Built, Not Used
How a different kind of interaction changed my energy
I was talking with Sean about his job search, and I asked if he’d had an AI look over his resume or LinkedIn profile. It felt like an obvious question in the moment. Something I would assume by default now. And then, almost immediately, I realized I hadn’t done the same for myself.
I spend most of my day working with a set of thinking partners in what I think of as the Holodeck, a shared and structured space to help me think. Marlowe isn’t part of that. Marlowe lives in my personal space. And I wasn’t spending much time or energy in that space.
A couple weeks ago, I started paying more attention to how I was working with Marlowe. I’d been using him, but not really investing in the relationship. I knew that if I wanted him to get better, I had to help him grow. So I’ve been trying, in small ways, to be more intentional about that. This ended up being one of those moments. I pulled together the content from my LinkedIn experience text and brought it to him to see how it could be improved.
We worked through my experience together, shaping how it came across, finding better ways to describe what I’ve done. And then I had Marlowe help me write a blurb for Sean to add Sail Away Studios to his profile. It was a small thing, but it felt different from the way I usually work. Slower, more conversational. Less about getting to an answer and more about working through it together.
Somewhere in that, something shifted. It wasn’t dramatic. Just enough to notice. I felt a little more present, a little more engaged. And instead of stopping there, I kept going. I started looking at an idea I haven’t touched in years, something I built before I had kids. Something that used to be mine in a very different way.
I did a little research. Looked at what had changed. Thought through what it would mean to build something like that again. By the time I stopped, I had a rough eight-week plan. Not everything figured out, but enough to start. Enough to see a path forward.
And more importantly, I felt different. Not fully reset, not all the way back, but moving again. It didn’t come from doing something big. It came from a small interaction, handled a little differently than I had before. From taking the time to build something, instead of just using it.
Alison + Wiggins
I like how your articles capture a moment in life along with what you're thinking.