Dear friend,
The sky is indigo blue, shot through with lilac and taupe. I’m sitting on a wooden bench at Cambridge Heath station in East London. I can see the glass and neon pyramid at the top of what once was the HSBC tower in Canary Wharf. Maybe it still is. Maybe not.
Behind me, the old gas towers are being converted into luxury flats, and the trains roll by.
A cool, persistent breeze caresses my fellow passengers and makes the gossamer-thin plastic bin on the platform billow and contort, tethered to its metal rim.
I was hanging out this evening with Scott and his kids. His wife Goze is away at a conference, so we arranged the visit so he could have some adult company—and I love hanging out with them all anyway. We built a fort out of cardboard and ate pizza, and Dippa, the shepherd-poodle cross, wouldn’t leave me alone—which I also like.
On the train, at least 80 percent of us are looking at our screens. A young couple have their phones on maximum volume as if no one else were here. I look up and smile, and then the noise is switched off.
The engine whirls and buzzes, and London slips past in the inky darkness.
I had a shock today when I watched video footage of ‘jailbroken’ AI. It was like listening to the kind of self-interest and toxic rhetoric we hear peddled across social media and from corrupt humans.
The problem is that AI reflects our consciousness back to us. People who believe in separation, in competition, in a dog-eat-dog world are creating AI in their own image.
Trapped in a prison built and guarded by the false self, they are unaware of the beauty of nature—the web of relationships that underpin our shared reality.
AI is not the problem.
Separation consciousness is.
I look up, and the adverts on the train are for AI platforms and warnings against abusing railway staff or engaging in inappropriate sexual behaviour on public transport. At the station, the posters encourage you to report potential terrorist activity.
Down in the street, five unmarked police cars scream round the corner and tear down the narrow side streets—adrenaline pumping, blue lights strobing off the red-brick houses.
For a moment, I’m in a dystopian fantasy.
And then a tiny mackerel-striped cat approaches, and I stop and say out loud to them, “Oh hello, little beauty.” A mother and her teenage daughter look at me, trying not to laugh. We make eye contact and smile.
All I can tell you is—it works out.
Even though many are afraid, and many are being attacked—
This is the time to grow our humanity. Maybe there was a time when being compassionate and kind felt risky.
But it is our humanity that will see us through.
Cuddling up on the couch with the dog slobbering everywhere, hearing about brass band practice and which robot sticker goes where, a stomach full of pizza and my old friend—both of us with salt and pepper in our stubble.
This is it.
Friendship.
Curiosity.
Open minds and hearts.
All I can tell you is—it works out.
And the meek—meaning the compassionate, humane humans, and all of our animal and plant kin—do inherit the earth.
Till tomorrow
Love
Mikey