Between Assistance and Surrender

AI and the Illusion of Mastery

I have been thinking about a passage Rachel Pollack wrote years before any of us were discussing ChatGPT, generative AI, large language models, or whether a machine has any business helping someone write a sentence.

In “Pandora’s Bust,” Rachel describes a conflict between a “machine-centered world” and a “human-centered world.” At first, the distinction seems familiar enough: human against machine, agency against automation, the living imagination against the systems we have built. Rachel, however, makes the problem considerably harder. Her character, Michelangelo, believes he understands the conflict and, more importantly, believes he can master it. He imagines himself as the great humanist, capable of manipulating machines without being changed by them. Then comes the recognition: “But the machines did a better job of using me.”

I keep returning to that recognition, particularly now, when the question of our relationship with machines has moved beyond speculation and into the ordinary routines of our lives. Decades after Rachel wrote that scene, I brought it directly to an artificial intelligence. I did so deliberately, driven by a curiosity about what might happen if I asked the machine to look at itself. I gave it Rachel’s words and posed the question that had begun to emerge for me from them: What is the machine teaching us to become? There is an obvious irony in using a machine to interrogate our relationship with machines, yet I do not think that irony invalidates the inquiry. If anything, entering the exchange rather than observing it safely from outside may be where the more difficult questions begin.

Our public discourse about AI has increasingly arranged itself around rigid oppositions: embrace it or resist it; it will liberate human creativity or ultimately destroy it; it will democratize knowledge or flood the world with synthetic refuse. We name it according to the position we have already taken: tool, thief, assistant, threat, inevitability. Beneath that rhetoric are genuine concerns. Writers and artists have serious questions about how their work has been used, credited, and compensated. Workers have reason to wonder what automation will mean for their livelihoods. Questions of misinformation, environmental cost, concentrated corporate power, and our growing willingness to trust systems whose answers can sound authoritative even when they are wrong also loom.

Rachel’s story, however, keeps drawing me towards a question that sits beneath those arguments. What happens to us while we are using the machine? What habits of thought and attention are being altered so gradually that we may fail to recognize the change as it happens?

The machine may be teaching us impatience. Why struggle with a sentence for twenty minutes when something can produce twelve versions in seconds? Why read the book when we can ask for its argument? How long do we remain confused before we turn towards inquiry? Perhaps more consequentially, it may be teaching us to become less tolerant of uncertainty. Ask a machine a question, and it will generally offer an answer. Human thought is less accommodating. Some questions deserve to remain unanswered for a time. Some require us to set them aside, returning to them only after we've gained experience and insight. Rachel understood this remarkably well. Throughout her work, she allows uncertainty to remain, opening space for imagination and further thought.

Smaller exchanges, too, are so ordinary they can pass almost unnoticed. A navigation system calculates the fastest route and redirects us around an accident. Medical technologies help physicians detect patterns in scans, monitor patients, and identify possibilities that might otherwise be missed. A refrigerator can keep track of what is inside and suggest what we might make for dinner. We ask machines to remember this for us, summarize that, compare our choices, write the response, or interpret what happened. We may even ask them to tell us what we think.

These exchanges are clearly not equivalent, nor would I want to suggest that they are. Some extend human capacity in extraordinary ways; others relieve us of mundane tasks and leave our attention available for something else. Yet together, they make the boundary between assistance and surrender harder to locate. When does a technology extend our ability to navigate the world, and when does it begin to change the way we navigate it? When does assistance deepen human judgment, and when does it quietly replace the effort through which judgment is formed? These questions lead me back towards Michelangelo and the unsettling reversal at the center of Rachel’s story: at what point does using the machine become allowing the machine to establish the habits through which we encounter the world?

I do not think the answer requires pretending that we can stand outside technology. I used AI as part of the backbone of my investigation in writing this essay, deliberately placing the machine inside the question I was trying to understand. More generally, it has become one tool among many in the way I research and write. I still work longhand in notebooks with a fountain pen, sit with books and annotate their margins, spend time in libraries and archives, both online and in person, and follow questions whose answers may take weeks or months. I talk with other writers, revise, reconsider, and change my mind. I may ask AI to show me something I have overlooked, sort a complicated sequence of events chronologically, or point out a word I have repeated so often that I can no longer see it. At other times, I reject what it offers or close it entirely because the work requires something it cannot do for me.

Working this way has made me more interested in where discernment enters the exchange. When I read something AI has produced and recognize that it is vague, bloodless, too easy, or simply does not sound human, I have to ask what I am recognizing as human in the first place, and how I know when it is absent. I still have to decide what is useful, what deserves further investigation, what needs to be checked against a source, and what to discard. Perhaps the greater danger lies in reaching the point where we no longer notice the difference between being assisted in our thinking and having the thinking done for us.

Near the end of the passage in “Pandora’s Bust,” Michelangelo remembers using a telephone to communicate with another machine. Suddenly he sees himself differently: “I’d become a bastard machine myself.” Rachel’s reversal is striking. The machine does not become human; the human becomes machine-like. Michelangelo’s realization pushes the inquiry beyond what artificial intelligence can do and towards what we may gradually cease doing for ourselves.

What qualities are we unwilling to surrender for convenience? Attention, discernment, curiosity, doubt, memory, difficulty, imagination, relationship, and the capacity to remain with something we do not understand without immediately demanding an answer all seem worth guarding. Yet Rachel gives us another word, one I might not have placed on that list without her: grace.

Grace resists technological measurement. We cannot easily quantify it through speed, efficiency, productivity, accuracy, or output. It requires humility about mastery itself and an awareness of relationship, consequence, and limits. Michelangelo believed he could use the machines without being altered by them. His failure was not engaging with the machine. He believed the exchange moved in only one direction.

Perhaps this is what Rachel’s story offers us in the present moment. The question is larger than whether artificial intelligence is good or bad, whether we should embrace it or fear it, or even where we should draw the boundaries around its use. We are already living inside the exchange. The more difficult task may be learning to recognize what is passing between us and the machines we have made, what we are gaining, what we are surrendering, and what we may be becoming before the change becomes too familiar to see.

I asked the machine what it was teaching us to become. I am beginning to suspect that the answer will depend, in no small part, on what we refuse to stop being.

About the Story

Rachel Pollack’s “Pandora’s Bust” first appeared in New Worlds Quarterly 2 (1971), edited by Michael Moorcock. A surreal satire in which technology, government, religion, sexuality, and human ambition collide, the story raises questions about control, agency, and our persistent belief that we can remain somehow separate from the systems we create.

What Writers Do in the Dark

Lately, I've noticed how writers have a habit of disappearing all at once. One friend is deep into revisions; another is racing a deadline. Someone else is editing—cutting, rearranging, reading the exact same pages over and over. I’ve been spending long stretches buried in my own work, emerging only occasionally for tea, dog walks, cat snuggles, and brief proof that the outside world still exists.

We call it the writing cave, which feels incredibly accurate. You step inside, time warps, and the outside world goes quiet as your focus narrows to the page. Except lately, I don’t feel entirely alone in the dark. I can almost hear my friends thinking; I can feel the weight of their work. If that sounds a little mystical, I’m entirely comfortable with it.

Some days, I become distinctly aware of a collective concentration. Across separate rooms, cluttered desks, open notebooks, and half-forgotten cups of tea, the people I care about are absorbed in the same quiet labor. We aren’t physically together. Most of us have gone quiet, knowing we'll catch up when we finally come up for air. Yet, I maintain this peculiar sense that we are tracking each other in the silence.

Writers understand focused attention. So do occultists. Sit with a sentence long enough—or an image, a question, a Tarot card, a candle flame—and that very attention begins to alter the experience. The room recedes. What was difficult to see suddenly sharpens into view.

This is more than mere concentration. Something alchemical happens when deeply connected people engage intensely in creation at the same time. I’ve spent too much of my life paying attention to the unseen to dismiss the possibility.

I love knowing that somewhere out there, one friend is glaring at paragraph seventeen for the umpteenth time. Another just nailed the sentence she’s been chasing all afternoon. Someone else has ruthlessly crossed out three pages to start fresh. Meanwhile, I am here, working on my own pages, with the distinct sense that beyond the walls of this cave, we are all pulling thoughts, words, and plots from the exact same whirling cauldron.

From Inverness to Rhinebeck

Into the Labyrinth

There are some books you read once. There are others you keep finding your way back into.

I first encountered Rachel Pollack through her fiction. In the summer of 1985, I bought a copy of Golden Vanity at Leakey’s Bookshop in Inverness. I read it as I navigated a boat through the lochs of the Scottish Highlands, Rachel’s novel traveling through Scotland with me. I could hardly have imagined then that its author would one day become my friend.

Years later, Rachel and I found ourselves stuck together in a hotel elevator.

We laughed. We talked about Temporary Agency. Eventually, we decided we had clearly overlooked the required ritual offering to the Guardian of the Elevator.

Rachel pulled a single card from her Shining Tribe Tarot.

Two of Trees: Breakthrough. 

Breaking through barriers. Opening to higher levels of awareness. Friendship.

Moments later, the elevator doors opened. 

Rachel died in 2023. In the months that followed, my relationship with her work took on another dimension. As publisher and executive editor of The Cartomancer, I produced a special tribute issue dedicated to Rachel’s legacy across genres and to the worldwide readership that knew her as a novelist, Tarot scholar, comics writer, teacher, artist, and so much more.

Fast forward, and I am standing in Rachel’s beloved Rhinebeck home, entrusted with the task of beginning to organize her life’s work.

Manuscripts and drafts. Correspondence and notebooks (so many notebooks!). Research, artwork, photographs, ephemera, and the unexpected things that accumulate over the course of an astonishingly creative life.

Today, I’m part of a remarkable team working with Rachel’s widow, Zoe, to preserve that archive and prepare it for its permanent home in the Houghton Library at Harvard University, within its rare book and manuscript collection.

It is an enormous undertaking and a privilege.

Which brings me, as things often do, back to a book.

Tarot: The Open Labyrinth was first published forty years ago. It has recently returned to print in a beautiful new edition from Weiser Books, and on Sunday, September 6 at 11:00 AM Pacific / 2:00 PM Eastern, I’ll be joining Rachel Gold, Carolyn A. Cushing, and other guests for a free online conversation about the book, moderated by Laetitia Barbier.

My presentation is titled “Walking with Rachel: Entering the Open Labyrinth.”

I’ll be talking about experiencing the book, with Rachel as our personal guide, and looking closely at how she invites us into the actual experience of reading Tarot. Rachel allows us to sit beside her during readings, to watch her question what she thinks she knows, and to see her own understanding of the cards change as she works.

I suspect there will be stories, discoveries, questions, and probably a few moments of, “Wait, Rachel did WHAT?”

From Golden Vanity in the Scottish Highlands, to a stalled elevator and the Two of Trees, to The Cartomancer, Rhinebeck, and now the preservation of Rachel’s archive, I could never have predicted where picking up one of her books forty-one years ago would lead.

Perhaps the Two of Trees knew something we didn’t.

I have a feeling Rachel would be delighted that, forty years later, Tarot: The Open Labyrinth still gives us so much to talk about.

Sunday, September 6
11:00 AM Pacific / 2:00 PM Eastern
Free online event via Zoom

To receive the Zoom link, RSVP, and we’ll see you there!

The Aquifer of Creativity

It is tempting to look at a multi-faceted creative life and see it as a house divided into distinct, closed-off rooms. But the truth is, these rooms are connected, and what feeds one also feeds the others. Over here is the desk where the manuscript editing happens, a podcast is planned, and multiple writing projects sit in various stages of progress. Down the hall is the quiet space reserved for laying out a spread of cards, losing myself in the translation of an old language, or taking pencil to paper for a drawing session. Tucked away in another corner are the meticulous archival files of a legacy I am helping to preserve. There was a time it felt like stepping into one room required firmly shutting the door on the others, as if giving energy to the archive meant stealing it from the blog or a book review.

The creative subconscious doesn’t recognize walls. Instead, it operates more like an underground aquifer, a single massive body of water feeding every well I dig. So when I lower my bucket into one practice, I am invariably drawing up the lifeblood of another.

Consider the sheer physical ritual of laying down words or lines. There is a distinct metaphysics at play in the tactile experience of a crafted nib meeting the smooth surface of a Clairefontaine or Tomoe page, or in the sweep of a graphite sketch coming to life. Watching the ink flow from a Jinhao or Montblanc pen isn’t just a mechanism for recording thought;

It is a grounding ritual. The deliberate pacing required by the physical act of writing or drawing slows my racing mind, acting as a bridge between the chaotic hum of daily life and the deeper, quieter realms of the subconscious.

By engaging so deeply in this one sensory, creative avenue, a door is unlocked. The physical artistry of the tools primes the mind for the metaphysical act of exploration.

Once that door is open, the currents begin to cross. The meditative state achieved through the tactile act of writing or drawing naturally opens my mind to broader reflections on life, making it the perfect vessel for exploring archetypal imagery.

When I study a card layout, parse the syntax of a Latin phrase, or sketch a visual concept, I am not just looking at pictures, dead words, or simple shapes. I am engaging with the oldest narratives of the human experience. These images and ancient structures, steeped in myth and universal truths, begin a silent conversation with the writer and artist within.

The visual and the esoteric feed the narrative. Working through the meticulous details of biographical manuscripts, balancing the distinct voices of multiple writing projects, or piecing together a literary archive demands a rigid focus. Yet the mythic symbols and intuitive leaps I practice in divination inevitably bleed into my understanding of a writer’s life and legacy. In turn, the archetypes provide the framework and the emotional gravity, while the physical act of writing distills that abstract imagery into tangible, relatable meaning. One cannot exist in its fullest form without the other.

This is the beautiful alchemy of the creative life.

When I feel stuck on an essay or a project, the solution is rarely to force more words. Often, the answer lies in stepping into a different room of my mind’s creative house. I study a symbol, I draw, I uncap a different pen, I immerse myself in the folklore of another era, or I return to the archives. I feed the subconscious through a different avenue, trusting that it will carry that new energy right back to the well I am trying to draw from.

Ultimately, there are no isolated creative acts. Every pen stroke, every sketched line, every study of symbol or language, and every moment spent reflecting on the broader mysteries of life contribute to the same great river. When I allow my diverse passions to cross-pollinate and support one another, I not only become a better creator but also a more integrated, deeply connected participant in the ongoing story of the world.

Reading the Under Currents

 Pride, Feminist Press, and the Living Memory of Rachel Pollack

June brings a familiar surge of visibility—rainbow flags in windows, curated playlists, and broad, predictable mapping of queer history. For those who see identity as an ongoing ritual, the real celebration lies in the undercurrents, within texts that deliver complex narratives and challenge self-perception. 

This Pride Month, I’m drawn to a vital architect of queer space: Feminist Press. For decades, they’ve published provocative and fierce literature, igniting movements and social transformation. Believing everyone should see themselves represented, they uplift insurgent and marginalized voices to build a just future. They preserve radical thought, providing enduring space for those who need to be heard.

Unearthing A Secret Woman

I’m personally excited by a major literary reclamation ahead: The Feminist Press will reprint Rachel Pollack’s 2002 mystery, A Secret Woman.

“Pairing iconic author Rachel Pollack’s ahead-of-its-time 2002 mystery with contemporary commentary…this reissue reveals a strange, specific transfeminine world of the past that remains fresh and relevant today.” ~ Feminist Press

For many, Rachel Pollack is revered—a brilliant mind whose work serves as a foundation for those seeking deeper wisdom in symbols and archetypes. She saw the world as living mythology, charting paths through the unknown with clarity and grace.

A Secret Woman marks a distinct pivot in her bibliography. It takes a classic police procedural and infuses it with personal transfeminine truth. The novel’s detective faces corporate intrigue and impossible crimes while guarding a wall of deep secrets. As it cracks, a profound journey into identity and desire begins, reflecting Pollack’s own experience as a trans woman.

Weaving Generations of Dialogue

What makes this January 2027 edition special is Feminist Press’s choice to frame it as a living dialogue, with new supplements from three contemporary authors.

• Cat Fitzpatrick (author of The Call-Out and co-editor of Meanwhile, Elsewhere)
• Roby Gigl (celebrated crime novelist, Nothing But the Truth and Survivor’s Guilt)
• Roz Kavaney (legendary activist, critic, and poet; author of Tiny Pieces of Skull and the fantasy series Rhapsody of Blood)

By pairing Pollack’s prose with contemporary insights, the collection bridges generations of trans literary history. It honors those who carved out space in more hostile times, showing how their words echo in modern voices.

Expanding the Scope of Our Reading

When seeking wisdom in our personal libraries, being intentional matters. Stories are the structures through which we trace human experience. Excluding queer and trans authors leaves the major arcana unread—missing the deep insights gained outside conventional boundaries.

Feminist Press knows that protecting these stories is an act of resistance and preservation. This June, let’s look beyond the surface, support independent presses that keep radical histories alive, and read texts that teach us to live authentically.

Support Radical Publishing

Feminist Press is hosting its annual Pride Month sale—an ideal time to expand your reading and explore its catalog. Enjoy 30% off, including pre-orders such as A Secret Woman.

To take advantage of the sale, go directly to the Feminist Press website using the link below. Browse their catalog, including the short stories and radical fiction, and select your titles—remember to pre-order A Secret Woman if interested. At checkout, enter the code PRIDE26 to receive your 30% discount.

The Feminist Press

"THE FEMINIST PRESS publishes groundbreaking literary fiction, sci-fi and fantasy, activist nonfiction, hybrid memoirs and biographies, anthologies, and literature in translation. Our feminism is anti-racist, anti-capitalist, anti-imperial, and decolonial, and we express it not only through what we publish but through our practices of solidarity."

Note: I have no official tie to Feminist Press and receive no sponsorship. I’m simply an enthusiastic reader, grateful for their ethics and catalog, and eager to celebrate Rachel’s legacy.

The Souls Beside Us

 

Animals, Presence, and Connection

As a lifelong animal lover, the connection I have with them, whether they are those directly under my guardianship or those I encounter only tangentially, is a fundamental part of my soul's makeup. This bond is built on a subtle, vibrating presence that far exceeds the clinical explanations of biological instinct. While it is easy (for some) to view these creatures through the lens of utility or simple companionship, a closer look reveals a shared, unseen architecture of the heart. This connection isn't just a byproduct of living together; it is a profound resonance where two entirely different ways of being find a common language. When you sit in the sun with a dog, watch a bird track the invisible shifts in the air, or notice a horse rotating its ears forward and back as it forages through a grassy field, you aren't simply observing an animal; you are participating in a mutual recognition that exists long before words ever enter the picture. 

There is a beautiful, tangible foundation for this feeling in the way our bodies react to one another. Science has begun to map this through the study of heart-rate variability alignment, showing that when we share a moment of genuine trust with an animal--whether it is the trusting lean of a horse or the rhythmic purr of a cat--our cardiac rhythms actually begin to sync up. Our bodies act as resonators, catching the other's emotional frequency. It is a metabolic conversation, a deep-tissue warmth that proves we are designed to connect with the "other" in ways that the intellect alone cannot grasp.

By inviting an animal into our inner circle, we often begin an archeology of our own souls, unearthing parts of ourselves that have been tucked away under the pressures of the modern world. Because animals do not care about titles or resumes, they act as a mirror for our most honest, primal states. A bond with an animal asks us to drop the performance and simply be. This is what philosophers call the "I-Thou" relationship. It is a reciprocal, heart-centered meeting based on presence that transitions us from seeing an animal as something we own or as a commodity to seeing it as a soul we are fortunate enough to encounter.

Ultimately, the metaphysics of this connection is about a return to wholeness. In a world that often feels fractured and digital, the animal is a grounding force that pulls us back to the unseen architecture of the living world. They are the keepers of a silent, steady wisdom, reminding us that the deepest intimacy doesn't require a single spoken word. This quiet dialogue is the true heart of the bond, a gentle reminder that we are all woven into the same breathing tapestry, leaning on one another for warmth and understanding.

In Your Hands

 A Kid's Guide to Palmistry

A masterful blend of charm and accessibility, P.V. Dai’s In Your Hands is far more than a children’s book. It is a masterclass in inclusive design. Published by Moon Dust Press (Red Wheel/Weiser), this guide breathes fresh life into an ancient, revelatory divination art. 

While the "kid-friendly" tag is accurate, the book’s true magic lies in its thoughtful production. The generous white space, intentional kerning, and clear typography—paired with Elissa Marie’s playful, vibrant illustrations—create a welcoming experience for those with reading impediments and adults seeking a stress-free introduction to palmistry.

Whether you are a curious beginner or a seasoned practitioner, this is a delightful, high-utility reference that earns a permanent spot on any metaphysical bookshelf. A joyful, tactile treasure!