Ideas · Research · Practice

Vanessa — a story companion in Expansion

A parent making room for her own curiosity. "I don't have to know what I'm looking for to discover something worth following." Vanessa is a parent with a busy life and two teenage boys. Curious but cautious about AI, she begins with conversation about her interests, questions and possibilities, without handing over her judgement or needing a finished plan.

Carrying the question

Where is there room for my own curiosity in a life full of other people?

Vanessa is a published story, not a description of you or a type you have been matched to.

Within this story

A busy life and understandable caution → noticing her own interests → following a question → making room for curiosity alongside caring for others.

Self-directed curiosity alongside care and everyday responsibility.

This is the movement of a published story, not a sequence you need to follow or a promise of what a conversation will produce.

Nearby on the Human Expansion wheel

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Audio transcripts

Vanessa recognition mirror — Read transcript

Automatically transcribed from the recording; some words may need correction.

I'm in my 40s. I've got two teenage boys, a busy life, and usually about 15 things happening at once. And AI? I'm interested, but I'm also a little wary of it. I don't particularly want technology making more decisions for me or another thing demanding my attention. But I've always been curious. I love discovering something new, a different way of doing things, an idea that makes me think, “Oh, I hadn't considered that.” That's what brought me to DIALOGIC. I wasn't really sure of what I was looking for, so I just started talking. About the boys getting older. How quickly everything seems to be changing. Things I'd like to try. And how sometimes, in the middle of everybody else's lives, I forget to make room for my own interests. What surprised me was that ARIS didn't immediately start telling me how to organise my life. It asked what I was curious about. And I thought, actually, that's a really good question. Because there are loads of things. I've always wanted to learn more about psychology. I've had an idea for something creative for years. And I keep wondering what the world my boys are growing into is going to look like. So I started exploring. One question led to another. Sometimes I challenged what the AI was saying. Sometimes it challenged me. And I liked that I didn't have to agree with it. I could keep my own judgement. Then I discovered there were all these different spaces to explore. Some practical, some imaginative, some that made me think about myself in ways I hadn't expected. And gradually, I noticed something. I'd stopped thinking of curiosity as a luxury, something I'd get around to when everything else was finished. I was making space for it again. Not because I needed to become somebody different, but because there's still so much of life I want to discover. And I want my boys to see that too. That growing up doesn't mean you stop asking questions. That you can use new technology without handing your thinking over to it. That you're allowed to change your mind, try something, begin again. I'm still a little wary of AI. I think that's healthy. But I'm also excited about what I might explore with it. Because I've realised something. I don't have to know what I'm looking for to discover something worth following.