For understandable reasons, a lot of people, including a lot of writers, are thinking carefully about the proper place of AI in writing. I certainly have put a lot of thought into it. The purpose of this piece is to be transparent with you about my standards for using AI on this blog.
Can you imagine opening a book and finding this message on the first page: “No editing of any kind has been used in the writing of this book.” You might reasonably expect that book to be a lesser version of what it could have become with the benefit of good editing.
I believe in editing. I believe in good ideas, including the idea that I do not possess all of them. I have written songs, spent hours laboring over the lyrics, and then had a bizarre, random dream that gave me an idea for improving them substantially. I have heard someone say something in a unique way I had not heard before. I have been upset about something in my life that I considered a failure, only to have a burst of insight that made me want to alter my work in some way.
In other words, your best shot at writing well is to actively search for insights and inspiration from every source imaginable. My writing here draws largely from my education and experience working with couples. It also draws from my own experiences with suffering, my personal growth journey, and the ups and downs of my 38-year marriage. It draws from a lifelong love of technology, from my faith, and from my understanding of what gives meaning to human existence. I am actively looking for insight and inspiration from all of those places and more.
AI is one of those sources. I use AI on this website in two ways: as an editor and as a ghostwriter. In both cases, it is a tool, but it is never in charge.
AI as an Editor
I have worked with a professional editor on my unpublished book, so I know that good editing is not someone making the writing easier. A good editor asks hard questions, challenges the order of an argument, points out what is unclear, and sometimes even suggests that you cut something that felt essential when you wrote it.
That is how I use AI. It can suggest different wording, a clearer structure, a better example, or a shorter way to say something. Sometimes those suggestions help. Sometimes they do not. Nothing changes until I have read it, considered it, and decided that it is better than what was there before.
For a suggestion to stay, it has to meet two tests: it has to improve the writing, and it has to bear the stamp of my own voice as a writer. If it is clearer but does not bear that stamp, I work on it until it does, or I leave it out.
AI as a Ghostwriter
Sometimes the AI will suggest a new article that may help people who come to this site looking for help. I welcome all suggestions and then read every word. I may use a draft as a starting point, reshape it substantially, or decide it doesn't belong here at all.
I do not allow automatic publishing. AI can suggest whatever it wants. Nothing goes on this site until I have reviewed it, edited it, and made it into something I recognize as my own.
I think of it like a musician bringing other players into a recording session. The song may go out under the songwriter's name, but the other musicians are free to make suggestions. Some may be used exactly as offered. Others may become a starting point for the songwriter to take in a different direction. Others may be set aside in favor of keeping what was already there. That is how creative collaboration often works when one artist is responsible for the finished piece.
The Standard I Hold Myself To
Every published word on this site has passed before my eyes and been subject to my judgment. I am responsible for what it says. AI helps me do my best work to my own highest standard. It does not make decisions for me.
If you would like to see the starting point for this page, you can read the original draft, preserved before editorial work began. All additional personal content and examples added during the revision are mine.
