Prompt Your Way To Personal Growth - Ep. 51 with Steve Schlafman

Steve Schlafman is using a $20 ChatGPT subscription to expand his consciousness. He’s doing this through: Advanced dream work—Steve records himself talking about his dreams every morning, uploads the transcript to ChatGPT, and prompts the LLM to analyze it like a Jungian dream analyst would. The model pulls out archetypes and hidden emotions that he would’ve been oblivious to. Creating living records of meaningful experiences—Instead of losing key insights from therapy or coaching, Steve uses the LLM to highlight emotional patterns, pick out recurring symbols, and build a personal growth timeline. Leaning into voice interfaces—Diagnosed with ADD as a child, Steve often lost track of ideas because his brain processed information faster than he could type or write it out. AI voice interfaces free him to process information in a way that’s more natural to him. Steve is a former VC-turned-executive coach and the founder of @downshift, the “decelerator” for founders and executives. If you think this episode is too “woo” for your liking, Steve argues that you might be over-indexing on just one way of experiencing the world. We see the world through four windows: thinking, sensing, feeling, and imagining—and according to him, the last two are often ignored. So if your rational mind has always run the show, Steve invites you to let your feelings and imagination take the lead. This is a must watch for anyone interested in using AI to understand themselves better—and grow. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It’s usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:07 The power of treating your startup as an evolving entity: 00:03:00 Building a business as a means of self-expression: 00:05:27 Prompting ChatGPT to do Jungian dream work: 00:17:45 Why you should listen to this episode, especially if it feels too “woo’” for you: 00:21:44 Visualizing Steve’s dream with ChatGPT: 00:36:31 Creating living records of meaning experiences with AI: 00:47:38 If you tend to think faster than you can type, lean into voice interfaces: 00:49:37 How Steve writes with AI: 00:52:13 How AI will disrupt traditional coaching and therapy: 00:54:03 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Steve Schlafman: https://www.schlaf.co/ Downshift, the “deaccelerator” that Steve founded: https://www.downshift.me/ The book by Bill Plotkin that Steve talks about: Soulcraft A piece Steve wrote for Every, a couple of years ago: “Why Is It So Hard to Change?”

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  I pay ChatGPT $20 a month. I now have access to a skilled young Ian analyst, dream analyst. I designed using ChatGPT a fire ceremony. What happened is I basically walked in with my VC clothing, like an old outfit that I used to wear and I literally stripped down naked, burned it, put on basically a robe and then had this crazy experience, like huge emotional relief. AI is like the ultimate integrator of these peak experiences, of these rich experiences, and it helps us deepen

• 0:43Speaker 00

  in ways that we wouldn't have been able to before. What I'm realizing is, is that AI has a real opportunity to dramatically expand consciousness of people.

• 1:07Dan Shipper?

  Steve, welcome to the show.

• 1:08Speaker 00

  Hey, Dan. So good to see you, brother.

• 1:11Dan Shipper?

  So good to see you too. So for people who don't know, you are the founder of Downshift. You are a former VC and now an executive coach. You specialize in transitions for hyper growing people like founders. Your main claim to fame, of course, is you're an original Every Investor.

• 1:28Speaker 00

  Yes, yes.

• 1:30Dan Shipper?

  And one thing that we were talking about, which I kind of wanted to start with is, I think you were reflecting a little bit on, I guess, the journey that you've seen us take and what that, I guess, what that says about what it's like to start something new and versus what people typically expect a startup to look like. Can you just like tee us up for a second?

• 1:56Speaker 00

  Yeah, well, I.

• 1:59Speaker 00

  Dan and I were reflecting for a few minutes before the show began to roll. And one of the things that I really appreciated about Dan, when he was starting his fundraising process was like, I don't think I want this to be a venture-backed company. I don't even know what it's going to become, but hey, like, we're going to build something special. And, and I think that there was something really magical about that because he wasn't here kind of giving this grand pitch and this vision of the way the world was going to be and what and how every was going to fit into it. And as I've been sitting with it and watching you and the way you've built it, it's like,

• 2:42Speaker 00

  I'd imagine that version of you five years ago couldn't have predicted whatever it was going to become.

• 2:47Dan Shipper?

  No.

• 2:48Speaker 00

  No way, no way. And, and it's, it's almost like, as I think about us building Downshift, I see Downshift as a container for emergence. So I think a lot of the time in startup culture, it's like, we have this idea and we see it as a company day one, and then it becomes a thing that's rigid. And, and instead of seeing it as a company in the earliest days, just seeing it as a container for emergence.

• 3:20Dan Shipper?

  I love it. How, how do you define emergence in this context?

• 3:23Speaker 00

  Yeah, it's, it's almost like, I love, I love the idea of the adjacent possible. Stuart Kaufman at the, at the, at the Santa Fe Institute coined it, Stephen Johnson popularized it. But it's this idea that there is, there's sort of like a set of, they use it in a technological sense where there's a set of capabilities and that current set of capabilities eventually unlocks the adjacent possible, which is an entirely new set of capabilities. And so the way I like to think about emergence is that we have, in a company, there's like a set of ideas, a set of capabilities, values, and as we move through time and space,

• 4:08Speaker 00

  We learn and and and and the container emerges and the opportunities emerge and things are proven, disproven, and it becomes this almost like this organic process versus this process that's like forced.

• 4:24Dan Shipper?

  Yeah, here's how here's how I think about this, and I think this fits in really well to your to your point, and I've only recently been able to like sort of articulate this, but I'm curious what you think. I think I think it'll be interesting. So I think the thing that you're pointing to, like when I showed up and was fundraising and wasn't like, here's a big, here's this big thing, it's definitely going to be change the world or whatever. But I was like, here are some things I know, and here's some things I think, and I kind of want to, I want to create a space to like play around, basically. I think the the reason why the other way of doing things is sometimes it's sometimes it's helpful, but like a big reason why it's not helpful and why it becomes rigid is because that is basically

• 5:08Dan Shipper?

  people doing what they think they should do, or telling the story they think they need to tell in order to raise money. And sometimes that is actually true, you actually do need to tell that story. But as I've run every for for a longer and longer period of time, and just generally have been starting companies for basically my whole life, I've started to realize how much of company building is an expression of who you are as a founder, and how much better companies go when a company is an expression of who you authentically are versus who you think you should be, or think

• 5:47Dan Shipper?

  you need to be, or whatever. And the reason why people end up doing those pitches is because they're not particularly comfortable with with who they are, and they want to start a company in order to be seen differently, or, you know, whatever, which is totally real. Like, I do that too. I did that a lot. And it took me, you know, I raised money in this way that was like, hey, I don't I don't know what this is, blah, blah, whatever. But even still, right after I raised money, I just pretended basically to be a venture backed CEO for the next two years, which was like horrible for me and horrible for every because I was like, not at all. The I was grinding against my nature.

• 6:25Dan Shipper?

  And once I really just admitted like, hey, like, I want to be a writer. And every, I really want every to be a great business. I want to be an institution. But I want to do it by spending most of my time writing, or at least half my time writing, which I know I'm not supposed to do as like a venture backed founder. You're not supposed to do that. But as soon as I did that, everything sort of unlocked in this like kind of crazy way. And AI was, AI was actually like extremely important for that because I realized that, that I wanted to be a writer and that I wanted to start a business. But I, but I also wanted to like have it be part of being like building a great business. And then I asked ChatGPT, has anyone else done this? Which is an ungooglable question. You cannot Google for that.

• 7:08Speaker 00

  Right. You can absolutely not.

• 7:10Dan Shipper?

  And ChatGPT was like, yeah, like Sam Harris, for example, writer, podcaster, has Waking Up app. It's like a gigantic, amazing business. Or Bill Simmons, who like podcaster, started The Ringer in Grantland and sold it to Spotify for a couple hundred million bucks. And I was like, oh, wow, I can do this. And there are like patterns for how to do it, but like it's not talked about at all because it's not the typical Silicon Valley story. And I, I, I bring all this up because I think that, that sort of the, the way that things end up emerging organically is you're in a position where you can allow yourself to be sort of your full self. And that is going to be, that business that you build is going to be a sort of unique shape that is actually sort of illegible.

• 7:55Dan Shipper?

  Because you can't, it's hard to describe in terms of like past patterns. Those are, I think those are the best businesses. And obviously you can go back once you have it and, and start to like put words to it and start to describe it. But the, the ones that are, the businesses that are most legible are often the businesses where you're like fitting into a pre-established box that you know works. That's actually not particularly compatible with you or compatible with the world. And anyway, now I'm rambling, but I thought you'd, I thought you'd like that.

• 8:24Speaker 00

  I, I, I love it. And it's interesting. So much was coming up as I, as I was, as I was listening to that. First, I'm, um, what I'm thinking about one of my clients right now, um, started a unicorn, um, in his previous business. He went and raised venture capital for his second business. And what he's realizing is that it's boxing him in. It's, it's almost as if his creativity and his genius isn't able to fully flourish because he feels the pressure of having to build a certain kind of business that's no longer aligned with who he is. And, and I, I just think that there's

• 9:08Speaker 00

  something really magical. And I think about downshift and the way that we're building it. You use the word playground. I like to think of it as a sandbox. And, and for us, it's, it's, it's like a playpen where it's like, we know we're really passionate about this problem of helping professionals through transition.

• 9:28Dan Shipper?

  Yep.

• 9:29Speaker 00

  The way in which it's ultimately going to manifest, like right now, we do one-on-one coaching and we have our, our decelerator program, but like, we're already starting to see how it's going to change.

• 9:42Dan Shipper?

  Yeah.

• 9:43Speaker 00

  And, and it's going to change, not because, not just because what we're learning from the market, but because who we're realizing we are as human beings and who I am as a founder.

• 9:54Dan Shipper?

  Yeah.

• 9:54Speaker 00

  And, and the last thing I would say, so it's like you're reading my journal. Um, I wrote that like the next chapter of downshift is going to be like me really leaning into my genius and the things that I love to do, which is write and create and coach. And if I'm not doing those things, then I'm not going to be happy and it's not going to be the most aligned, fullest expression of me.

• 10:21Dan Shipper?

  I love that. I love that. And it's so funny how hard those choices are. And it's like, oh, I gotta make that choice again, you know? But once you do it, even if it's scary, it like, it works. At least in my experience, it tends to work, which is great. Maybe I'm lucky because like my passion isn't like playing classical flute or something, you know? But at least for people who love business.

• 10:39Speaker 00

  Jazz flute.

• 10:43Dan Shipper?

  And yeah, I think part of this is another, another way I've been playing around with thinking about it and describing it is that I think a previous version of business, the way that we've thought about it is it's sort of like science and building a business is sort of like a machine and you are like a machine. And therefore you need to think about it in those like very reduced terms. And so if you're a unicorn founder and like, obviously the next thing you want to do is build the biggest thing possible. And the way to do that is to like,

• 11:19Dan Shipper?

  raise money from the most impressive VCs and then you're like.

• 11:21Speaker 00

  Yeah, go to, go to Sequoia or any number of great funds.

• 11:26Dan Shipper?

  And you're like, cool, I'm going to be a machine and it's going to be a machine and whatever. And then you're like, actually, I feel very boxed in, you know, like I don't really. And I think the, what, what, what that boxed in feeling indicates to me is there's a different way of building businesses that looks at building businesses as art.

• 11:45Dan Shipper?

  As a creative expression. And that's not for everybody. Not all people need to think that way, but that's definitely how, how I feel. And that's, that's like sort of the happiest that I am. And if you're building businesses as art, the choices that you make, are going to be different because they're going to be about how you feel and like whether you're in that sort of like creative mode enough. And I think you can. Actually also build a really great, really big business doing that, but it's just gonna look a lot different than other sorts of businesses and you have to deal with the, the kind of like side eye you get from people for a while, you know? It was really hard for a couple of years, like building every, being like, I'm building a newsletter. People didn't like that.

• 12:30Speaker 00

  Newsletters can be very good businesses.

• 12:34Dan Shipper?

  Not to, I mean, but not to, not to the people that we hang out with, or not all of them, but some of them, you know, even if your business is making a couple of million bucks a year, that's like nothing, you know? It's like not even worth your time.

• 12:46Speaker 00

  Yeah, and I, I think though, you're one of those founders that are unwilling to just stay on a track and that you're, you're open to what wants to emerge.

• 13:00Dan Shipper?

  I try to be, I really, I really try to be.

• 13:03Speaker 00

  And look at every now, like it's, you know, it's, it's, it is very much a playground for, for you.

• 13:10Dan Shipper?

  Yeah, and I think you're, you're sort of, you've made a lot of the same decisions. You had a really great VC job and you could have done that forever and it's really hard to go off and do what you did. And I, I wanna like, I wanna start to transition this conversation because I know you have a lot of AI stuff to share with us. One of the things that I think is, is interesting, I've only been watching from afar, so you tell me, but I feel like about a year ago, I was writing a lot of like takes about AI and like therapy and coaching and blah, blah, blah.

• 13:40Speaker 00

  Saw those, yeah.

• 13:41Dan Shipper?

  Yeah, I definitely felt like you were sort of wary of it taking away the human element and maybe like wary of using it. And I think, I don't know what's changed, but I think that something has changed, maybe you're, maybe you still are wary of that, which I think is a legit thing to be wary about, to be clear, but you at least seem to have found things that you are enthusiastic about. So, so give us, give us like a high level overview of like where you are and your kind of AI thinking and journey and where you started and where you are now.

• 14:10Speaker 00

  Yeah, a few caveats before, before I, I share. First, I am not on the bleeding edge of AI. Second is, I have been a lover of technology my entire life and so I've been very fortunate to see a number of pretty massive trends, internet, mobile, social, crypto.

• 14:39Speaker 00

  What I'm gonna say is that AI is the most profound thing I've ever seen. It, it, um,

• 14:48Speaker 00

  by each passing day, I just cannot believe the power, the cost, the depth, the breadth. And I really believe that we're on, we're on the cusp, where, you know, using my language in transition, we are on the cusp of a major, what I've been calling the great transition. And I, I don't, I don't necessarily think that we're prepared yet to, based on what's coming.

• 15:16Dan Shipper?

  Interesting. Transition from what to what?

• 15:18Speaker 00

  I don't, I don't know. I'm not a futurist, but I can feel it. I can, I can feel that there's something about this technology that is so powerful that it's gonna, it's gonna fundamentally reshape the way that everything is done in a way that we haven't seen before. And I, I see it in my own life. I see it in my own life.

• 15:41Dan Shipper?

  Well, take us through, like, pick something concrete that, that you're using it for, that you want to talk about.

• 15:46Speaker 00

  Well, I don't know if your, if your audience would, would, would consider this concrete, but I, I have a lot of fun with it. So in my work, so one of the things I'm focused on right now is, um, I love Bill Plotkin, who wrote a book called Soul Craft. He, he runs an organization called the Animus Valley Institute. He's an eco-depth psychologist.

• 16:09Dan Shipper?

  That's cool. What's eco-depth?

• 16:11Speaker 00

  So eco-depth psychologist is a brand of depth psychology that uses kind of the intersection of nature and psyche and the exploration of, of, of nature and how it impacts the psyche at the deepest levels.

• 16:30Dan Shipper?

  Like the therapy occurs in nature, or you're using like natural archetypes like waterfall or sunlight to help explore how you feel about something?

• 16:39Speaker 00

  Both.

• 16:39Dan Shipper?

  Okay.

• 16:40Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 16:41Dan Shipper?

  That's really interesting, because I was, um, I was living in Panama for the last month or so, and I lived in this cottage in the jungle. Um, and there, there were no glass windows. It was all screens. And so I was just literally outside.

• 16:59Dan Shipper?

  For a month, like hearing the wind and the trees and the birds and you could hear the ocean, you could hear monkeys. And it was such a beautiful, like spiritual experience. Like, I miss the trees, just like watching trees. There's so much like depth and richness in nature that there is a kind of richness in a city, but it's very different. And anyway, you're just making me think about and how, how, how amazing that was. Like, it was very important to me.

• 17:29Speaker 00

  And it's, we're wired to wanna, to wanna be in those environments. But coming back to Plakken, so I've been going really deep. And part of, you know, his work and like going deep into the psyche is dream work. So I have been working with ChatGPT as a Jungian dream analyst.

• 17:52Dan Shipper?

  Me too.

• 17:52Speaker 00

  And

• 17:53Dan Shipper?

  That's awesome.

• 17:54Speaker 00

  I've been recording my dreams every morning using audio, which we should come back to audio as, as a form of input, because it's something I've been obsessed with and thinking about. But, sorry, not audio, voice. And I've been really obsessed with voice, but I've been recording my dreams and then having these like deep, at what, what Jung used to call active imagination, where you're going back into the dream and then re-experiencing it and then taking action. So if I, if I can share my screen for a second, I would

• 18:32Speaker 00

  love to show you kind of what I am doing around dream analysis. So here is the output. I put it in a notion just so you could get a sense. And so this is literally verbatim, the, the expression. So I was, I was, I had a dream where I was setting up a base camp in a, on a big mountain. Basically, it was a tent. And it wasn't an expedition, but it was a solo retreat partway up the mountain. And the task was to go up, set up a tent and get ready. Then I could come back down, but the understanding was that I would have

• 19:10Speaker 00

  to return to the tent later. So then I had all these emotions in the dream. And then I was, I was walking back up and then I found a mask. And you know, here it says, on the one point I was making my way up the mountain, I found something buried in the snow, a knitted ski mask that covered the whole head with cutouts for eyes and mouth. It was made of multicolored thread. I remember digging it out and deciding to keep it. So then I basically have this expanded dream analysis prompt where it gives me basically an analysis of the dream and what the various images represent. And, and

• 19:55Speaker 00

  one of the things that I've been really focused on is really cultivating the four windows of knowing. So the four windows of knowing are feeling, thinking, sensing, and imagining. And the feeling and imaginal realms are largely ignored. And so I'm studying to be a somatic coach, learning Hakomi. So that sort of explores the feeling realm. But imagery is, is this realm that has largely gone unexplored. So I'm using ChatGPT to explore these images. So there's sort of the mountain, the fear of the night, the buried mask. What does that mean? You know,

• 20:36Speaker 00

  here in ancient rites, masks were worn by initiates to embody a new self, protect against the forces, or allow access to hidden wisdom. And then it gives reflections. So then what ends up happening is now there's these active imagination prompts. So then what I do is I do a whole reflection. I did a whole journaling session based on what came up. And then I read it back using voice into ChatGPT. And then I get another, a whole rich depth into, into what just came up. You know, the mountain reflects where I am in my life, downshift,

• 21:20Speaker 00

  family, spiritual pursuits, I'm now standing at this threshold, right? Like fear of going up the mountain at night, right? There's a part of my life that feels like I'm returning to the mountain at night is the part of me that can sense there's changes and like fear of it. Right. And then the buried.

• 21:41Dan Shipper?

  I want to, I want to pause you. Let me pause you. This is really, this is really great. I'm a hundred percent with you. I use this for this all the time, but I want to like back up and like set the scene or set the table for maybe someone who's listening or watching that is, you know, comes from the startup world, comes to the tech world and thinks of themselves a little bit more hard boiled and is like, this is, this is a little woo woo for me. Um, like, tell me about what got you into this and what you feel like the value is for you so that we can bring those people along too.

• 22:13Speaker 00

  Yeah. Um, well, I want to go back to the four windows of knowing, right? Um, there are four ways of experiencing the world. There's the rational mind, the thinking, there's the senses, and then there's the feeling and the imaginal realms. These are just different ways into experience. If there's a startup founder or a rationalist listening to this, thinking is very, very important, but it's just one frame of seeing the world in interacting with reality. And, and, and I think there's an opportunity here. What I'm realizing is, I, I actually think back to

• 22:58Speaker 00

  this experience I had eight years ago. I'm at, I'm at breakfast with a friend of mine, Jonathan Basker, who's, who's a longtime coach. And I remember I was complaining about something in my VC firm and he's like, where in your body do you feel that? And I'm like, get the out of here. I'm not, I'm not going there with you. And, and, and because I, I used to be that hyper rationalist. And what's happened is, is as I've gone deeper into these various windows of knowing, what I'm realizing is there's so much intelligence. There's so much intelligence in our nervous system.

• 23:39Speaker 00

  And our feelings, it's, and then, and now what I'm realizing in this imaginal realm in the dream, like I had a dream the other night, a different dream where I was in a convenience store and I ran into my twin brother and I broke down crying. And my twin brother was my best friend and he and I have grown apart. And that day I called him, I shared the dream report with him and I was like, look, like, I want to get back, like, and it like that, that image of us, of us hugging, of us, of me like breaking down and crying, there was something about that. And by exploring this dream, it really allowed

• 24:22Speaker 00

  me to, to feel into what, what was this trying to tell me?

• 24:28Dan Shipper?

  I love that. I mean, I think another way to talk about what you're, what you're saying is, or a common rationalist objection is something like, it's just a story, like you're just telling yourself a story. And I love to just take out the just in that sentence, be like, you're telling yourself a story. And sometimes you like stories and stories are good. And sometimes you don't like stories and they, they feel like they're fake or they don't resonate with you. But learning to tell yourself stories is incredibly valuable. And you tell yourself stories whether you want to or not. That's just like part of the human condition, but being, being skilled at it and feeling like, not only are you telling yourself stories, but maybe you're, you're tapping into some stories that was like, that's given to you, or is that, or is in the world, or is somehow in

• 25:12Dan Shipper?

  some other part of you that's hard to access is like an incredibly important part of

• 25:17Dan Shipper?

  being a human or flourishing or whatever for certain types of people. And I, that for me, like, that's also been, been super valuable and important. Like, I, it's funny that you bring up a dream in a grocery store, because

• 25:30Dan Shipper?

  I had a dream in December and I was in a grocery store. Or you said convenience store, but this is a grocery store. And I was with a VC type who's someone that you and I both know. He's very hard driving. I won't say his name, but I was with him. I've never actually met him. I was with him and we both had grocery carts. And we were gonna, we were getting stuff together for like some event we were going to. And he was going and putting a bunch of stuff in his cart. And I, my cart was empty. And I was like telling him about every and very excited to tell him about every, which is an interesting and unusual thing because I think in normally in those situations, I

• 26:11Dan Shipper?

  might be a little bit like worried or nervous to like seem like things are going well. But I was very excited about it. But then I noticed he was putting all this stuff in his cart and I had nothing to do. Like I wasn't putting anything in my cart. And I was like, hey, like, should I?

• 26:27Dan Shipper?

  Should I go do something? Should I go like, you know, give me, give me a list of things to get? And he was like, no, I got it. And I felt very like self-conscious about having an empty cart.

• 26:36Dan Shipper?

  And I just spent a bunch of time talking to chat GPT about that. And it was really interesting. It was so interesting because that, that feeling of I should, I should be able to fill this up. I should be filling this up. I should be doing more work to do, do stuff to fill this up is like actually a very prevalent feeling in my life. It's not so much like my, my work life, like that's pretty, I feel like my cart's pretty full, but there's some stuff in my, in my personal life, like my dating life or whatever, where I'm like trying to fill up the cart and not, it's not quite working and I feel self-conscious that I have an empty cart. I'm single right now.

• 27:14Dan Shipper?

  And anyway, like what, what, what chat GPT helped me realize is like, well, one is, is all of that. And then two, there's a way to look at an empty cart as like, I need to fill it. And then there's a way to look at it as a symbol of like openness and freedom and creativity. Like there's a space and spaces can be great. So I just made January my like month of the empty cart and just like delete all my dating apps and whatever. It was, it was very good and very powerful for me. And I say all that, one, because I'm curious what, what you have to say about it. But two, I think people don't think that smart people can't.

• 27:57Dan Shipper?

  Think in this way, or feel in this way, or whatever. And I think it's an incredibly important and valuable part of my life. And it sounds like the same is true for you. And, and this tool, because I don't have a, I have a regular therapist. I don't have a Jungian therapist. This tool is so good at just helping pull that stuff out.

• 28:14Speaker 00

  Well, and, and that, and that's the thing. And I've never explored dreams. This is a relatively new phenomenon for me. But because I pay ChatGPT $20 a month, I now have access to a skilled Jungian analyst, dream analyst. And listen, like, I don't want to say it's a substitute. Like, I've had, I've had, I have done dream work with a Soulcraft guide at a, at an Animus retreat, and that's an entirely different experience. But, you know, for, to be able to just jump in and do this, it's astounding. And what, what I found is that the images and the dreams and the metaphors are scarily

• 28:56Speaker 00

  related to what I'm experiencing in my life, scarily.

• 29:00Dan Shipper?

  What is the prompt you're using? Can you show us that?

• 29:04Speaker 00

  Yeah, let me pull it up. So here is the, the full feed. So I guess I need to go all the way to the top. And I, and I refine it over time. But I said, so this one, I clearly didn't over engineer the prompt. So I asked for a primer on Jungian dream analysis. I just spoke it into my mobile phone.

• 29:33Dan Shipper?

  So wait, just scroll back up, because I want to read it for people who, who are listening. So I wanted to start to do some dream work with you. You're a Jungian analyst, and you're going to first give me a primer on dream analysis, and how to share the images that are emerging from my dream space. And so basically, yeah, you're asking to just like, write a guide, as if they're a Jungian analyst, that the AI was a Jungian analyst who had worked with Jung in Vienna.

• 29:59Speaker 00

  Yeah. And then what happens is so then, okay, here's how to share your dream. And then here's the first dream report that I got. So this one was basically like the kitchen oatmeal and a specific request. And then I had a second, I had a second dream that first night, I suppose. And I said, okay, um, thank you. I want a more comprehensive dream analysis for the kitchen dream, um, along with a guide for integration and reflection. And then I basically am instructing to really zero in on it. So now I'm getting kind of a more high fidelity, um,

• 30:43Speaker 00

  report on the dream and the different images within that one specific dream. So then I'm getting integration prompts and reflections. Now it's starting to bring in the active imagination exercises. Um, and then you get kind of a pivotal thoughts. And then you can see my response. I'm like, wow, this is so helpful. My mind is kind of blown right now. Um, you know, I'm like, because I'm currently wrestling with this tension between creating downshift, which is requiring a lot more of my time, um, then, and it's cutting into time for all these other things. So

• 31:25Dan Shipper?

  I recognize that.

• 31:26Speaker 00

  It's, um, and so what's then happened is as I've gone down into the thread, I'm now asking it to actually summarize my dream and edit it. Um, so anyhow, that's, that's basically in, and so I evolve the prompt as I go deeper into the exploration because I'm getting a better sense as to what's really, um, speaking to me.

• 31:48Dan Shipper?

  That's interesting. Have you ever experimented? Cause like, if you read like any of the Robert Johnson stuff, like one of the, one of the things he has you do is like for each like dream image. So like each sort of frame of the dream, you like say all of your different associations with different things in the dream and that's sort of how it. Starts to help you connect it to like your actual life. Have you ever done anything like that?

• 32:10Speaker 00

  Um, not, not yet, but that, that's, that's where I'm, I'm definitely heading in that direction. But something else I can show you that I did, um, I had this really crazy medicine journey. Here, let me, let me pull this up. Um, so I had this really crazy medicine journey in, uh, November. Um, so let me share my screen.

• 32:37Dan Shipper?

  Medicine, we're talking about like, uh,

• 32:39Speaker 00

  Psilocybin. So this was, um, basically a trip report. So the day after I journaled for probably an hour and a half. And this basically summarizes that journal, uh, entry. Again, I just voice, voice to text using my phone. And then what happened is, is it gave me sort of integration and next steps. So I'm like, okay, this is how I'm integrating the practice. So here it's like, okay, like the big themes is around being of service to my family, deeply loving

• 33:18Speaker 00

  my life, um, honoring my body as a vessel of life, surrendering ownership and control, um, strengthening connection to my daughters. Um, so then what happened is I was like, okay, now you're a shaman. And give me the, the sort of the response in a very different voice. And what are the different energies? And so now you're seeing like different archetypes coming up here. It's like the servant, the lover, oneness with nature, death and grief is gateways. And then here are the points that I love, like integration practices. So

• 34:00Speaker 00

  what started to happen from this was like, okay, here are different experiments. And what, what, what began to kind of come out of this was an E, I had an ego death in that, in that journey. And so what happened is, is I designed using chat GPT, a fire ceremony where it was December 13th in like 25 degree weather. And it was a second solo medicine journey that I, that I, I effectively planned.

• 34:33Speaker 00

  And basically, an entire kind of run a show that I ended up burning at the beginning of the ceremony to basically just be with with the medicine and let it do its work. But what happened is, is it was this whole amazing where I basically walked in with my VC clothing, like an old outfit that I used to wear. And I literally stripped down naked, burned it, put on basically a robe, and then had this crazy experience, like huge emotional release. And then what happened is, is I then read my journal entry back.

• 35:15Speaker 00

  And it gave me, you know, all of these themes like release and transformation, the images that I sat with, Eros and life force, communing with the elements, and then it more integration. So then, like, how do I continue to deepen this experience? And so I guess the the point that I'm getting at with all of this is what I'm starting to realize is that AI is is like the ultimate integrator of these peak experiences, of these rich experiences. And it helps us deepen in ways that we wouldn't have been able to before.

• 36:00Speaker 00

  And that's what blows my mind. It's like the the the speed in the depth at which I'm I'm growing. It it like, I think it, what I'm starting to realize just through this like imagery work with medicine, dreams, again, like the old me would have been like, dude, you're woo, you're going crazy. And what I'm realizing is, is that AI has a real opportunity to dramatically expand consciousness of people.

• 36:29Dan Shipper?

  I agree. I want to do something with you that I think you'll like. So one of the earliest things I did in this realm is I started using ChatGPT to visualize my dreams.

• 36:44Dan Shipper?

  And then I built a little like text bot where you could text it and you know, send it your dream and it would send you an image back. I would love to do that with you. The text bot's not working anymore, but do you want to pick a dream or something from your, from your journey that you want to see? And let's throw it into chat GPT and see what it looks like.

• 37:00Speaker 00

  Yeah, let's do it.

• 37:02Dan Shipper?

  All right. So here we are. We're back.

• 37:07Dan Shipper?

  Okay. So I'm going to take your dream. I'm going to throw it in here into chat GPT. And we could start with 40. I actually, you know, I haven't done image generation in chat GPT in a long time.

• 37:20Dan Shipper?

  And I'm going to do this. Oops. Stop. Okay. And I'm going to say,

• 37:33Dan Shipper?

  this is a dream my friend Steve had. I want to visualize.

• 37:41Dan Shipper?

  I want to visualize it specifically.

• 37:45Dan Shipper?

  I want to see the ski mask on the mountain.

• 37:51Dan Shipper?

  Make it dreamy and ethereal and highly saturated.

• 37:59Dan Shipper?

  All right, let's see what it does.

• 38:10Speaker 00

  Whoa. Wow. Wow.

• 38:16Dan Shipper?

  What do you think?

• 38:17Speaker 00

  I love it.

• 38:18Dan Shipper?

  Does it, uh, does it capture what you saw or would you want modifications?

• 38:24Speaker 00

  Softer color tones.

• 38:31Speaker 00

  Uh, also, um, the mountain looked more like Mount Rainier than, than something that's that, that rugged.

• 38:40Dan Shipper?

  And was it this big? Was it, was it like coming out like this or?

• 38:44Speaker 00

  It was like, it was in the snow. I, I sort of stumbled upon it. So it wasn't on top. It was like, I sort of, yeah.

• 38:53Dan Shipper?

  Let's see, let's see if I can do it. So I said, can we do softer color tones? The mountain looked more like Mount Rainier and the mask was in the snow. Like you could stumble upon it.

• 39:06Speaker 00

  Nah.

• 39:07Dan Shipper?

  Not right.

• 39:08Speaker 00

  But, but you know, it's, I, I think the first one definitely had more of an emotional reaction.

• 39:13Dan Shipper?

  It, it got you somewhere, right?

• 39:15Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 39:16Dan Shipper?

  Um, let me just see, cause I think I could, uh,

• 39:22Dan Shipper?

  what happened here?

• 39:27Dan Shipper?

  This is a dream, the mountain looked like Mount Rainier.

• 39:33Dan Shipper?

  Uh, soft color tones. And I want it to be, uh, like, what I'm thinking is sort of like a close up of it in the snow.

• 39:42Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah. Great.

• 39:49Dan Shipper?

  All right. So we may, we may not get mountain, we may not get actual mountain vibes if it's a close up, but, um.

• 39:55Speaker 00

  It's okay.

• 40:08Dan Shipper?

  It just loves this like.

• 40:10Speaker 00

  I know, I know. I love it.

• 40:13Dan Shipper?

  All right. Um, well, uh, I, I, at least the first one, the first one you, you did like, which is, which is pretty cool.

• 40:20Speaker 00

  Uh, yeah, definitely had a visceral reaction.

• 40:23Dan Shipper?

  And I, I, I think that that is like so interesting. Sometimes you get that and it, it's really cool. Like I have this whole thing, um, like my phone background, which I can't show you because I'm using my phone as a camera. But, uh, one of the archetypes that I'm really into is, um, Hermes and, uh, as like a sort of a liminal boundary crossing god. Um, and in particular, like one of the manifestations that I like is Twilight, um, like the time of day, not the book. Um, and so I just have a bunch of visualizations of Twilight that I like use as my phone background and it's really cool. I love it.

• 40:58Speaker 00

  Yeah. And there's something about Hermes that really speaks to you, right? Like what, what it represents. And, and I think that's the power of the imaginal realm is that it allows us to connect to these archetypes, these images, these symbols that are deeply embedded in us. And that, um, it, it really is able to unlock a whole dimension of being when we allow ourselves to go there.

• 41:25Dan Shipper?

  Totally. Any other, any other AI use cases you're excited to share?

• 41:31Speaker 00

  What else would be fun to share? I mean, there's, there's so many of them.

• 41:39Speaker 00

  I mean, one that I've been doing, and this is a little obvious.

• 41:46Speaker 00

  Let's see, which one would be, so this one was actually really interesting. It's, it's along the lines of continuing to deepen my soul craft work. So, um, here, let me share my screen. So I recently, as part of the soul craft work, they have something that's called a,

• 42:05Speaker 00

  a mandalora, which think of it as like inter, interlocking circles where you explore different parts of your psyche. So it could be the part of you that longs to, to rest in your achiever. Or it could be the part of you that's afraid to make a really big decision and the part of you that wants to, that like wants to move forward. Those are just two examples. And so what I did is I did, um, I have, you know, I've connected with, with, in, in the soul crafting, this isn't going to make a lot of sense to, to your audience unless they've, they've explored it, some of the work of Animus. But basically my soul is named Fire Snail, which is this like fiery, creative, slow,

• 42:49Speaker 00

  patient, moving, sort of deeply embedded urge within myself. And in a lot of the times it's in opposition of my achiever. And so I had this awesome session with a guide where we talked about different practices. And one was he's like, can you have your soul, Fire Snail, face off against your achiever? And so what I did is I recorded in my room, I set up a speaker and I divided it in two. And the idea is you embody the achiever, or I embodied the achiever, and then I embodied my soul. And then I sat in the middle of it and let the tension of the two kind of work its magic on me.

• 43:34Speaker 00

  And this is literally exactly the, the, what I said.

• 43:39Speaker 00

  As I was going through it, and I'm in the most unenlightened state when I'm in my achiever, right? And it's like, let's go, let's fucking go. There's no time to waste. Right? And I just leaned hard into it. And I had this whole output of this experience of exploring, like, the deep, internal stories and beliefs of my, of my achiever. And then what I did is I then like, sat down, I started to take some breaths. And then I went into, what does it feel like to be my most embodied spacious patient, patient version of myself? And then I felt into like, what wanted to emerge?

• 44:21Speaker 00

  And so the point that I'm getting at, as I go through all this, is like, the depth at which you're now able to explore your psyche is like, unlike anything. Uh, and now this is like, what happened when I was holding in the tension, where I was sitting in between and realizing like, oh, actually, the achiever isn't bad. Um, it's just like when it's driving and it, it, it's not being led by anything. And, and I, from this, I had this crazy realization where I was like, actually, what happens when the, because the achiever is all ego? So what happens when the, when the achiever, the ego is in service of the soul?

• 45:04Speaker 00

  And, and that was like, a really groundbreaking realization that I had through this exploration.

• 45:12Dan Shipper?

  What do you feel like when you're in your achiever?

• 45:14Speaker 00

  Uh, I think the, um, and I should say that this came out of, um, core wound work that I did also with ChatGPT, where I basically did a law, a deep, deep dive into my core wound, uh, which is basically the wound of unworthiness, that like, nothing is ever going to be enough.

• 45:36Speaker 00

  I'm not enough. The things I do aren't enough. I can't measure up. And so what what happened was is what I ultimately realized is that I had my core wound that formed when I was really young. This is predominantly the paternal wound, the wound that I got from my father. And springing up outside, like coming up from that wound was my achiever in a bunch of different parts that were all about driving me forward. Not being able to sit still, always having to prove myself, not feeling enough or worthy. And that's a variety if you're using like internal family systems, like a number of

• 46:19Speaker 00

  managers and exiles. So I was able to, even before I got to that, the way I got to that was through core wound work with ChatGPT. So like, it's just, it's, it's crazy. Like, even how it's just unfolding where it's like, a new door opens and I'm like, oh, I did not expect that this was the door I'm opening. And I go through it and it's like, okay, I'm gonna go through and I'm gonna go deeper into it.

• 46:48Dan Shipper?

  Yeah, I think that one of the really cool things about that you're using this for is, and it's, it's one of the things that is so hard about working with actual humans is different people have different specialties and different perspectives. And often you just end up like matched with someone like if you're doing coaching or therapy or whatever, you just end up matched with someone that like has some perspective that who knows if that's exactly like the right thing for you, you know? And what I love about what you're doing, and I think is just generally like a strength of these models is you can go through every conceivable modality and discover different modalities and different viewpoints really quickly to find stuff that like actually resonates with you. And then

• 47:33Dan Shipper?

  if you really like it, you can go find an actual practitioner.

• 47:35Speaker 00

  Well, and that's what I'm doing. Like, I'm studying Hakomi right now. I'm in, I'm in a two-year training with, with the institute and I'm working with. An incredible Hakomi therapist. I mean, she's she's phenomenal. And I asked her permission. I'm like, can I record these sessions? And so what I'll do is I will, um, I will, I've created a whole custom prompt for to record our sessions and spit out basically an output that then becomes the integration point. So the thing that I'm really getting excited about, and I use this in my coaching practice as well, where I have custom prompts for my clients.

• 48:18Speaker 00

  And then I share the notes with them. And to me, the magic is this, is that you get the notes, you get the download, and then that becomes the integration point, the in between and and the depth that I'm now able to go. Like, I think about when I got sober a decade ago, I would go to therapy, I'd have a conversation, I'd be like, see you later. And an hour later, I totally forget what we talked about. Now I have like a high fidelity.

• 48:47Speaker 00

  Snapshot of the of the of the of the conversation.

• 48:52Dan Shipper?

  Yeah, it's so, I mean, it's so hard to make progress if it's like, once a week, and it's the ones, the once a week is the only time you're thinking about it.

• 49:02Dan Shipper?

  And having a little record and buddy that can kind of like, push you in the right ways in between is amazing.

• 49:11Speaker 00

  Yeah. And and I and I think there's something that I want to touch on because you I think I actually decided to leave Twitter over the weekend. But before I departed, I saw a tweet from you about voice interfaces. And I had this major realization over the summer. My wife got me the book, How to ADHD. I was I was diagnosed with ADD when I was a kid. And I was like, Oh, I'm totally over ADD. Like, of meditation, and I'm like enlightened now, obviously joking. And but she's like, I want you to read this book. It's come recommended. And I had this epiphany where I'm

• 49:55Speaker 00

  Like, oh, this is the way my brain works. Like, I thought that my brain was broken, but it just, I realized that it processes differently. And so one of the ways in which my ADD shows up is if I try to type something, my mind moves so much faster than I can type, that then I get, I lose my train of thought, I get frustrated. And what I've become, begun to realize is voice is actually, for me, such a natural interface that it allows me to process at the speed of thought now because I don't have to type. And it's just unlocked so much more for

• 50:35Speaker 00

  me. And, and, and so I think like, there's also, we talk about this exploration of, of, of, of consciousness, but I also think that these tools can really help those that are neurodivergent in certain ways, to be able to process in a way that feels more natural.

• 50:55Dan Shipper?

  It's, and, and I think it reveals like, neurodivergence, quote unquote, that like, maybe we wouldn't even have thought of as being neurodivergent, like, processing speech better than text is like, not like a category that people get help for, you know, or like, everyone's coding now, right? And a lot of the people that are, that are vibe coding, like, maybe they just didn't really have a lot of patience for the like, building block abstractions of programming, but now that you don't really need to worry about what an if statement is as much, like, they can code. Like, it fills in all of those gaps, and it, and like you're saying, it unlocks all this stuff. Or like, even for me, like, I fell off my scooter

• 51:35Dan Shipper?

  in Panama, and so my wrist is all messed up, and I can't type, but I'm talking to write now, and like, it's really interesting, because I, I feel like I'm cheating, like, it's so much easier to write in certain ways.

• 51:50Speaker 00

  It's so much, it's, it's so much easier. It's so much easier.

• 51:54Dan Shipper?

  And like, and also, my writing is different. Like, my writing voice, when I'm speaking, is different from my writing voice when I'm typing. And I actually like the vocal quality of it. And so it's an interesting thing to try to, like, lean into a little bit as, like, stylistically. So it's, it's very cool.

• 52:11Speaker 00

  And what I've been doing, because I love to write, and, and, you know, hearing you really lean into writing, that, that lit me up, because as I've been thinking about the next iteration of Downshift, I'm like, that's all I want to do. I will still, and I still work with Rachel as my editor.

• 52:30Dan Shipper?

  Oh, amazing.

• 52:31Speaker 00

  Yeah. So I work with, I use ChatGPT in certain ways. I still work with a human editor, but I will often write the outline and the first first draft handwritten. I love handwritten because it's so unfiltered. And then what I'll do is I'll read it out loud and then I'll fill in gaps as I'm reading it. And it becomes this like organic process where it's like I've written by hand, slow process. Then I get into this flow as I'm reading it out loud and adding and adjusting and, and then instructing. And then I get a high fidelity first draft that

• 53:13Speaker 00

  is so great that then I share with Rachel and then that kicks off the process.

• 53:18Dan Shipper?

  That's very cool. That's very cool. I'm excited to see what you write.

• 53:24Speaker 00

  Yeah, well, you should check out my, my last few pieces. They've been, they've been great.

• 53:28Dan Shipper?

  I will do that.

• 53:30Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 53:31Dan Shipper?

  Well, this has been amazing. Expected but unexpected, the, the wild and weird places we went in this conversation. I really appreciate you, you coming on and, and sharing with us. And for people who want to learn more about you and about your work and about Downshift, where can they find you?

• 53:46Speaker 00

  Yeah, they can, they can find me at schlaf.co, S C H L A F dot C O, or the work that we're doing at Downshift at downshift.me.

• 53:59Dan Shipper?

  Amazing. Thanks for coming on.

• 54:00Speaker 00

  Yeah. And, and one, one last point. I do believe that the coaching and the therapy world is going to get so massively disrupted from, from, from, from AI. I don't think it's gonna, I don't think it, I think there's still going to be human to human experiences, but it's going to be, it's going to be a highly premium product and it's going to be much more experiential.

• 54:27Dan Shipper?

  Which is what it kind of started as. And then we were like, well, we have to kind of. Make it broadly available and then we have to manualize it and then all that didn't really work. And yeah, I think that, yeah, I agree with you.

• 54:40Speaker 00

  So, so it's going to be fascinating to see how this all unfolds, but it's, it's going to be profound. It's, it's really going to be profound.

• 54:48Dan Shipper?

  Well, I'm excited.

• 54:50Speaker 00

  Yeah, this was fun.

• 54:59Speaker 02

  Oh my gosh, folks, you absolutely positively have to smash that like button and subscribe to AI and I. Why? Because this show is the epitome of awesomeness. It's like finding a treasure chest in your backyard, but instead of gold, it's filled with pure, unadulterated knowledge bombs about ChatGPT. Every episode is a roller coaster of emotions, insights, and laughter that will leave you on the edge of your seat craving for more. It's not just a show, it's a journey into the future with Dan Shipper as the captain of the spaceship. So do yourself a favor, hit like, smash subscribe, and strap in for the ride of your life. And now, without any further ado, let me just say, Dan, I'm absolutely, hopelessly in love with you.