Episode 105: Is AI Making Us Less Creative?

Written By Siobhan Fox

Is AI making us less creative – especially us neurodivergent folks who might use it just to get through daily life?

I’m joined by Hari Patience-Davies for this meaty episode. Hari is a storytelling coach who helps people improve their public speaking and presentations. We originally connected on LinkedIn and immediately got into a big, uncomfortable question: Is AI making us less creative?

In this ep of the podcast, we talk about shame, late-diagnosed ADHD and autism, school trauma (hello, horrible art teachers), perfectionism, and the slippery slope of how easy it becomes to outsource our creativity and critical thinking to tools that were meant to “save us time”. 

Hari shares why she refuses to hand her writing voice over to AI, as well as the situations she happily uses tech for efficiency elsewhere.

We also look at what happens when students and graduates lean on AI to write and research for them, what that might mean for the workplace, and how to use AI intentionally without losing the skills that actually matter to you.

We cover:

  • Why storytelling is a learnable skill, not a magical talent

  • How early criticism such as “you’re bad at drawing” can create a lifelong identity that looks like: “I can’t draw.”

  • ADHD, autism, and the perfectionist gap between the idea in your head and what actually comes out

  • Hari’s experiments with AI-written LinkedIn posts – and why they all started to sound the same

  • Studies suggesting heavy AI use can erode writing and critical thinking skills in students

  • The difference between using AI for efficiency vs. outsourcing your core creativity

  • Phones, social media, and why today’s teens often say they wish they’d never had a smartphone

This episode is part therapy session, part tech-ethics chat, and part love letter to human creativity! Leave a comment and let me know what you're taking away from this ep - and please follow us and share the pod with someone else who needs to hear this message!

Resources and links

Find out more about Hari:

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