Elea.notes is a newsletter about AI, writing and creativity. If you haven’t subscribed, join me.
🍷 I shared a lovely boozy lunch with someone at the French House this week who said the following about AI: “Even if all progress stops now, we are still in a very different place than we were three years ago.”
👩🏻💻 That’s exactly why I’ve forced myself to experiment with AI tools across my novel writing, my work as a journalist and my work in communications/marketing. I remain broadly frustrated with it all, but I push on.
🎨 So this week, instead of the usual interview format, I’m sharing tips from my own creative process with AI, inspired by the fascinating conversations I’ve had in recent months through this newsletter (catch up on those if you missed them).
1- Take time with a pen + a notebook
For all ideas-intensive writing projects, I warm up by writing in a notebook for a few minutes. I find the physical process of writing focuses me and brings out ideas I would not otherwise have accessed.
It reminds me of Maya Angelou’s creative process; she would play solitaire during writing sessions as a way to distract her ‘Little Mind,’ while her ‘Big Mind’ engaged with the topic of her writing. The physical act of writing usually distracts my ‘Little Mind,’ allowing deeper thoughts to emerge.
Marketing guru Ann Handley also mentioned she likes a little notebook time in my interview with her.
2-Pretend like it’s a person, really
AI gives outputs faster than our brains can process, so we need to force ourselves to slow down, or no thinking occurs, and we die, submerged in slopland. I slow myself down by pretending there is a human on the other side. This means:
I am more prescriptive and precise with my instructions.
I ask for further information instead of being satisfied with the first answer.
I fact-check. I’ll never forget the first time I managed a junior journalist and published his first article with minimal edits…only to be met with the wrath of readers who noticed lots of errors. I made the mistake of trusting the journalist too much, too early; he still needed lots of oversight. The AI is that junior journalist.
I end conversations. Despite what Slack has led you to believe, you never have one continually open conversation with a colleague in real life. Start a new conversation when the old one meanders.
3-Use AI as a librarian, not an encyclopedia
When being right matters, I use tools like Claude/ChatGPT to point me in the right direction, then finish by finding primary sources on Google.
Example in communications: I had to prepare someone for a panel discussion. ChatGPT gave me a few relevant examples for a question about tech exits; I fact-checked numbers with media reports found through Google, and added my own analysis on top. The good articles I found, I also gave to the person I was prepping for further reading.
4-Edit in small chunks, constraints are your friend
LLM tools are better editors than they are writers. When I edit with AI, working with smaller chunks has given me better output and more control.
Example in creative writing: Instead of giving Claude a whole chapter, I work on a specific section of dialogue. Does the dialogue capture the character motivations I want to show? Does it sound natural? Are there ways to show the characters’ emotions throughout the dialogue?
Example in marketing: I’ll feed Claude a few examples of high-performing, relevant LinkedIn posts, plus my draft. Then I will spar on just the opening line until it’s killer.
More constraints can also yield creative results: “Explain this in 47 words.”
Semafor’s Executive Editor at Large, Gina Chua, has a good piece on editing with AI.
5-Ask for low probability answers.
The only time Claude gave me a creative idea that was better than something I came up with was when I was struggling with a plot point in my novel. I gave Claude the chapter and detailed notes about what needed to happen, and asked, “What would the readers not expect to happen in this situation?” Claude’s answer was brilliant because it was surprising. (And I ended up using it!)
Now, I deliberately prompt for “low probability” answers. Sometimes one of those is good enough to spark an even better idea, and I build from there.
👀 Watching this week…
The clip of Billie Eilish telling billionaires to give their money away has probably invaded all your feeds by now. But in other news of celebrities standing up for things that matter, RM, leader of K-pop group BTS, gave a major speech on Wednesday, urging top business leaders to prioritize art and culture.
“When you think about investing in tomorrow’s generations, think about culture, as well as economics. Culture and art are a powerful force that moves hearts.”
A lot of the anxiety about AI among creatives stems from a deeper reality: our societies don’t value creativity or art. As culture budgets are slashed, technology has become an easy scapegoat for that underlying devaluation. Meanwhile, the soft power that the creative industries bolster slowly erodes. It’s not often that something as blatant the Louvre heist hits us on the head about why culture is important.
So I’m glad we have RM to remind us, and he should know a thing or two about why we should take creativity seriously; BTS were the first Korean act to be nominated for a Grammy, and it’s estimated that the group contributed $32.6bn to South Korea’s economy in the decade to 2023. Where do I vote for him?
Thank you for reading! I’ll be back next week with another interview.
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Thanks Eleanor for both the mention and the excellent post. I love how RM seems to genuinely use his platform to promote the capacity for societal good. And that stat about BTS' contribution to the South Korean economy is wild. 🙏