Latest / Revolution of Purpose Podcast / John Street Interviews Will Hawkins: Human Consciousness in the Age of AI

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John Street Interviews Will Hawkins: Human Consciousness in the Age of AI · Revolution of Purpose Podcast

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Today on the Revolution of Purpose podcast, we are going to be talking
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about an intersection you don't really hear discussed too often,
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but I think it's one we need to dive into. The intersection of AI,
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identity, and purpose. What makes us human in
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an increasingly AI world? Welcome to the Revolution of Purpose podcast.
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I'm your host, John Streit, and each week we bring you conversations with
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thought leaders, entrepreneurs, and individuals who have aligned
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their life with purpose and created extraordinary results. So I'm going to live
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through it and accept it with grace and hope and
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love. I mean, I would be proud to be in this council. It was an
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honor. I had so much fun. Tune in every Monday for the Revolution of Purpose
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solo show and every Thursday for Revolution of Purpose Conversations.
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Will Hawkins is the founder and CEO of RightWay AI and
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a Microsoft Copilot Studio MVP. Known as the AI Imagineer,
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Will works at the intersection of AI strategy,
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architecture, and hands-on engineering,
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helping organizations move beyond simply saying we should
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do something with AI and actually build AI solutions that
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solve meaningful problems. He's also the author of AI Essentials
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and Agentic AI Revolution. But that's actually
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not the primary reason that I wanted Will on the show today. You see,
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Will and I are part of the same mindset mastermind, and I've become fascinated
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by what— by the way that he thinks. Not only about artificial intelligence,
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but about mathematics, mindset, human potential,
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identity, and the effect that this technology could
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have on humanity. We also share an appreciation
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for some of the same great teachers and mindset leaders in
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human potential and personal development, like Bob Proctor and Neville Goddard
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and Napoleon Hill. So today I want to explore the intersection
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of 2 worlds that might seem completely different on the surface,
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artificial intelligence and human consciousness. And somewhere in
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that intersection, I think we're going to find a fascinating conversation
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about purpose. So, Will Hawkins, welcome to Revolution of Purpose.
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Yeah, thank you so much, John. I, I'm getting goosebumps. I honestly,
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you know, I've been, especially the last couple of weeks, been in a period of
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just really feeling how much love I have for life and how grateful I am
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for just the fact that I get the gift of living. And So I'm
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really stoked to share some meaningful insights, you know, provide some,
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you know, information and wisdom that I've, you know,
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accumulated through my life experience. And, you know, I'm excited
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to see what that does for you and for this audience.
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That's amazing. I'm so excited about this.
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Like, you are literally probably one of the most brilliant
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people that I know from an IQ perspective and just from a deep thinking perspective.
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And so having you on, on this podcast is Got me
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trying to like calm down and not fanboy a little bit. I'm just like,
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gosh, he's brilliant. This is amazing. I can't wait to hear everything he says.
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But I do want to start with actually the same question that I ask everybody
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that comes on this podcast. And I love it because it tells us so much
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about each and every guest. And that question is this, Will, who are you today
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that your younger self would be proud of? I am my whole self.
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I think. Most of my life I
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felt like something was wrong with my brain. I kind of felt like I was
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in the wrong body. I was very confused about who
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I was, why that mattered, all these kinds of things. And I really
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couldn't find anything that helped me relate to other
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people about that, especially early on. Like, I'm sure other people have
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had the experience of high school and university. Most people just haven't developed the level
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of consciousness to be really even thinking about themselves
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in that way. Um, and so I think, you know, I look at the decisions
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I made 6 years ago and the person I've become since,
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and I'm, I'm just so proud that I've gotten to meet the true me,
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um, and that I could walk around in my own skin, totally,
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completely myself, um, and authentic to the core, and just
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completely in tune with the universal expression of me,
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um, and bringing that into every every single moment that I get.
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I just feel like a permanent child. That's amazing. I love that,
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a permanent child, but a permanent child, well, delve into that
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a little more, like a permanent child when it comes to the faith that the
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universe is creating you and who you need to be? Mm-hmm. I mean,
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I think that's what's so interesting when I talk to people about what
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we do as a company and where that Imagineer term came from,
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right? So when I, was kind of transitioning the organization
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to a bit more of the place that it is today. I read a really
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good book by Lou Prosperi called Walt Disney's
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Imagineering Pyramid and then Imagineering Playbook.
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And it was this whole kind of lore that
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he had built around like why— like how did they build Disney theme parks?
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How did they, you know, come up with all of these attractions?
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Like what was their process and everything like that? And super fascinating.
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They go into so many interesting things, but the most significant part of that
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was it really became a model for me of the creative process.
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And as I delved into more of the material and they talk about the,
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the tenets of what allows them to create meaningful experiences,
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it was so interesting to me that it really just introduced me back to
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like what an inner child is and what they want to experience
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and how they want to experience that and what that feels like. And you,
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as you're going through and thinking about Imagineering through
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that conversation, it really became an intuitive thing
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to think of, this is actually just what it feels like to create and build.
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And that's been my whole life. Like, I was a huge,
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huge Lego fanatic. I played so many video games growing up.
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I was always obsessed with just figuring out how to create
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cool stuff and meaningful things that I really liked.
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And as an adult, that's what's come back to me. You know, I've, I've been
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able to sift through a lot of the, the conditioning and paradigms
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that, you know, the world tries to dump on you, um, and kind
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of unearth that, like, they just came from people that gave up their inner child.
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And, you know, for me, I'm, I'm very grateful that the center of my work
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is being an inner child. Like, especially as a founder, especially as the
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CEO of the company, the technical person on the team, like, a lot of my
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day-to-day is just solving problems in creative ways, in ways
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that have never been solved before. Like, the amount of times In the last
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couple months, I've solved technical problems in the world that frankly I'm one
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of the only people in the world that can solve because they require that really
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creative spark. It's just made me really sit in my
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own skin and realize it's such a gift for me to just get
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to play and live from a state of play and work from a state of
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play and to just really have honed my creative skills to the point
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where I can really kind of, you know, transition and move things from
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idea to form as, you know, as succinctly as possible.
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I love how you said that, like getting to, to live
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and work from a state of play. Like, so for you,
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imagination— tell me if I'm, if I've got this off— but imagination
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is creation, and then that creation is,
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you know, finding the solutions that you need. And that's why it just
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feels like play to you. Is that, is that right? Like your creativity
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is exciting and, and light instead of this heavy
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burden of, oh my gosh, I've got to do this for this client. Am I
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on the right track with that? Yeah, I mean, you know, I think that's an
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interesting dichotomy because there, there has been times for sure.
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I mean, I always say, um, a lot of my success is
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inspiration by desperation. Um, and, you know,
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I think I'm at a place now where I don't necessarily put myself in that
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position as much, but Especially living on the bleeding edge of technology. Like that's
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a lot of what happens. Like I can remember numerous occasions
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over the years where I'm building AI solutions that no one else
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in the world has put out any documentation on. There's no how-to guide.
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It's, you're figuring it out, you're figuring it out one way or another. And through
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enough iterations of that, it really taught me
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that, you know, there is a clear
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sense, almost a formula of, if you will, of when
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you've identified real needs, requirements, and constraints, which come
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from the world of Imagineering, you're able to create.
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That's how creativity is spawned, right? Like you can't,
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I love the expression, like you can't create a route to somewhere if
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you don't have a destination. Like if you don't have a destination, there's no way
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for a route to be created because it's ambiguous. You're just kind of aimlessly
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moving through things. And so what they teach you in Imagineering is by identifying
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the needs, understanding the specifications of those needs or the requirements,
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and then understanding the constraints, as in what box you're able to work with.
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That's really what spawns creativity. And, you know,
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time and time again, especially as I've studied more of my spiritual side
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and my manifestation side, that's become clearer and clearer. Like, if I
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come out and say I want to create, you know, a new roller
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coaster, like Sure, in theory that is something I could create, but do I really
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look at the bounds of time, resources, opportunity, and say
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that is the most meaningful thing that I create? No.
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And when putting those bounds on of, hey,
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I just want to make something that's so meaningful based off of this criteria
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with the information that I have, with the constraints that I'm under
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at this current moment in time, that to me is really what sparks the
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fire of actually starting to figure it out and start to create something.
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And so that's kind of what I distilled out of a lot of inspiration by
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desperation is, hey, I don't necessarily have to get to this point where
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everything is pressure soaked and I have no other option but to figure it out.
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But if I just take the same environment conditions and say,
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hey, I'm gonna put these placeholders here for
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me to work on creating, I can really hone that skill and get to a
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place where I know how to get stuff out as fast as I can and
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really create that through line. And then I can choose where I move
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those parameters thereafter. And so that to me is really what's
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allowed creativity to feel like play and, you know, an opportunity.
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Because it's a game. It's like, okay, here's the rules, here's the bounds,
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here's whatever. This is my surface area. Let me go paint.
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Let me go canvas. Because I think that's where a lot of people lose touch
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with creativity is they have this endless canvas and they don't even know where
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to start. But as soon as you shape it and you give yourself, you know,
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room, that's really when you start to see some deeply meaningful
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creative stuff come out of you. I think what's really especially beautiful to me
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about that too is that you're in a technical space, an AI space.
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Like if I were interviewing a painter, I would expect that type of
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answer. Or if I were interviewing— oh, there's my dog Judah in the background.
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Most people watch this on YouTube instead of just listening on Apple
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or Spotify because they get to see a cameo from my dog. Um,
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but, uh, but you know, if I were interviewing an actor or
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an entertainer, then yes, I expect everyone to talk about creativity
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and how important imagination is. But you're someone who has brought something that
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is essentially human to artificial intelligence. And I think that's
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amazing in, because that's probably one of the things that
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actually separates us from artificial intelligence, but you are imagining
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and creating Um, in a world where you're
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working with people with very finite, you know,
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problems that you're creating solutions for. Yeah, I think that's
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really, really awesome. So was there ever a time when
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you went somewhere in between Will who loves to
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play with Legos and let your imagination go crazy to Will
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who is now living as an AI Imagineer? Was there a period
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in your life where imagination was stifled, where you weren't flowing
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in it, where you— because we're all kind of told, okay, you grew
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up, stop imagining, you know. And it wasn't until I found like Neville
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Goddard especially, or some of these amazing OG mindset coaches who,
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who were giving us permission to dream again and
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to live from the wish fulfilled, that's when I allowed myself to start imagining
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again. So yeah, what was that kind of life for Will,
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you know, after childhood but before, um,
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uh, Right Way I? Yeah, that's a great point.
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Um, I think What I'll come back to at the end of what
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I'm wanting to share on this, because I think to me it was kind of,
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you know, if you would really put a ribbon on the present that is imagination,
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to me this was kind of the, the most important piece, is creativity
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is a state. And it's a state that you can really only access
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when you feel safe, when you feel secure.
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And that's where a lot of people Um,
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and myself included, have a hard time accessing things
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like that. You know, when I was going through my teenage
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years through university, um, I was notorious
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for being socially anxious. Like, I remember my, my mom,
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you know, not sure, like, checking with my brothers whether I had friends at school.
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Like, I would leave school to just come home and lay in bed. And like,
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I, I don't think mental health was as far as it was,
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um, now back then, but I was like Googling, like, do I have
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depression? Like, I don't know any of these things. I don't know how talk to
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somebody about them. I can't talk to my family about them. They, they don't understand
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things at this level in terms of psycho— psychology.
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And I just remember this period of being
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so overwhelmed by the things
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I was worried about in life. And you could look at even as an adult,
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that's very much a thing. Like, you know, the line that I keep coming back
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to and I read it almost every day is, are you creating your life or
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are you managing your circumstances? By Tony Robbins. Because That
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to me is really the period of my
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life where I felt I could not tap into that. I was
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so worried. I was so fretting about all kinds
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of different things. I had a really brutal high school relationship. I was very,
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very broke mindset-wise and financially-wise when I was
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in university. I was flunking out of school. I just had all these things kind
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of compiling on top of each other and COVID happening. And I just
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kind of felt like I was managing so much circumstance
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and like the level of anxiety that I slept with
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every night that I woke up to, like everything that I went through in a
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day. I just— there was no way I was going to be able to create
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anything. I didn't have, you know, it's like I'm a huge fan of like
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looking at your mind like a body of water. Like,
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how are you ever going to see the reflection of
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yourself when the water is rippling and the
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currents are hard and the waves are crashing.
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It's just almost impossible. And so, you know, that was really the
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biggest thing for me is I got to a place so
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dark and so deep within myself that
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I essentially burned away all that I thought to be true about me.
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And that was really when I was released from, you know, a lot
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of these anxious tendencies, a lot of the stories that I created.
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And it was only then that I could say, well, I actually now have
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the space to create. You know, so many things have been burned away in my
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life. My relationship fell apart. I had very bad friends. You know, I had to
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walk away from so many things. And then I just had a blank canvas.
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And I was like, well, there's 2 options now. It's either I just, you know,
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mull and feel disappointed in the fact that I
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quote unquote have nothing, or I actually go out and create stuff. And I do
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whatever it takes to make the life that I want, because why not? Like,
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I'm sick and tired of feeling like trash every day. Like, I want to
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feel like my life makes sense. I want to feel like my life
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is something that I'm passionate about. Like, I want to be excited to get up.
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I want to feel every bit of being alive,
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and I want to do that by doing something meaningful with my time
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here. And so to summarize, like, it's a choice
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of whether you're managing your circumstances or creating your life, because the minute that you
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choose to occupy a creative state, you're safe.
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There's nothing for you to be concerned about. It's really a place where you
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can play. And when you're playing as a kid, like, you're not thinking about,
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oh gosh, if I break my thumb on, you know, this monkey bar, like,
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I'm gonna be paying 5 grand out of pocket when I— like, these are all
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trains of thought that only occur because of you thinking you need to manage
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your circumstances. And no child thinks about managing their circumstances. So that
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is the block. That we all run into, myself included. Gosh, that is so powerful
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too. And from an anxiety standpoint, you know, when,
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when we battle anxious feelings, we battle worry,
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it usually comes from a place of not feeling safe, you know,
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not feeling safe emotionally, not feeling safe in our environment
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or whatever. But when you get to that point of play, like you said,
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you're almost in that childlike faith of Everything's fine,
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you know? And, and I think taking it to the next
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step, it's, I'm completely supported by my creator.
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You know, I feel safe because I know that the creator of the universe is
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supporting me in this creativity, because you wouldn't have the
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ability to create. You wouldn't have the desire to create. You wouldn't have the
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thing you're imagining if the creator of the universe wasn't
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putting that within you, you know? And, and I love to tell
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people, and I think it's so true, we wouldn't have the desire without
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the capability to bring forth that desire. And I think that's part of
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where that safety comes from that you're talking about when we realize that,
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you know, and that's like you said, when we let all of the adulting
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worries go, you know, like I'm going to go play and I'm
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not worried about what my copay is, if something happens, you know, like that is
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such a great example because we get caught up in all of the worries
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and that's stifles our creativity in such a huge way.
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So yeah, well said. Well said. So let me ask you this.
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Has building an artificial intelligence changed what
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you believe about human potential in any way, or even about
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what humans are capable of? So one of the things
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that I was most excited about with this podcast
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is it's really orbiting around
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purpose. And as somebody who's in their mid-20s,
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the amount of times I talk with friends and most of them just don't
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have a North Star, and I'm always like, how can you operate without
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a North Star? I'm like, that's everything.
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And the reason I say that is because much like them,
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for myself, there was a point in time where I
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kind of knew what I wanted to do with life, but I didn't really have
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a good grip on what it really meant to have your life serve a purpose,
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right? Like, that sentence in and of itself, I think, is something that most people
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won't even get to a place where they want to tackle that concept because it's
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super, super uncomfortable. It is super uncomfortable to
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look in the mirror and say, what, what purpose does my life serve? And when
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I was, you know, during COVID um, I had finally
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gotten to a good place mentally, and I was watching this movie,
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and I won't spoil the the details of it, but essentially this
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person in the movie committed suicide. And the character
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in the movie had like everything you could ever want— amazing partner,
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super financially successful, very famous,
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all these kinds of things. And I had seen that before, but for some reason
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it just kind of struck me differently this time. I'm like, well, what actually about
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this person led to that happening? I was like, why? Why?
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I just can't understand. And at the same time, I was
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in a statistical course called regression analysis, or econometrics was the
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actual name of it. And the whole course was about how do
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you statistically predict economic events?
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And one of the events that they brought up in the course was
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like, how do you gauge the likelihood that somebody's gonna get divorced?
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And they were looking at it through the lens of, you know, the economical aspect.
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Of, you know, when a divorce occurs. Personally, I have parents that are divorced,
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so that like immediately caught up to me and I was like, yeah, how do
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you forecast, if you will, the likelihood that somebody gets divorced?
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And so in learning that and watching the show, I was
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like, holy crap, like every behavior has
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a propensity to occur and that can be rooted back to a
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bunch of related factors. That influenced said
20:49
behavior. Like, for somebody to not be with us anymore,
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or even, you know, get in a car, like, there's just— there's always
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a reason that something happens, and that can be proven by
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data. And there's a bit of a tangent, but that ended up with me realizing,
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like, oh my gosh, like, this is exactly the point of
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artificial intelligence. Like, I can use this to understand
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my own behavior, understand what drives my behavior,
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understand other people's behavior, and use
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that to make better decisions at the end of the day. Like this was pre-ChatGPT
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and everything. So this was back when it was just data science, like the whole
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notion of I'm just gonna study all the data and be able to predict events
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based off of that. But then if you like even unearth
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that tactical element, it's like when I have an
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intelligent canvas that I can go to and explore
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my own data and explore my own insights, how am I not
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going to evolve as a person? How am I not going to have my consciousness
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expand by having to look at the behavior? Like, you know, I grew
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up watching a lot of sports and so I found it always interesting. Like you'll
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go watch the guys, you know, at bat or like they hit
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a golf swing or whatever. And the first thing they do is go back and
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watch the replay. And they're watching it and they're looking at the stats and they're
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like, okay, like here's, here's the little tweak that I can make. Here's the little
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thing that I can do. And that's being done at a very high
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level for performance reasons. But that same concept applies to pretty much anything anywhere
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in life. And it's like, well, if that's true, how am I not using
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artificial intelligence to expand my consciousness? Like I'm basically able
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to offload so much data and so much intelligence
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and so much things that I can't wrap my head around. Like if I look
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at, The last 5 years of every single data point about my
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life, that's way too much for my brain to process. But I have a machine
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that can go rip through that, distill out insights and communicate
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back to me based off of my own data, what I can evolve into,
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what I can change. And you know, that, that really to me is
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what opens up the ability to be the most human you can be.
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Because if a machine, you know, through any context, whether it's being
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able to help you with your behavior, or if a machine can help you do
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certain cognitive loads at work, like naturally that freed
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up space in your mind is only gonna result in one thing. It's gonna result
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in expansion of consciousness. And so I just committed my life to that. I'm like,
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I don't care what it takes. I don't care what I have to do.
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I truly think that you can cure diseases of the mind, whatever that may look
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like. It could be anxiety, it could be depression, it could be stories, narratives,
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whatever. Like I truly believe that this technology with
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its ability to process data and identify signals from noise, is a
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mirror for us to look at and be able to evolve our own sense
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of consciousness. Gosh. And that is probably
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the exact opposite of how most people look at AI. You know,
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like you're looking at AI as this, as this,
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you know, amazing tool that can help us grow even further into consciousness.
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And I feel like a lot of people have a lot of fear around AI
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that it's replacing our need for human consciousness.
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It's replacing our need for humanity and that somehow,
24:04
you know, it's just leading to a robot revolution that's
24:09
going to take, you know, take over. And I will say, just in case,
24:12
I'm very polite to all of my AI because if they do rise
24:16
up, I want to be one of the good ones, you know? Yeah. I please
24:19
and thank you it all the time. I don't care how many tokens it costs
24:22
me. Exactly the same way. I'm, you know, if,
24:26
if, if takes over, I'm gonna be his best friend.
24:29
But what do you say to that fear? Like, what?
24:32
Because I'm sure you see it too and you hear it. I mean,
24:35
it's a fear that I keep hearing. It's gonna steal all of our jobs.
24:39
It's gonna take over the world and we won't even
24:42
need humanity, as if somehow we're gonna become a slave to
24:45
AI. What would you say to that? I mean,
24:48
I've heard that so many
24:53
times. Even from people that build AI, like,
24:57
I mean, even like Bill Gates has come out and said stuff like that.
25:01
Tons of leaders come out and like talk about these fearful aspects
25:05
of artificial intelligence. And if you look
25:09
at history, like that's always been the theme, right? Like any dystopian movie that
25:13
brings up AI, like you can think of Terminator, I, Robot, you name it.
25:17
That's the place that they all kind of convene towards is like there's an
25:20
issue with the technology that results in it becoming
25:26
singularity or whatever and finding no reason for human
25:30
involvement in things. Right. That's usually the narrative,
25:34
cut and dry, that comes out of a lot of those things. And that's the
25:36
belief that a lot of people live with.
25:39
And the fundamental flaw that I've found in that is who
25:44
do you think created those systems? Who do you think programmed
25:47
those machines to operate like that? Like, you know,
25:50
I'm, I'm a firm believer that humans are
25:53
a derivative of the universe and artificial intelligence
25:57
is a derivative of humans. So I don't care what movie
26:01
you've watched. I don't care what you believe about artificial intelligence.
26:05
It is designed and carries these same flaws twice
26:09
over that a human does, right? Like there's a really famous story
26:14
out of the US that I always bring up when it comes down to AI
26:17
bias. Because there was an algorithm that was released
26:21
for healthcare and they were using it to figure out who
26:26
was needing extra patient care. Like they would do an analysis of all their data
26:29
and like recommend them for extra treatments, whatever.
26:33
And they had to pull the project because it kept recommending affluent
26:39
Caucasian males and they couldn't figure out why.
26:42
They're like, it's not racist. Like how could an algorithm be racist? And what
26:46
they didn't realize, and through, you know, an independent review, they learned that
26:50
the developer of said program was using US
26:54
expenditure data as a proxy for determining, you know,
26:58
level of care needs. Like basically if they spent more money,
27:01
that meant that they needed more care. But it did not consider the fact that,
27:05
you know, minorities, socioeconomic minorities just
27:09
did not go to the doctor as often because one, they didn't have the funds
27:11
for it. Two, they were busy working. They had family to feed, all that kind
27:15
of stuff. Stuff so they couldn't spend more money. So is it really a developer
27:18
that's racist? No, it's just an inherent bias in a
27:22
system that assists— that artificial intelligence software
27:26
is modeling. And that's the root of where a lot
27:30
of these misconceptions come from, is this belief that it
27:34
somehow can do something that it's not programmed to do. Like, you can go look
27:38
at any artificial intelligence, it has some kind of system prompt, it has something
27:42
somewhere down the line, it had some kind of human involvement, even if it's
27:46
responds, its own agents, its own thing, like it can always be traced
27:50
back to some human at some point in time. And that's always
27:54
the really hard thing. And I think a lot of it is a big ego
27:57
death when I talk to people about it, because you're, you're looking at a
28:01
piece of technology and potentially thinking that you'd
28:05
be inferior to it somehow. But it's really because your approach
28:09
to it is what let you down, and it's your inability to evolve
28:13
your own consciousness that has resulted in this machine not being able to
28:17
do the things that you do. Like I literally was in a call yesterday with
28:20
a client where I was coaching them on building prompts.
28:23
And I said to them, I was like, write a prompt like you're ordering food.
28:27
Like don't leave anything to chance. And just that approach
28:31
difference made a massive difference in what the return was from the
28:36
LLM because it is a change in consciousness that is now
28:39
passed onto a machine. So Naturally, that's the point of it.
28:43
We have this, this, you know, technology and artificial canvas
28:46
that allows us to look in the mirror and say, how do I need to
28:50
get better? That is the greatest blessing in the world. Like, I kid
28:54
you not, guys. Like I have a, an agent that I run every Sunday and
28:57
it's called my identity. It's, well, the agent itself is called Behavioral Coach, but I
29:01
use it to do what I call identity resolution exercises. So I have it
29:04
look at every meeting that I was in the week before, every single data point
29:08
it can find. And we go through a 10-question process and I say,
29:12
where are my limiting beliefs? Where are the paradigms?
29:15
Where are the narratives? Like, what are the things about myself that are causing
29:19
me to hold myself back right now? And I'm not kidding, we've done that for
29:24
3 months. And I, I look at every week, I've just step
29:28
functioned again and again in my own understanding of myself,
29:31
in my own ability to be the best version of me.
29:34
And that, like, that's why I say I feel the most true to
29:38
myself that I've ever felt in my life because the data literally supports it.
29:42
Like, I have a system that shows me, here's your beliefs 4
29:45
months ago, here's where you're at now. That's what's missing.
29:49
And I think that's the area that most people have yet to even cross
29:53
the threshold of, because they're not willing to do that work themselves to evolve their
29:57
own consciousness so that they can use the mirror better. And when
30:00
you use the mirror better, it becomes this collaborative cycle. Like, last thing that I
30:04
want to mention, because I think this is the true state we're trying to get
30:07
to. There's doctors that use artificial intelligence
30:11
to predict tumors and you'd think like, oh great, you know,
30:14
all of my cancer readings are gonna become AI
30:18
at some point. And that's not what happened because what radiologists do is,
30:22
yeah, the AI can process 1,000 images much faster than a human
30:26
can, but it's not gonna know a lot of the nuance of everything
30:30
that it can't touch, right? It can only touch data. So what happens
30:34
is the radiologist gives feedback to the AI software,
30:38
the AI software improves the radiologist's understanding,
30:41
the radiologist improves the AI's understanding, and you have this collaborative
30:45
loop that makes both systems better. And the overall consciousness
30:49
of that system converges to a higher point. That's the whole
30:53
reason that this stuff exists. That's the whole reason
30:57
it's here. It is not replacing things. It is displacing where consciousness
31:01
and intelligence and all that stuff lives, and it's an opportunity to
31:05
scale your own identity. And most people just aren't
31:09
comfortable enough with their own identity to really be at a place where they can
31:12
welcome in that truth. That is so, that is so true.
31:16
Please pardon this interruption to your podcast episode. This will not take but a
31:20
minute. Before we continue, I want to ask you something. Do you know that you're
31:24
capable of more, but your life right now just isn't fully reflecting
31:27
the person you know you can become, then I want to personally invite
31:31
you to schedule a Shift Mindset call with me. This Shift Mindset
31:35
experience is something that I created to help you identify one
31:39
decision that you can make that will shift your life. And when I
31:42
say that this is a call with me, I mean exactly that.
31:46
This is a live, one-on-one personal call between
31:50
you and I. This is not prerecorded. This is not a member of my team.
31:54
It is you and I having a real coaching conversation about your life And it
31:59
does not cost you any money. It is a 45-minute exchange of time.
32:03
I'll give you 30 minutes of my best mindset coaching to help you identify a
32:07
decision that will create a real shift in your life. And in exchange, I just
32:11
ask that you give me about 15 minutes to show you the coaching experiences that
32:14
I offer. There's no obligation, but there is an opportunity to
32:18
create a meaningful shift in your life just from this
32:22
call. You can schedule yours today at johnstreet.org.
32:26
Just click on the button that says schedule your shift call.
32:29
And also, if this podcast is helping you, please subscribe,
32:33
please like and please share it. Every time you do that, every time you
32:37
engage, you're helping to spread this message and inspire someone else to
32:41
create their best life through also living their own revolution of
32:45
purpose. Now let's get you back to the Revolution of Purpose
32:49
podcast. So many people aren't— they don't necessarily want to take
32:53
the deep dives into purpose or into their identity or into their own consciousness.
32:57
And I think what you've pointed out is that AI is
33:01
not something that is replacing the need to
33:05
go deep into human consciousness. It is actually something that can help us deep dive
33:08
into human consciousness. And I think that's a whole different way
33:12
to, to look at it. Um, so where do you
33:16
think spirituality comes into this? Like, where— yeah, where does,
33:21
where does the world of, of Neville Goddard and Bob Proctor and
33:25
Napoleon Hill and Thomas Troward and, and all of this, you know,
33:29
quantum physics too, from a science perspective and all
33:33
of this, where does that fit in with AI and purpose and,
33:37
and human consciousness? Yeah. You know, it's a simple question like
33:41
that. Well, nothing. Yeah, I thought it was going to be a trivia,
33:44
trivia question. So it's pretty much, pretty much online there.
33:49
So one of the things that I studied early on at
33:53
like the academic level With AI machinery is AI
33:58
machinery is taking all of the data points of a particular situation
34:02
and identifying a pattern, right? It's a pattern recognition machine.
34:06
It can now make patterns because of generative AI being able to predict
34:10
what's called the next token, which is actually what happens when you see ChatGPT or
34:14
Claude respond is it's actually just looking at, here's the semantic meaning of
34:18
everything you said based off my training data. Here's the most likely match
34:22
to the output that you're looking for. But if you look at that process,
34:26
you know, end to end, there's no actual creation happening.
34:30
It's really just regurgitating existing information
34:34
in a slightly different semantic context based off of the
34:38
previous context that it received. It's kind of like it's playing fill
34:42
in the blanks because it looks at your prompt as the
34:45
first half of the sentence. And then it says, okay, second half of the sentence
34:49
needs to be blank, and it goes and fills it in. So it is
34:53
only ever going to, and this is stuff
34:57
that the OpenAIs of the world, the Anthropics of the world, they're trying
35:00
to evolve radically on their own end. But as a fundamental principle,
35:04
AI systems can only learn from the past. They don't know the
35:08
future. They can only hypothesize about the future based off
35:11
the past. And fun fact about humans, intuition,
35:15
imagination, the actual non-IQ elements
35:20
of a person, right? Like I think so many people get tied up in the
35:23
fact that AI is crushing the right hemisphere brain activities
35:27
better than anybody. But like left hemisphere side,
35:31
you know, deep hemisphere side, like the actual superconscious and
35:34
your intuition and those aspects that actually make you a spirit.
35:39
Having a human experience. How in the world would
35:43
a machine learn how to do that when fundamentally
35:47
it is designed to take the past data, like things it
35:51
can only touch in the real world, like words, like things, and it
35:55
has no grasp on the intangibles? It can't. It is
35:58
not a metaphysical system. It never will be. How,
36:02
as a human, could you not end up taking on more spiritual
36:06
stuff as a result of that, right? Like, that's why I
36:09
love this idea of offloading cognitive loads
36:13
to machines, because that's actually— and I don't have MRI scans,
36:16
of course, to prove it— but physiologically changing your brain. Like,
36:20
you know, the fact that I used— like, I look at as an analogy,
36:23
like, I used to do work like long division, and then I got a calculator.
36:26
Now I don't even have to put any thought towards the arithmetic components of
36:30
it. Doesn't mean that I don't understand the underlying structure
36:33
of division, but I don't have to put any more cognitive load
36:37
or energy towards that. And what's going to happen with the system? The energy has
36:41
to flow somewhere else. So naturally, these machines are going
36:45
to offload and handle more and more and more
36:49
cognitive and tangible activities,
36:53
which only leaves more room to do more intangible
36:57
work. And what is intangible work? Imagination,
37:00
intuition, spirituality, the things that are going on inside
37:04
of you all the time that you just don't address because you're like, I have
37:07
to go type this stuff in an Excel spreadsheet. So that's
37:11
an area that I genuinely believe you're never going to see an artificial
37:15
intelligence machine compete with, especially with the world that we're in
37:19
with mindset and manifestation. Like, having seen the things that we're
37:23
able to do in that space There's just no way that a machine that is
37:27
a derivative of us, you know, it goes back to Thomas Troward's higher and lower
37:30
consciousness. Like, how would a lower consciousness supersede a higher
37:34
consciousness that taught it everything it knows? It just doesn't make sense.
37:37
I think that's really amazing because still, if we believe that there is a
37:42
higher power, there is a God, there is something that is the highest
37:45
consciousness, then that consciousness has given us the ability
37:49
through all of these years and evolution and everything to then create
37:54
the AI, then yes, the AI is not going to jump us or jump,
37:59
um, you know, God or the higher power in, in the whole,
38:02
in the whole scheme of things. So I think that was a brilliant way to
38:05
put it. So I have a question that I typically ask
38:09
as the last question, but I have a follow-up for you to it, so I'm
38:13
not going to save it to the ass— I'm going to add to the end.
38:15
I'm going to go on and ask it now. What is, is coming kind
38:19
of back around to purpose What is something about purpose that you feel like
38:23
people are missing today? I think creating the space for it.
38:27
I think whenever I've had conversations with people about pursuing
38:31
their purpose, they're trying to do it while managing circumstance,
38:35
like we had talked about earlier. And I have lots of friends that are like,
38:39
I'm doing all these things, like I'm working this job or I'm doing this hobby
38:43
or whatever, and it just is not fulfilling.
38:46
And I'm like, well, that's your first clue. Why are
38:51
you not reducing the things that don't feel aligned? Like, that's how you're gonna get
38:54
to a sense of— and I have yet to meet very
38:58
many people that just woke up one day like myself and said, this is exactly
39:01
what I want to commit the rest of my life to. I don't think that
39:04
that's something that most people will ever experience. But if you're not freeing
39:08
up space, questioning, reflecting,
39:12
introspecting and actually wanting to learn about that, how would
39:16
you ever expect it to come on your plate? Like, if you're super caught
39:19
up in what somebody said on social media or watching this 100th
39:24
reel for the day, like, how do you ever expect you're going to unlock
39:28
your purpose? Like, I was blessed that mine came during COVID when I had a
39:33
lot of space. I was just at a point in life where I had
39:36
the mental space to explore that.
39:40
And I think most people never give themselves that space.
39:43
And that's why they're still managing their circumstances instead of creating
39:47
their life by design. And a lot of times those circumstances get almost
39:51
unlivable. You know, like you, you kind of like you talked about, basically you
39:56
described a rock bottom story that you went through.
39:59
Like, you know, you were just like, I hate where I'm at. And,
40:03
you know, things changed. And I think for me, when I
40:06
found my purpose and moved into mindset coaching and personal development speaking
40:10
and writing, it, it was because I could
40:14
not keep going through the motions. Like, the discomfort
40:18
of not surrendering to whatever my purpose was became greater
40:22
than the comfort of the life I was living was the status quo,
40:25
you know. And it sounds like that's, that's what you went through. So here's
40:29
the follow-up to that though, and this is, uh, This is what I
40:33
think you can bring to the table that no other guest that's been on this
40:36
podcast could answer. With all the AI tools that we have today,
40:40
in, in addition to hiring a purpose-finding coach,
40:44
um, what, um, what are some ways that people can actually
40:48
use AI to help them in, in flowing
40:52
in their purpose, discovering their purpose, awakening to their purpose? I love
40:56
that question. Um, and there's a specific example that came to mind
41:00
that I want to use as a case study. So I spent the last 3
41:04
years doing a lot of inner work around like my dream partner
41:08
and like what a really healthy partnership meant to me. And the culmination
41:13
of that work was going into ChatGPT and saying,
41:16
based off of everything you know about me, who should my dream partner be and
41:20
why? And I think you could take that same approach with your purpose.
41:23
Like these systems that you've been using, assuming that you've been using them
41:27
to some degree, or even if not, Just asking that question. Like, you know,
41:32
I think that's another great value add
41:35
of AI machinery is it's not going to judge you. It's a safe
41:39
space to just go and explore. And so what's stopping you today from
41:43
going into ChatGPT or Claude or whatever you're using and saying,
41:47
based off of what you know about me or based off of what I'm describing
41:50
to you about me, how do I find my purpose? Or where do I
41:54
explore more to understand more? Of my purpose because,
41:58
you know, that event with me of asking who it thought my dream partner
42:02
should be, the chain of events that occurred thereafter the fact— I think within a
42:05
month I met my current girlfriend, um, who I love to death, and I'm just
42:09
so thankful that I get to spend every day with her. Um, so I,
42:13
I think you're much closer than you realize,
42:16
and you're one prompt away from pretty much anything in life.
42:19
So yeah, go out and get it. You're one prompt away
42:23
from pretty much anything in life because I talk about how you're one decision
42:26
away and I love that. But from an AI term, you're one prompt away
42:30
from, you know, living your dream life. And I do think that's huge. And,
42:34
you know, for someone who's not as familiar with, with AI,
42:37
obviously as you are, but even just someone who's kind of new to it,
42:41
if they're in that AI space, they can, you know, their AI
42:44
is only gonna know what you tell it. So it's gonna answer off of the
42:48
data points that you put in. So. They could even ask a question like,
42:52
hey, ask me 20 questions to help you get
42:56
to know me well enough to help me find my purpose or something like that.
42:59
Like, what I love to do with AI is I love to
43:02
ask it to ask me questions. I also love to put
43:06
whatever I've written and then say, okay, show me where my
43:10
blind spots are. Show me what I'm missing. Show me if there's something that
43:14
I should be doing that I'm not in this. And, and I do that
43:18
with interviews. I do that with articles. I do that with so many different things.
43:23
Because for me, it— I don't want it to take my
43:27
voice, and it's not going to if I don't give that voice away. But I
43:31
do want it to help me see some things that maybe I have a bias
43:34
toward or a blind spot on. And I think that's a great way to use
43:38
AI. Yeah, absolutely. Like, if you're looking for a very tactical term,
43:42
I love using what I call Socratic probing. Which is essentially it's
43:46
going to hold a mirror up to you and it's going to mirror back what
43:49
you said in its words. And it's so interesting when you read back
43:53
what it's saying because you're like, that's what I'm saying, that's what I believe.
43:56
Holy crap, I gotta, I gotta— it's just, it changes your whole state
44:00
of awareness. Um, so yeah, I love what you said. And to just kind of
44:04
tag on to that, like, use that technique and just watch the kind of crazy
44:08
stuff that comes back. Like, it will, it will rip your whole concept themselves apart
44:12
in the most beautiful way. It's amazing. That's amazing. That's amazing.
44:16
So I've got a quick lightning round and then we will,
44:19
we will wind things up, Will. But, um, this has been such an
44:23
amazing conversation and has gone by so quickly. This is crazy.
44:27
Um, but yeah, quick lightning round for you. Just answer the very
44:30
first appropriate answer that comes to mind. Go.
44:35
All right. What is your favorite book? Inside Out Revolution
44:38
by Michael Neal. Awesome. What's your favorite movie?
44:41
Um, A Star Is Born. Lady Gaga and Bradley
44:46
Cooper. Outstanding. Have you ever seen the, the original of that too with— I
44:50
have not. Judy Garland. It's definitely worth— you need to, you need to check it
44:53
out. It's amazing too. Um, but yeah, but it's hard to improve
44:57
on Lady Gaga too. Um, what is your favorite food? Uh,
45:01
granola? No. Blueberry muffins with
45:04
melted butter. I don't care about the carb count. It's amazing.
45:08
Gosh, that's— now that's what I want too. Any pets,
45:12
Will? Where I live now, I don't, but we have family dogs.
45:16
Like, I have 2 12-year-old Border Collies at my parents'
45:19
place that have the craziest personalities. So yeah,
45:23
they're the best. That's good. Judah will be happy to hear that. That's awesome.
45:27
And then Where will we find you usually on
45:31
a Saturday afternoon? I am outside
45:35
either at a cafe or a park reading,
45:40
studying, reflecting, and building the craziest
45:43
AI machines you will ever see. That's,
45:46
that's my Saturdays. I call them Sabbath Saturdays because I just turn
45:50
off everything. Don't even think about anything. It's just pure go and
45:54
create and don't create because you feel obligated to just rest.
45:58
And let whatever comes to mind just go, just go play with
46:02
it. Oh, I love that. That sounds, that sounds like play. You know,
46:06
it sounds absolutely amazing like that. You are definitely someone
46:10
who is flowing in your purpose, Will. And I'm just so glad that you
46:14
took the time to have this conversation with us today. And I'm sure everyone that
46:17
sees this or listens to this will, will agree this has been very enlightening.
46:21
And we're gonna have to do a part 2 because I have so many questions
46:24
I did not get to that I, I really want to ask you.
46:28
Um, hey, if someone wants to follow you, social media or connect with you,
46:31
what's the best way to do that, Will? Yeah, I mean, if you just look
46:34
up, I'd say just look up my name, but there's actually like 80 other Will
46:37
Hawkins out there. I actually got added to a group chat with all of them
46:40
one time. That's a whole funny story. But, um, if you look up,
46:44
uh, will_theaicoach on Instagram,
46:48
or if you just look up Will Hawkins Right Way Eye on LinkedIn, those are
46:52
the places that you can find me the most. And then I have YouTube with
46:55
the same name. Pretty much if you look up Will Hawkins AI, you'll probably find
46:59
me at some point. I guess that's the best way to put it. Either that
47:02
or it'll, it'll point you towards Stranger Things, I would assume. Yes. So either
47:07
way, you're gonna get something great. I mean, yeah, yeah, that's awesome.
47:12
Um, well, yeah, thank you again for being here today, Will, and thank you so
47:15
much for tuning into this episode of Revolution of Purpose. Listen, if this
47:19
episode you know, reached you, if, if it, uh, helped spark
47:23
some questions or answer some questions, I hope that you will subscribe, like,
47:27
follow, do all the things, share this, help me continue to spread
47:31
this revolution of purpose. And until next time, thank you so much
47:35
for being here. Don't forget Monday's solo show coming up on Mindset as well.
47:38
Have a great day. Thank you so much for spending this time with me today.
47:42
If this episode encouraged you, if it challenged you, or if
47:46
it helped you see your life a little bit differently, would you do me a
47:49
favor? Subscribe to the podcast, leave a rating or review,
47:53
and share this episode with someone who needs to hear it.
47:56
Every share helps us reach more people who are searching for hope,
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purpose, and a life of greater meaning. And if you're ready
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to stop wondering what's next and start living with greater clarity and purpose
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in your own life, I would love to meet with you personally.
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Visit johnstreet.org right now to schedule your complimentary
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live Purpose and Clarity call with me.
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Until next time, remember, your purpose is not something you find.
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It is something you awaken to, and then you choose
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to live it. Go make today another step in your own revolution
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of purpose.