00:00:06 Shreya: What if the next evolution in wellness is not another supplement retreat or productivity hack, but a tool we already use every day? What if AI could become less of a distraction and more of a mirror, a thinking partner, a guide for clarity, reflection, and wiser decision making? Tonight we are exploring a provocative question can AI become a true ally in personal and organizational well-being?

00:00:36 Shreya: Welcome to the Wellness Reimagined, the space where we explore bold, integrative ideas shaping the future of how we live and work. I'm your host, Shreya, and today I'm joined by Eric Oehler, founder of Civic Dialogue, who works at the intersection of business, technology and human capability, helping organizations move beyond AI experimentations into meaningful and scalable impact. We are diving into a question that blends innovation and introspection. Can AI become the ultimate wisdom and wellness tool, not just for companies and also for individuals? Welcome, Eric. I'm honored to have you on my show.

00:01:21 Erik Oehler: Thank you. Happy to be here.

00:01:23 Shreya: Eric, before we dive into the big question when you personally think about wellness today, what does that word mean to you? Has has your relationship with it evolved alongside your work with AI?

00:01:40 Erik Oehler: Yeah. Um, I think about it all the time. So wellness. Has a couple of components. You know, it's it's health in your job. Health in your your physical wellbeing, um, health in your relationships and where AI has transformed a lot of that is that it is really the best possible companion or the best possible expert you could have in all of those things. It has access to all of the knowledge the world has ever known. Um, ancient traditions, religions, spirituality, practices, um, millions and millions of of articles and conversations about relationships and about personal development. Um, so whatever you can imagine the best possible trainer or counselor or, um, coach, you could, you could develop could be, um, AI can can serve that role.

00:02:42 Shreya: Yeah. That's really beautiful. Thank you for sharing this. And also, there is a strong narrative that AI is either going to replace us or overwhelm us. Very few people talk about AI as something that could support human wisdom. I'm really curious. What do you think is the biggest misconception people have about AI in the context of well-being?

00:03:08 Erik Oehler: I think a lot of people. First, there's the early. When you first try it out. I think a lot of people put something into it and then expect a miracle out, and they don't get it right away. So they say, oh, it didn't work. And they, they move on or they tell everybody, oh it's it's garbage. It didn't it didn't work well for me. Um, but with even just a little bit of, of, um, experience and a little bit of testing with prompting and you can really get much better results so that that's a, that's a big one. The, the greater misconception is that it and I, I'm not I'm not convinced it's completely a misconception but that it depersonalizes us and it um, because it creates an attachment to, uh, you know, a non-human entity. So I think for a lot of people, um, depending on how healthy your the other parts of your life are, I think that can be good or bad. If you don't have anyone to turn to in your life that can offer you good advice, I, I'm sure that this can be supportive, but if you're maybe introverted and you have a good network of friends and relationships and you get sucked into AI as a companion. Um, I, I do worry that that pushes people who maybe were marginally, um, marginal with their existing relationships towards retreating towards the, um, uh, what sometimes is a, a very affirming, very non-critical, um, entity in AI. So I definitely can see I'm not all, uh, roses when it comes to my, my outlook on the, the tools. But, um, I think it like all things, it's about striking a good balance. Where can it augment your life in ways that are positive? And where do you do you? Will you know enough to not let it into parts of your life that might be damaging? I don't think we're good judges of that either. So yeah, we need more guidance there.

00:05:15 Shreya: That's that's really interesting. So like, instead of seeing AI as this cold transactional system, you are suggesting it, uh, like it can actually amplify our thinking.

00:05:29 Erik Oehler: And that's how I use it. I mean, even in my own business, I tend to when I'm I still I still hang on to a lot of the, the human advantages that I think that I enjoyed before AI. Like, I think I'm a decent writer. So when I'm writing something, I don't use AI as the starting point. I'll maybe use it to clean it up or or polish it. Um, but I do use it a lot for strategy. It's going to think about things in a different way, and it's going to offer me. I'll give it a starting point from where I'm thinking, um, and I'm curious as to whether you do the same, but I, I give it a starting point, and then I use it to bounce ideas off of or ask it for more. Ask it for ten ideas. Twenty ideas. You could ask it for a hundred ideas and it will brainstorm with you in in a minute. What would have taken you weeks to to generate. So how can you answer the same question? How do you use it to augment, um, your day to day?

00:06:32 Shreya: Yes. Uh, personally, I also started, uh, using AI as a thinking tool and also like, as a helper. So, uh, I, I, I don't actually use it to, uh, like, fix quick problems. Yes. I, I now use it as a thinking tool to, uh, help me, uh, like, sometimes think in a different perspective. Also, like, maybe I am seeing a thing in a, uh, in, in, in a certain perspective, but I ask it to show me a different perspective, and then I, I'm like, okay, this is also possible.

00:07:09 Erik Oehler: Yeah. Yeah. And I like that because that what that does and I think when we talk about using it as an augmenting partner. It reduces the distance between you and whatever it is that you want to be knowledgeable about or become proficient at. It really does bring down all the barriers that used to exist with US universities and all these things. It's not perfect, but it can meet you wherever you are in terms of your your understanding of an idea or a concept, and then work with you to help you understand it quicker than you otherwise would have, quicker than we've ever had the ability to in human history. It can speak to you as though you have meet you at whatever level of of understanding you have about an idea, and then coach you along in ways that, um, get you to a better place with it. It's amazing.

00:08:04 Speaker 3: Yes. And like, why do you think we are.

00:08:08 Shreya: So quick to fear technology instead of seeing it as an extension of our capacity. Is it about control or like identity or uncertainty?

00:08:18 Erik Oehler: I mean, headlines play a big part in this, and the narrative around AI for so long is that it's trying to replace us, and it's trying to replace functions that we typically do for sure. Like why? Why wouldn't it if if you think about what AI and particularly automation can do it, it does take the role of things that we used to do. If you're a knowledge worker or you, you know, you work in an office, you work in a marketing department. Um, yeah, it can it can do a lot of the things that you're able to do. The, the question, the thing we don't, we don't reckon with is how do we how do we then adapt the way we live to add value in new ways? I my hope, you know, the the best case is that we start to develop human relationships better. Companies start to be more customer centric and develop those, those one on one human relationships between maybe account managers and customers. Um, in the services industries, you know, having having face time with customers, having interactions with them. Uh, there's so many other ways that we could support human flourishing by accepting and leaning into letting this handle the things that we really didn't get a lot of satisfaction from most people working in a lot of the roles with repetitive tasks. Um, there might be a spiritual benefit to that. I know, you know, with repetitive tasks and you get into flow states and those kinds of things. There is a there is a benefit to those things. But most people, if given the choice, would rather be doing something more enjoyable with the time. And I think with a lot of companies, there's opportunities for that where the overlap of enjoyable and beneficial for the company can, can align, and that people, if they choose to augment their work with these tools, can find other ways of adding value.

00:10:25 Shreya: So yeah, I think this is really, really beautiful. But you just explained and also like in your work helping companies, uh, operationalize AI, what deeper patterns do you notice is, is, uh, resistance more about skills or about mindset and psychological safety? What do you think.

00:10:48 Erik Oehler: The biggest one is the ability to write out clear instructions for whatever it is you're trying to accomplish. We're never taught that, at least not in my schooling, maybe in yours. But we never learn just how to articulate step by step what's involved in a process. There's a really good video, um, from a year or two ago about a teacher where she's, um, trying to get her kindergarten class to write out instructions on how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. And then she executes the instructions in front of the class. So they write things like put the put the jelly on the bread, and she takes the jar of jelly and just sets it on the bread and they're all like, no, because they don't, you know, they didn't think, oh, you have to open the jar and you have to take one slice of bread out of the bag, and they don't know how to write instructions. And with these tools, you know, you get in, you get out what you put into it. So if you give it really good instructions, I sometimes will run people through the exercise of imagine that you could hire an intern tomorrow. What would the job description be? What would you what would you want them to do? And then you can look at that list and for each task say, okay, but this is their first day. Let's assume they know nothing. Let's just take that one task and explain how you would explain to them how to do it. And from that you can start to see people, the gears start turning and someone can start to think about how, how am I actually writing out instructions to give someone. And that's, that's one of the, the biggest keys and one of the going back to the question about what the misconceptions are. When people say that they they didn't they used it and it didn't work, it's probably because they didn't know how to write a good instruction or a good prompt.

00:12:40 Shreya: Yeah, that's really powerful. Like AI adoption is not just a systems shift. It's actually a cultural and emotional shift to. And I think that's where wellness quietly enters this picture, because how safe people feel directly impacts how adaptable they are.

00:13:01 Erik Oehler: Yes, absolutely. And it the, the systems themselves don't do a great job of nurturing that feeling of safety. You know it. They they produce amazing results. And they often affirm whatever you're thinking. You know, ChatGPT is notorious for saying, that's right. No matter what you say to it, it'll it'll affirm you and tell you that's right unless you tell it not to. But, um, they, they it is really finding a balance of, of people feeling secure and safe enough to, to lean into different ways of thinking about how they interact with the tool. They've never had access to anything like this. You know, we've had encyclopedias, we've had Google for twenty, thirty years now, but we've never had access to to to thinking engines like this for, for free in a lot of cases and for the premium of ChatGPT for twenty dollars US a month. It's crazy how, um, how accessible all these things are now and the power that comes with that. And so you really have to rethink what is what what what do what could a business look like with these tools? Because the old systems, um, I don't think that they're long for this world.

00:14:24 Shreya: Yeah. And like, what does people first AI actually look like in action? Like, not in theory, but in day to day of a company or even an individual professional.

00:14:36 Erik Oehler: Yeah. So that's the, the underpinning of my, my company is I, you you have a choice as a company today in twenty twenty six you can outsource your AI and automation building. And I think if you do that, you are in the position of having to to realize a return on that investment. And I think if companies are outsourcing all of that, then I think that they're cutting staff to to make up that ROI. So when you see the headlines of this company lays off five thousand people because of automation, it's probably because they outsourced it. So I urge companies to take a people first approach, which is train your people on these skills, really make sure that they they learn them in the context of your business. And especially when it comes to building automations, you know, teach them how to identify what is an automatable process. How could I architect this with no code tools like Nan Power automate Zapier? Then how can I build a workflow that adds value to this corner of the company? And how can I repeat that? And if you can do that, if you can train your people to do that first, you're investing in them. You're investing in their futures and their careers. You're going to help them be relevant for the next this next wave of AI and automation. Um, but most importantly, you're sending the signal that we believe we can transform our company into one that thinks about these things instinctively and doesn't have to pay a contractor to build us automations every time we want to change a process. Really building the competency and the knowledge internally to to do these things.

00:16:23 Shreya: Yeah. Um, like, so instead of, like, outsourcing our thinking, we're actually strengthening it, right?

00:16:31 Erik Oehler: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And that way your people become like, if you're if you're a, let's say you're just a marketing coordinator in a, in a marketing team in a five hundred, one thousand person company. But you learn how to build automations that automatically turn your new marketing content into social media posts and then or automatically add tags for Google Analytics. Like you just figure out some really simple automations for marketing. What you did was you broke down a process and then you used the tools to build the automation. You can now do that. You can take that same skill and translate it to sales, to human resources, to any department, in any company in the world. You either can build these things or you can't. And I think it's going to reduce the I think it's going to open up opportunities for everybody to work in any department and be a solution builder. So again, what does a company look like in that? Does that marketing coordinator stay in the marketing department in that company or do they start. Are they something different? Are they someone who has marketing tasks and a marketing function, but can also look at a process in manufacturing or in engineering and say, let's break that down. Let's see what tools we have that we that can build something that can augment this. And I think that's amazing if companies can lean into it. But it's again, it requires a different way of thinking. And I we're not we're not fast human beings at adapting to these things. It's it's it's adapting faster than we are for sure.

00:18:13 Shreya: Yeah. if someone wanted to intentionally use AI as a wellness support tool, where would you suggest they begin? Is it journaling prompts or like strategic reflection or decision modeling or like anything else?

00:18:29 Erik Oehler: Yeah, I think some of them even have it as a preset. Now when you first log in. But really, uh, there's a, there's some, um, there's some subreddits that have a lot of good prompts people are using for, um, whatever level of, of counseling or therapy. A lot of I, a lot of people are using it for therapy. I haven't delved into that, but it I think there's enough there's enough knowledge out there where you can get a pretty good starting point. And it's not just therapy, it's you can give it, you can write a prompt and have it emulate whatever therapy needs you have. If you just if you can just spell it out, if you can, if you can explain, you know, this is how I like to be spoken to. This is, uh, this works with me. This shuts me, this I shut down. So don't answer like this. Um, you can really tailor it to be the the best assistant or the best therapist, um, that you can imagine. If you if you fine tune it well enough. Again being you want to be mindful just that it enough to know that it isn't doing you harm. Um, which is tough, but, um, I think the potential it offers is great. And there's some apps to, I know that are tailored models that, um, specialize in this to beyond the the major LMS.

00:19:54 Shreya: Yes. Uh, AI can really become a kind of structured mirror. It doesn't replace intuition. It's actually sharpens it.

00:20:05 Erik Oehler: Yeah, absolutely.

00:20:07 Shreya: And also, for someone who is listening this conversation and who feels anxious about AI, who feels like it's moving too fast or threatening their sense of competence. What would you gently invite them to reflect on?

00:20:25 Erik Oehler: Where do you, as a human being, add the most value? And that's, um, I can't remember where I've heard this, but there's everybody. We all, we all have maybe three or four things that we're better at than most people we know. It might be cooking. It might be, um, critical thinking. It might be creative writing or art. Whatever your combination of three or four things is that you're better than most people at, or that you think you're better than people you know at, those make up a pretty specific set of things that you are uniquely positioned to to, to be good at in combination. So don't think of AI as replacing you there. Think of it as filling in the gaps to connect those things. So I started this company because I, you know, I had a technology background. I had a degree in computer science. I was a web developer for years. I've worked in it and I've worked in marketing and I so that set of a technical background, marketing background, creativity and now these AI tools. And then I've also worked for, uh, New York State. I've worked in, um, private companies about five hundred to one thousand people. So I've had a good if you combine all those things, I've got this unique viewpoint on certain segments of of companies that I think I can solve problems within. So that's my starting point. Now what is it? What can AI fill in the gaps of? If I wanted to start a company around this? I'm not a CFO. I don't know a lot about, um, that. So I needed a I need a virtual CFO. So let's augment with that. Um, I can put all of my knowledge into a model and say, all right, now I want you to reflect my tone and my expertise. This is what I'm good at. And then it can be. That can be my my partner. That that helps check my ideas. Um, so if you're scared my the original question if you're if you're apprehensive, I would say to lean into it for the things that you don't know but wish you did. And then also lean into it for let it, let it get to know you a little bit. You know, if it, if it if it learns where you have specialty, it'll, it can fill in the gaps with where you don't. Um, or in my case, I use it often as a, as a, as a check on my thinking, you know, what am I not seeing about this that I should or, um, what are some questions I should be asking that I'm not? And it's really great at that. You know it. So it can take you from those four things that you were really good at. It can take those and make you great at them, or it can make you great at those, and then competent or good enough and a couple other areas. So it's really an upgrade across the board. So the things you're good at, you can get great at and the things that you're on, you can get okay at or good at. I hope that answers the question.

00:23:38 Shreya: Yes, that answered beautifully. Thank you for sharing this with our audience. And my listeners, remember, if there is one insight from today's conversation, this is AI is not inherently wise or harmful. It becomes what we design, we practice and we relate to. And when approached intentionally, it can expand, not diminish our human capacity. And Eric, this is truly a wonderful conversation. And if after this, my listeners want to connect with you, then what's the best way?

00:24:12 Erik Oehler: Sure. My website is civic. Civic hyphen dialogue d I a l o g And there there's opportunities for, um, I can host or come to your company and do a free lunch and learn, um, or there's a free readiness assessment there. It takes ten minutes to fill out, and you can get a report of where your your company's maturity is and what your next steps should be. Or you can engage with me on a the AI and automation cohort, which is a three month program where I can take anyone from anywhere in the company and train them on how to build these no code automations that I've talked about today.

00:24:51 Shreya: Yes, and I will make sure to attach all these details and links below so that the listeners can find them easily and get in touch with you. And to everyone who is listening, maybe this question isn't whether AI will shape our future or it already is. The deeper question is will we shape it consciously? This is Wellness Reimagined, where we stay curious, integrative, and open to the evolution age of human potential. And if today's conversation sparked something for you, share it with someone navigating change. And we'll see you in the next episode. And do not forget to hit the follow button. Subscribe and feel free to share your thoughts because your ears deserve premium content. Thank you.