and closer to the speed of technology, it produces this question: is it too fast? Are we going to be able to keep up? Is it going to be too much? Kind of like the Tower of Babel. If we’re building this so fast, are we getting to a point where we end up harming ourselves as a society? I think that’s a fair question.

At the end of the day, though, I like what you said, Laura: being able to assure a life of comfort and safety for our kids has never been part of the equation. As believers, that’s something we have to reckon with and take seriously.

This is just me on a soapbox, but I think Western Christianity has lulled us into a sense of safety around our faith. We’ve created something close to prosperity gospel thinking, where we’re going to be immune to these things. Being in a society like America has made us believe that for some reason. But the truth is, this is not our home.

And if we remember that, it’s kind of written already. We know where this goes. If you think about your eschatology and how the end times go, and if we take the book of Revelation seriously, we know this is part of it. We don’t know how, but we know that’s the way this goes. So there’s a level of accountability, or a reminder, that we have to hold all of this very loosely.

We have to be reminded and comforted by the fact that while we’re in this world, we’re not promised freedom from sorrow and pain and suffering. In fact, we’re told it’s going to happen. But also that none of this is out of God’s hands, and this is all part of his plan, and at the end of it all, he makes all things new. So, that’s my soapbox.

Laura: I’d agree with all of that. And I think it’s important to stay present in the moment you actually have control over, because this is the only moment that really exists. In a second it’s gone, and then we have this one. What I’m currently saying right now is the only thing I have control over. And now I don’t, because it’s gone.

Now it falls into the bucket of: am I going to regret that? Am I going to be sad about that? Am I going to move forward from that thought, or am I going to fall into depression about the past? Or am I going to be anxious about the second that’s coming that I don’t have any control over? That creates anxiety, living in the future.

So really staying grounded in what is true right now, in this present moment where you currently are. That’s the way you continue to pull yourself back into connection with yourself, connection with God, and connection with others. Because that’s the only thing that actually exists.

That’s the hard part, because AI wants us to fall so far into the future. And like Ly says, it’s going fast. It might not be that far off. 2030, I’ve heard. Everything’s going to be done by then.

But you know what? I’m old enough now to have heard lots and lots of times that the world was going to end on X date. And we’re still here, we’re still rolling. Maybe it will. But I’m right here in this present second, and I’m going to try to stay right there.

Ly: You guys remember Y2K? That was the end of the world, when the millennium was going to turn.

Laura: So many. There was a spaceship that at some point was going to come and take people away and the rest of us were going to be gone.

Ly: Just to connect it, that was my last DJ event. I DJed a millennium party. And I lived to tell the story.

Laura: So how was it at 12:01? Did everybody go, yay, the lights are still on?

Ly: Yeah. My computer didn’t shut down and completely blow up on me. That was good. Because remember, I’m Clicky.

John: Ly, you alluded to a verse I think is so relevant to this conversation. Anytime something new comes into society and grabs our attention and creates a lot of fear, whether that’s nuclear technology, which stoked tons of fear, or AI — Ecclesiastes 1:9 says, “What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.”

That’s helpful to remember. We can go on ad nauseam about all the ways AI is unique, all the ways this technology is different from the past. But if we take the words of scripture seriously, is there a part of us that can rest on this truth? What has come before will come again. What has been done will be done again. There really is nothing new under the sun.

And Jesus’ words: in this world, you are going to have trouble. You are going to struggle. That is part of life. But then what does he say? Take heart. I have overcome the world.

That’s so important for us as people of faith, because of our posture. When we feel fear, we either want to over-control or we want to retreat. And yet the posture of believers really ought to be: I’m going to stand here, I’m going to be present, I’m going to engage.

Our colleague Harry shared a quote from C.S. Lewis that I had never heard, written in the age of anxiety around the nuclear bomb. He wrote:

“If we are all going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb when it comes find us doing sensible and human things — praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis” — or pickleball — “chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts. Not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs. They may break our bodies (a microbe can do that) but they need not dominate our minds.”

That is really good. So let us be found doing sensible and human things.

I think that’s a good place to put a pin on this conversation. There’s so much more to explore, and I’m sure as AI continues to evolve there will be new things we need to consider and discuss. But Laura, Ly, thank you so much as always for sharing your experience and insight.

I hope those of you listening might be able to take something of comfort, hopefulness, and even agency away from this conversation. So as always, let us end with our blessing.

May God bless you and strengthen you as you do the work. Thank you.

Looking for a clinically trained Christian therapist? Learn more at watershedinitiative.com.