This year, I’ve been spending time experimenting with new technologies, including AI. 

This immersion, however, has made me reflect more deeply on technology’s double edge: what it gives us, and what it takes (and has already taken) away. The question is no longer whether we’ll use these tools, but how they will shape and influence us depending on the way we choose to use them.

Use It or Lose It

We all know this phrase well: use it or lose it. Our physical bodies weaken if we don’t move them, and memory fades when the brain is left untested. In the same way, it’s interesting to recognise what exactly we lose when we outsource our capabilities to the technologies around us.

I notice it in some of the ordinary ways we already rely on tech every day: the calculator that means I never have to do sums in my head, the escalator which means I can travel fast without breaking a sweat, the takeaway App which mean I no longer need to source, cook or even think about where my food has come from. 

I am not ungrateful; tech is ridiculously brilliant. I would never want to forego my fridge, my clock or my phone. I would not give up my Zoom or the internet, which opens opportunity and connection with others. But is it just me?  Don’t you sometimes feel your devices control you more than you control them?

To AI or not to AI?

Even as I write this blog, I’m considering how much easier it would be to let AI write this whole thing - the time and iterations saved, handing me a product guaranteed to be sharper and slicker and ready to publish in mere minutes.  But I’m also hesitant: what am I trading by using this technology? Which part of my brain will atrophy? What will I lose if I don’t use? 

Because every time we choose to practise anything— writing an email or blog (albeit imperfectly), cooking instead of ordering in, walking instead of taking the car — something in us surely benefits by growing stronger.  Physical strength, ability, knowledge… right? And maybe eventually, even patience, grit, and mastery? 

And when we don’t practice?…will these skills all but disappear? 

Technology Gives Back

And this brings me to another kind of technology — a very old one.

Yoga has been called a “psychospiritual technology,” and I’ve always found that description fitting. Like modern tech, it is designed to improve our lives. But unlike sleek modern tools designed for ease, yoga never outsources the work. It gives it back to you. 

Yoga is honest. There’s no app, hack or potion for enlightenment in its manual; no shortcut to presence or fad for health. The only way forward is through practice: breath by breath, intention by intention, day after day. Effort, time and repetition are not obstacles; they are the technology.

Where modern tools can tempt us so seductively to remove the work we want to avoid, yoga makes us work everything we can to be the best we can be - from muscle to mind to spirit.  This tech values our innate capability to thrive, helping us remember who we are and how much we are capable of.

Choose Your Tools

I feel both lucky to have known a time when I had to write an essay by hand, and excited to live in a time where AI can, incredibly, do this for me.  The point is not to be ungrateful or reject new technology, but to understand we can be mindful - to use it to help us grow the things that are important to us, not inadvertently diminish the precious skills we possess. 

So I ask: what skills or qualities have faded away for you over the years? What did you outsource without realising something was taken away from you by doing so?  What would you, if you could, reclaim?

For my part, I’m taking the stairs more.  I’m practising my times table (yes, really).  And yes, I’ve written most of this blog by myself.  I’m forcing myself to take the choice to go the hard way (at least, sometimes).  Resisting the lure of using AI every time for everything seems to be the hardest decision yet.

Perhaps one day we’ll no longer need hard-earned human skills to thrive, and this is just a step in our evolution. But for now, to me, they feel essential to hold on to. And I won’t be forgetting that I have access to tech that gives back - yoga. 

If that resonates with you, I invite you to use your yoga practice to teach you to value what is not only convenient but sometimes hard.  To grow the parts of yourself you most want to nourish, strengthen and amplify. Whether it’s a stronger body, the resilience to see you through life’s tribulations, or maybe the ability to show up for yourself - isn’t the only way to practice?

Let’s practice.