Think Like an Eagle
To thrive in the world of ChatGPT and Creative AI, you need to think big
The Mouse and the Eagle
I recently came across a Native American teaching which I love. It speaks about the “Eagle” and the “Mouse”. The Eagle soars high above the ground, and is able to see far-and-wide — the big picture, while the Mouse operates in the fields, looking at what’s right in front of him.
Throughout the Bible, God calls us to act and think like Eagles. (Isaiah 40:31; Psalm 103:5–6), and to set our minds on things above (Colossians 3:2).
Eagles have a specialised adaptation known as “foveae”, which are small, central regions of the retina that contain a high concentration of light-sensitive cells, giving them visual acuity 8 times greater than that of a human. Whenever the Eagle spots prey or needs to navigate more precisely, this allows them to focus on specific areas with great precision.
They don’t spend their time in the fields, but instead, soar at high altitudes, scanning their surroundings, and narrowing their focus once they spot something interesting.
Mice, on the other hand, roam through the grass in the fields, running to, and from, the next big thing in front of them. They lack direction, intentionality, and concern themselves with minutiae and detail which lack importance in the grand scheme of things. They do not hunt, but are hunted by the distractions of life, and the serpent that entagles and ensares (Genesis 3:1–5).
2022 was undoubtedly the year of creative AI. Technologies like ChatGPT, MidJourney, DALLE-2 and Stable Diffusion have taken the world by storm, and opened up a series of possibilities previously unthinkable. As an engineer, I’m surprised every day at the capability of these systems. Yet I can’t help but ponder how they will change our working processes and systems over the next decade to come.
Instead of viewing these technologies as a threat, we should embrace them in order to think at higher-levels and enable a velocity of creative problem solving that was simply not possible previously.
As these technologies proliferate, they will threaten those who live and operate in the fields — those who do low-level work which can easily be replicated by AI. In the decade to come, humans will no longer bring value by implementing APIs, scraping data, or *gasp*, doing data-entry — but by thinking at a higher level; connecting dots between distant ideas and having vision for what their industry will look like in the next 10, 20, or 30 years.
There is a new world fast approaching; and it belongs to those who have the faith and courage to soar high above the fields, building a piece of a world which doesn’t exist yet.
Don’t be a Mouse. Be an Eagle.
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