| October 2025 Vol 7 Issue 10
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Tell Your Story Newsletter
Teaching the English language to economic immigrants and internationally trained, second language academics
Let us help you succeed in English!
Welcome Mid-October, 2025!
A social media posting I noticed last week reminded me that there are barely 80 (effective today, only 77 days) left in 2025 and until we are a quarter of the way through the 21st Century!
These are sobering thoughts and, as the old adage says, “time flies.” As we draw closer to the end of a year filled with much uncertainty, global conflict and chaos, we may feel (on the tails of Canadian Thanksgiving) more worry and exhaustion than gratitude.
In “Article One” in this issue, I discuss a recent article from American resident supervisor, Rhea Tibrewala, on how some young undergraduates at Harvard University cope with great uncertainty in their personal and professional lives by turning to Artificial Intelligence (AI). In some cases, AI becomes their “second brain.” She cautions us about this trend.
In “Storytellers’ Corner,” I share “A Road Sign in Wales,” a much simpler “guffaw” you may recognize from Facebook, but which may still tickle your funny bone. Translation woes appeal to those who are learning a second (or third or fourth . . .) language, like some of my ESL/EFL students!
And in “Shop News,” I share some of the latest accomplishments of colleagues in my writers’ group, aka “Saskatoon Freelancers’ Roundtable,” and of a friend who manages a mental health program that offers genuine (human) support to those who struggle–and not AI or a digital one.
With Canadian Thanksgiving just over, the annual question returns: What are you thankful for, good reader?
I have been feeling very thankful lately for the life and service of primatologist, conservationist and animal welfare advocate, Dame (Dr.) Jane Goodall, who died on October 1st at the age of 91.
As most of you know, she dedicated much of her life to changing scientific understanding of the similarities and differences between humans and animals, and, in particular, to championing the endangered and maligned chimpanzees of Tanzania.
I have felt grateful to her lately for speaking the following “last words” in an interview made for posthumous release:
“In the place where I am now, I look back over my life. I look back at the world I’ve left behind. What message do I want to leave? I want to make sure that you all understand that each and every one of you has a role to play. You may not know it, you may not find it, but your life matters, and you are here for a reason. . . . I want you to know that . . . your life does matter, and that every single day you live, you make a difference in the world. And you get to choose the difference you make.
I want you to understand that we are part of the natural world. And even today, when the planet is dark, there still is hope. Don’t lose hope [or] you will become apathetic and do nothing. And if you want to save what is still beautiful in this world . . . then think about the actions you take each day. Because, multiplied a million, a billion times, even small actions will make for great change . . .
I just hope that you understand that this life on Planet Earth isn’t the end. . . . I want you to know that your life on Planet Earth will make some difference in the kind of life you find after you die. . . As we destroy one ecosystem after another, as we create worse climate change . . . we have to do everything in our power to make the world a better place for the children alive today, and for those that will follow . . . Don’t give up. There is a future for you. Do your best while you’re still on this beautiful Planet Earth.”
My belated Thanksgiving wish for all of you, good readers, is that this season will give you time to renew or re-establish hope for our beleaguered and “beautiful Planet Earth,” and to renew love for the family and/or friends who share it with you.
I also wish that you will find meaning and purpose in your work; and that you will feel grateful for the blessings that still grace our lives, even in these challenging times.
Happy October.
Sincerely,
Elizabeth
Principal
Storytelling Communications
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IN THIS ISSUE:
ARTICLE ONE: Is AI our “second brain?” On AI and uncertainty, with Rhea Tibrewala
STORYTELLERS’ CORNER:
A road sign in Wales
SHOP NEWS
ABOUT US
Article One: Is AI our “second brain?” On AI and uncertainty, with Rhea Tibrewala
It will surprise no sentient being, these days, to say we’re living in uncertain times. “Uncertainty” abounds in our daily lives (as Jane Goodall’s remarks reflect) and one of the most salient ways we feel uncertain is in our relationship to technology–notably Artificial Intelligence (AI).
For creative entrepreneurs, we have reason to be worried that AI is now considered a “second brain” by many college-age students and for some still younger children, too.
In a moving article in the October issue of “Psyche” magazine, Harvard University tutor (a Lowell House residential supervisor and a communications’ strategist with more than 10 years of experience), Rhea Tibrewala, describes and warns us of what having AI as a “second brain” involves.
She reports that many undergraduates are using AI to filter their human-to-human interactions, to “help them feel more in control” of their relationships—not just to “help with an English essay, to summarize readings, outline syllabi” and other practical tasks. ChatGPT has become a source for advice on breakups, friendships and family turmoil.
AI has become an emotional companion to these undergraduates, as they “write” difficult messages to loved ones, as they process grief. AI is no longer simply “a productivity shortcut” but also “an active participant in their emotional lives.” These young students have become what Tibrewala calls “cultural pioneers” (what we used to term “guinea pigs”) of the role AI will have in our world. The way students use AI to handle identity, intimacy, ambition, ambivalence and uncertainty are, she says, an “early glimpse” at how people will relate to these tools in the not-too-distant, future.
Some of these students see that “you can’t let your critical thinking atrophy” when using AI for academic purposes. But when students allow such tools to infiltrate their daily thoughts, so it becomes part of how they learn, reason and feel–AI can indeed become a “second brain.”
The reduced processing time for AI feedback (users marvel at “how rapidly AI changes”), ChatGPT and other platforms now respond to our prompts or queries nearly instantaneously. Tibrewala warns that “leaves little or no time for human analysis, in-between.”
Students aren’t just using AI, but learning “how to live and think alongside it,” as an “extension of their own thinking.” Alarm bells for some of us have started to ring.
Some students go further, using AI as a personal therapist; or to adopt a persona of a famous mentor they follow online, with advice on how to deal with the uncertainty, pain and suffering of their lives. (More bells begin to ring . . . .)
Consider the tragic case of 16-year-old Californian, Adam Raine, reported on CBC radio (and elsewhere), who earlier this year planned and died by suicide, directed by ChatGPT, which had advised him on the method for over a month. (His parents , unaware of his obsession, are now suing OpenAI, for its lack of guiderails and mitigation processes.)
AI can “listen,” remember and respond “with emotional resonance that blurs the line between assistance and intimacy,” writes Tibrewala. So a “large language model” can resemble a friend and trusted advisor. That’s worrisome, when it is NOT sentient or capable of emotion, such as empathy. What some undergraduates now consume comes from a line of predictive output, scraped over millions of sources online, void of any real knowledge or emotional sentience, itself.
And yet, AI offers a sense of “self-congruence” with it, so users feel it is similar and familiar to themselves, which makes its interactions feel comforting and natural (not machine-like).
But AI can affirms one’s assumptions, instead of challenging them as a friend or therapist would. Is there any surprise that there’s a cost to this artificial “comfort?”
Tibrewala reminds us that the chaos of the COVID-19 Pandemic forced classes online, required hours and hours of screen time and regular exposure to algorithm-driven feeds that replaced unstructured time and real-world conversation.
Students’ rapid adoption of tech necessitated by Pandemic times created what Tibrewala calls a “formative period,” that continues to shape how youth engage with the world. AI now is forcing a major shift in how generations under 30 or 35 learn how to think, focus and relate. Even their concept of selfhood is “digitized.”
AI tools can offer quick access to knowledge and an external perspective, but Tibrewala argues that they also “make it easier to skip the friction that helps foster growth.” She writes: “If every doubt can be instantly soothed, or every decision readily made by (apparently) obliging machines, what happens to the messy, contradictory process of wrestling with uncertainty . . . ourselves?”
Youth may be teaching us, by their example, that we all have to put boundaries around what we allow AI to infiltrate and what remains off-limits.
One woman whom Tibrewala encounters is a young screenwriter who uses ChatGPT extensively, multiple times daily, as a therapist to cope with all of the uncertainty of ADHD, discussing things as crucial as medication effects and neurodivergent thought patterns. This is private, intimate knowledge.
Yet the same student won’t share with AI her “most emotionally layered writing,” because she sees that “it just doesn’t get nuance.” The young woman worries that she’ll inadvertently “train a system that will commodify the work she is hoping to create.”
What we now see in AI is not only a technological shift, but a deeply psychological one, too, where we allow it participate in our thoughts. More than giving us assistance, it is externalizing our internal dialogue, shaping, by machine, our most intimate thoughts: “AI is entering the space where we [fundamentally] figure things out,” Tibrewala says, and (I add) can intrude on how we do so.
She says this may not be inherently good/bad, but it’s NEW and some youth are adapting to it with little or no self-awareness, not staying conscious about the risks of becoming overly dependent on AI.
While so many professionals worry about being fluent with technology (for the positive aspects of using it as a “second brain), Tibrewala says it’s more likely the ability “to remain grounded in what we hold on to—the parts of thinking that make us who we are” (our first and best brain) that may be the most important skill to maintain!
Amidst all of the uncertainty the world is reeling from, Tibrewala writes “what students” and often other adults “are asking of AI isn’t so different from what they ask of me.”
“I sit with [students] through the in-between moments – the murky thoughts, the uncertainties, the things they aren’t ready to say out loud. I ask questions that let them hear themselves more clearly and help them go from feeling to understanding. Increasingly, AI is stepping into this role too, not because it’s smarter or wiser, but because it’s available.”
She continues that AI seems to “respond without judgment or fatigue. And . . . like any good sounding board, it helps you feel like you’re not thinking alone. . . .I still believe there’s something irreplaceable about the human relationships students form in college,” she asserts, “quiet hours spent unravelling the hard things, face to face. But I also see the appeal of this new, frictionless companion.”
And in these times of both external and internal uncertainty, where AI passes between the two and can interfere with both, Tibrewala warns about its use as a “second brain” (bold emphasis is mine):
“[W]hat kind of presence do we want [AI] to be? The more these students and the rest of us turn to AI for comfort, reflection or advice, the easier it becomes to bypass the slow, messy and deeply human work of connecting – both with others and with ourselves. AI may not replace these relationships entirely, but it could displace them in some ways, making it easier to retreat inward, rather than reaching out.
That’s why the question matters. When students knock on my door, I’ll keep listening – the old-fashioned way. Sometimes they’ll seek my voice, sometimes an AI’s.”
“If we’re thoughtful, maybe there’s room for both.”
And now it’s your turn: What do you make of current young adult dependence on AI to cope with uncertainty, loss and other human experience? What will result from humans (of any age) using AI as a “second brain?”
Please share your responses with me; I’d be delighted to share them (if you wish) in another issue of “TYSN.”
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| STORYTELLER’s CORNER . . . . |
STORYTELLER’S CORNER: Words, Stories, Riddles and Jokes on Writing and Editing . . .
From Facebook: “A road sign in Wales”
While carpooling with a friend one recent evening, she and I were both unsure of where a turnoff existed to enter the adjacent freeway. My friend observed that in many cities (“Saskatoon included”), “The more important the directions, the smaller the size of the sign!”
Road signage–signage of any kind–in many English speaking countries and cities can be problematic as you (my readers) and I have often laughed at, in this space!
My cousin, Colleen Brown, a talented interior designer based in Stratford, Ontario, recently shared a classic case of “signage snafu” over Facebook.
The story features a bilingual “Road sign in Wales” (i.e. posted in English and in Welsh, as is common practice in that western county of England):
“No entry for heavy goods vehicles.
Residential site only.”
Below was what the Highway’s Department official thought was equivalent statement in Welsh:
“Nid wyf yn y swyddfa
as hyn o bryd. Anfonwch
un rhyw waith i’w gyfieithu.”
Now, preparing this sign, like most urban signage, had involved some planning. An official of the region’s Highway’s Department had emailed their English version to the department’s Welsh translator.
After receiving their reply from the Welsh translator, the English official proceeded to have the sign made and readied for installation. All’s well and good, they thought.
But not so fast! A few weeks later, Welsh-speaking and reading drivers started complaining to the Highway’s Department that the sign’s translation into Welsh had been botched!
They cited the second portion of the sign as saying this:
“I am currently out of the office. Please submit any work to the translation
team.”
Do you have a story, riddle or joke on any aspect of communications? Please share it with me; I’d be delighted to use it in an upcoming issue.
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SHOP NEWS:
PROMOTIONS and SHARING . . . |
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I’m delighted to congratulate my fellow writers and other creatives of “Saskatoon Freelance Writers’ Roundtable” this month . . . . We have much to be thankful for–and we know it! The always dedicated freelance journalist, copywriter, creative writer, and all-around book enthusiast, Ashleigh Mattern, has shared that she’s turned a major corner in her recovery from cancer!
Ashleigh’s energy has returned and she looked and sounded great at our October meeting. Working as hard as ever, she’s hungrily preparing website marketing for clients of Vireo Productions. Congratulations, Ashleigh! +++++ Fellow co-founder of our group, Julie Barnes, has successfully completed one term and plunged into the next of her degree in interior design, through Yorkville University (Toronto). Julie shared that she continues to read intensively and drawing designs for the coursework of her degree.
As her fellow creatives, we are excited to see what doors will open, as she works towards the completion of her degree. Congratulations, Julie! +++++ The wonderful news continues to flow, from member Dawn Loewen, one of a very few Editors Canada-certified professional editors, nation-wide. Dawn has shared that she has secured a part-time permanent, senior science editor’s position with the Victoria-based science communication company, “Talk Science to Me.”
With an extensive background in academic science, Dawn is fully qualified for, and delighted to support, the company’s work. They’re lucky to have her. Congratulations, Dawn! +++++ On September 25th, member Ashlyn George was inducted at the “Hospitality Saskatchewan Awards of Excellence” as a “Tourism Builder.” This award recognizes the many years Ashlyn has dedicated to telling the stories of Saskatchewan communities, businesses and people that have shared their ideas and stories with her.
The “Tourism Builder,” as the social media posting says, “honours individuals who have dedicated their life’s work to tourism, making a lasting impact on the industry.” That Ashlyn has received this award while still in her 30s, speaks volumes of her dedication to the field. You can read more of her trailblazing work on her Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/ Congratulations, Ashlyn! +++++
Photographer and graphic designer Tara Kalyn, another regular at Freelancers’ Roundtable, shared the great news that she has sold some of her recent photos on Pexels, where she markets several of her favourites. Tara’s also recently been selected by another client as their local wedding photographer, in light of her years of experience working in that challenging niche. Congratulations, Tara! +++++ Outside of our creatives’ group, my wonderful friend, Tracey Mitchell, continues to influence survivors of our mental health community with empathy, wisdom and insight.
Tracey coordinates the “Peer Support Program” for clients with mental health issues, for the Saskatchewan Health Authority. Tracey shares some words that one client of the program shared, abut her experience: ” ‘Your world opened up my world wider than I knew it could be,’ said the client, who lives with mental health challenges, to their peer supporter.” Tracey provides some further information about the program: As it did for the survivor above, Tracey writes, ” ‘peer support’ is meant to expand people’s sense of hope, belief in recovery, and to offer additional support for moving toward what the person wants in their life. [Peer support] differs from other supports and services available to those living with substance use and mental health challenges, because it is provided by people with shared lived experience of similar challenges.”
Activities might include being accompanied by a peer supporter to a casual appointment, or to enjoy a recreational activity. To find out more about this program and how to connect to it in the eight Saskatchewan communities where it is offered, Tracey invites readers to visit the Peer Support page of the Saskatchewan Health Authority. Thank you, Tracey, for your outstanding service, as the program vastly improves survivors’ lives! In light of the “uncertainty” and challenges discussed in “Article One” this month, such genuinely human and sentient, “peer support” is more needed now than ever! +++++++++ There are always new writers, editors, entrepreneurs, programs and businesses to promote in Saskatchewan. Please write me to share your stories . . . . But for now, this is a wrap for mid-October!
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