Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode
of Theta and AI with Mukundan. So today's episode
is personal, it's about overwhelm, it's about
clarity, and about the weirdest moment of peace
that I've had in a while. And yes, it involves
an AI -coded app that I've built during a spiral
moment. So this particular moment... It was a
Wednesday. I was tired. I was just spiraling
like crazy. And, of course, craving some McDonald's
fries. And that's not the beginning of a recipe
podcast. It's the start of something more real.
Something very personal. I want to tell you about
a week where everything felt just a little off.
The meetings were tense. The expectations were
very unclear. And my brain just fighting on all
cylinders with nowhere to go. And in the middle
of all that noise, I built something. Something
that I didn't know that I needed. So let's look
at this more deeply. Things felt different at
work that week. The tone in the meetings was
different. The urgency in updates. There was
a lot of unspoken signals that something is shifting.
And while I've contributed a lot, I know that
I wasn't the loudest. I know that I wasn't the
most visible either. And that self -doubt started
whispering louder than usual. At the same time,
I was putting pressure on myself to write my
weekly blog post, publish my weekly podcast as
well, like this one. And I had made that promise
to myself and to my readers and my listeners.
But by Wednesday, I hadn't written a single line.
I wasn't blocked. I was just scattered. There's
too much going on that week. And somewhere in
that mess of thoughts, I found myself craving
those warm, soft McDonald's fries. That's the
thing about spiraling. It doesn't always look
like you're crying in a corner. Sometimes it
just looks like micro -anxiety that's disguised
as productivity. So, I'm a builder. That's how
I deal. And let me help you understand why I
build these tools. Because I'm a builder like
that. And I don't journal. I don't even vent.
I just code. And I had this thought, like, what
if I gave all this chaos to an AI? Not to solve
it. Not even to coach me. Just to reflect on
it. To notice it. To help me name what I was
feeling. And so I built this. I called it an
AI thought organizer. It wasn't flashy. It wasn't
something for productivity either. It wasn't
for sale. It was just a mirror that I built.
Something that I used Python to code and powered
it using an AI model, like a GPT -4 model. And
it's just like this. Imagine that your brain
is a cluttered desk. And this little AI quietly
walks in and says, Hey. let me just straighten
this up for you so you can see the surface again
right so that's how it is and let's look at how
this app works this tool works without losing
you in the code right now if you're wondering
how this works under the hood yes there's a blog
with the full code so that the blog you can obviously
look at I'll give you how to do it yourself.
But for you, my dear listener, here's what matters.
You type in whatever is on your mind, right?
And the AI organizes it into three things. First,
it will give you a summary of your thoughts.
Then it will give you an emotional signal. Like,
you know, what are your... What are you probably
feeling right now? Is it like maybe you're happy,
you're sad or whatever, right? Or maybe some
more complex emotions. You're anxious, for example.
Third thing could be a reflective nudge to help
you reframe your thoughts. That's it, right?
There's no coaching. There's no judgment either.
Just like a gentle clarity. and if you're curious
the back end uses gpt4 like i mentioned and a
few lines of python with streamlit and that's
it nothing complex streamlit is this uh front
-end library that i use for all my projects it's
just like really easy to use um it helps you
build this like front -end applications um using
python but like very simple application it's
not something complex so streamlit can help you
if you don't know how to use javascript or node
.js or whatever those front -end libraries are
which i don't personally so streamlit helps in
my case to give you this quiet little mirror
helps you build in this particular use case it
was helping me build this quiet little mirror
for my brain but for most of us What matters
is that this tool works. And here's what caused
me to laugh. I pasted in my rambling thoughts.
There was three scattered sentences. And what
I got back wasn't a solution. It wasn't even
advice. It was just... understanding and the
summary well it was on point the emotion it noticed
my low -key stress and the prompt it asked something
I'd been avoiding so that made me laugh not because
it was funny it was because it just saw me So
I did what I always do after a moment like this.
I went and got the fries. So this is not a coach.
This is not a fix. It's just a mirror. We think
of AI as fast, efficient, and smart. What if
it could be quiet? Like, not like a therapist,
but not even your productivity tool. Just a space.
A space to talk about whatever you want to talk
about. That's what this app gave me. Gave me
space. Not to do more, but to be more clear about
how I felt. And for me, that mattered. so what
i want to talk about a before and after case
like before i'd say that i'm tired meetings were
weird i want fries for mcdonald's i haven't written
my blog it's wednesday and after this ai output
the summary would be you're feeling overwhelmed
by shifting the work dynamics and self -imposed
creative pressure and that's true right that's
what i'm feeling right now i mean in this case
the dynamics of workflow shifting and um i've
imposed a lot of pressure on myself so a lot
of pressure to create so that the separate pressure
to create blogs and stuff that is something that
i've imposed on myself and in emotion in this
case um there'll be subtle stress craving small
wins So I'll tell you that you are stressed out
and you're craving a little win. Could be the
fries, right? That could be a small win. And
prompt, what would it look like to give yourself
permission to pause without any guilt? This prompt
is kind of helping you think through the next
action that you should do, right? The mirror
that will help you to... think through what to
do after this so the before is like a noise and
the other just signal to um just deal with your
emotions i would say finally just these are my
thoughts this isn't the big launch there's no
call to action here there's no paid deal just
a reminder that sometimes you're building something
for yourself and and it could be the best kind
of therapy and maybe just maybe the fries were
always the point if you want to try building
this tool you can go to the blog that i have
linked to this show notes for the full blog and
the source code it will be linked in the show
notes and if you want to reflect on your own
thoughts just leave a comment or reply with your
biggest takeaway and let's normalize pausing
pausing on your thoughts let's just normalize
being seen even if by an ai