Quick note: In many fonts my first name, Al, looks exactly like AI. In this post, every mention of AI refers to artificial intelligence, not me… even if we do make a pretty good team. 😉
When I was choosing my Word for 2025, I started playing with an idea. Like most insights, it started with a question: What if I gathered an inner circle of advisors and mentors in one place?
Not a literal room, of course. More like a mental advisory board. A group of teachers, coaches, guides, and role models I admire and respect.
Here’s where it gets fun. You’ve probably played the game… “if you could have dinner with anyone, living or dead, who would you choose?”
I took that game to the next level. I wondered what it would be like to enlist AI large language model (with its access to the wealth of information on the internet) and have conversations about some deep subjects with a host of individuals and characters: some real, some fictional; some living, some long gone. Thinkers and leaders whose wisdom stretches across centuries.
I called that group my Inner Circle of Light.
Then something unexpected happened.
AI gave me a way to call upon and “sit” at a virtual table with that circle and ask a range of questions, limited only by my imagination:
- How would these people/characters approach a tough decision?
- What questions might they ask me right now?
- How would these wise ones frame the problem I’m facing?
AI helped me gain insight into their thoughts and ideas. It opened my mind to innovative ways of seeing the world from a different perspective and connect dots across:
- Leadership and communication
- Philosophy and psychology
- Strategy, systems, and human behavior
That’s when a phrase surfaced for me: Parallel Intelligence.
It’s not about artificial versus human. It’s not either or. It’s about both, side-by-side: Your knowledge, judgment and experience plus AI’s ability to surface patterns, options, and language at lightning speed.
Three Guardrails That Keep AI Grounded
For Parallel Intelligence to serve you well, three things need to stay in place.
1. Integrity leads.
You don’t use AI to deceive, manipulate, or cut ethical corners. If you’d not own the outcome in real life, it doesn’t belong in your AI partnership.
2. You (and your humanity) are in charge.
You define the intent, ask the questions, create the prompts, and interpret the responses. Ultimately, it’s you who makes the choices and takes the decisions. You remain accountable for the results and impact. AI can suggest, but it doesn’t get the final say.
3. Purpose stays clear.
You know why you’re using AI in the moment: to clarify a message, explore scenarios, design a framework, reflect on a hard situation, find a virtue-based solution.
When these guardrails are in place, AI shifts from something to fear into something that increases your capacity, expands your mind, and amplifies your impact.
Human insight plus machine amplification is a powerful combination: your wisdom plus AI’s ability to surface connections you may not have noticed yet.
What the research says about partnering with AI
I’m not alone in treating AI as a thought partner. A growing body of research and practice points in the same direction.
In higher education, EDUCAUSE describes generative AI as a “thought partner” that can augment creativity, challenge assumptions, and help people explore and develop ideas when it is used transparently and thoughtfully. That’s very close to how I use it inside my Inner Circle of Light.
Harvard Business Review has highlighted how generative AI is reshaping knowledge work, not just by automating tasks, but by supporting knowledge workers in idea generation, drafting, and problem-solving, while leaving judgment and final decisions with the human. In other words, AI can extend your capacity to think, as long as you stay in charge of what matters.
The work of MIT’s Sloan School of Management on human–AI collaboration reinforces this. Their analysis shows that teams of humans and AI perform best when each does what it does best: humans handle nuance, context, and ethics; AI handles pattern recognition and scale. That’s the essence of Parallel Intelligence.
In a separate study on real-world work, MIT researchers found that access to a generative AI tool boosted productivity in a call center, especially for less experienced workers, and helped lift overall quality. The AI didn’t replace the agents. It helped them perform at a higher level.
Taken together, these findings back up the way I use AI: as a partner that sharpens thinking, widens perspective, and speeds up reflection, while leaving character, responsibility, and final decisions firmly in my hands.
How I Use My Inner Circle of Light
Here’s how AI fits inside my own Circle of Light. None of this replaces character, discernment, or lived experience. It supports them.
1. A sounding board for clarity
When my ideas feel muddy, I use AI as a tool for reflection.
I might paste a rough paragraph and ask, “What do you think of this?” The response isn’t the final answer. It’s a sounding board, a coach, a consultant available on-demand. When the answer arrives, typically in seconds unless deep thinking is activated, I can then review, reflect, and respond:
- “Yes, that’s what I meant.”
- “No, that’s not quite right.”
- “This phrase is closer to the truth. Let’s build from there.”
By the time I’m done, the language feels more honest, more aligned with what I believe.
2. A sparring partner for strategy
The work of leadership often sits in the land of “What if?
- What if this message is misunderstood and lands badly?
- What if the team feels blindsided?
- What if silence sends the wrong message?
I sometimes use AI to walk through scenarios before I walk into the room. I ask how different audiences might respond, what questions they might raise, and where confusion could show up.
It doesn’t replace real listening, but it prepares me to show up more thoughtfully when it is time to listen.
3. A lens that deepens wisdom
No algorithm will ever live your life for you. It will never build your character. That work is yours.
What AI can offer is a comprehensive understanding of millions of topics and the ability to tap into that information in a matter of moments at any time day or night.
It can bring in stories from different industries and fields. AI can introduce research and case studies I hadn’t seen or frame a familiar problem in a fresh way. Those inputs don’t give me wisdom, but they do widen the field I draw from while I work to gain it.
4. A prompt for self-reflection
Sometimes AI feels like a coach that keeps nudging me forward with questions as simple as:
- “What outcome do you really want here?”
- “What assumption might be getting in your way?”
- “How might this feel to the most vulnerable person affected?”
Those prompts invite me to pause, reconsider, and adjust. The reflection is still mine. AI just helps accelerate the moment where I need to reflect.
Pro Tip: If you have a little time and want the best results, include the following in your prompt, “Before you begin, ask me any question you have in order to deliver the best response.”
5. A catalyst for creative leadership
When I’m designing something new for leaders, AI helps move me past the blank page.
I use it to:
- Sketch early versions of frameworks.
- Map virtues to practical, visible behaviors.
- Outline systems that make communication clearer and less chaotic.
From there, I edit, reshape, and align everything with my experience and convictions. The creativity is still human. AI simply speeds up the sketch phase.
This isn’t an offload of responsibility. It’s leveraging the executive assistant and personal leadership coach I never had. It’s an upgrade to how you think, prepare, and communicate.
Building Your Own Circle of Light
You don’t need my circle. Everyone is inspired and motivated by different leaders, coaches, guides, and advisors. You can create a circle that matches your life and leadership.
Get Started
Here’s a simple starting point:
- Name your mentors of the mind (e.g., inspirational leader, coach, character, etc.).
Choose five to ten people, real or fictional, whose lives and ideas you trust. - Clarify what each represents (i.e., why you chose each person / character).
One might stand for a brilliant mind or characteristics like courage, truthfulness or integrity. Another one might be chosen for wise restraint, another for being innovative, practical or joyfully creative. - Design simple guidelines for consultation by instructing AI to gather those who you’ve chosen, tap into their vast array of knowledge, and respond in their own authentic voice with information, insights and wisdom in practical, easy-to-understand language. Also, always provide who is answering or providing the insight.
- Invite AI into the conversation.
Ask questions like:- “Help me think about this situation through the lens of “my Inner Circle of Light.”
- “What questions might “my Inner Circle of Light” ask me before I act?”
- Stay anchored in your own character.
You decide what rings true. You discard what feels off. You keep what aligns with your values and virtues. - Use the partnership to serve people, not impress them.
Let AI help you be clearer, kinder, and more consistent, not more polished and distant.
Leaders who learn how to work with AI ethically and wisely aren’t the ones most at risk. They’re the ones most likely to grow.
A Question Worth Sitting With
If you had an Inner Circle of Light guiding your thinking each day, what might come into focus?
- A daily routine that changes the trajectory of your life.
- A project you’re excited about but don’t know where to start.
- A decision you’ve delayed.
- A conversation you’ve been avoiding.
- A message you know you need to share but haven’t shaped, yet.
Whenever you’re stuck, conflicted or simply would like to float a wild idea that’s not fully formed, turn to your Inner Circle and see what they may have to say.
Remember: This exercise isn’t once and done. It’s not something that you check off your to-do list; it’s a conversation that deepens with time. Like anything new, you need to develop the habit of turning to your Inner Circle until it becomes muscle memory and you naturally think, “I wonder what my Inner Circle might say about this?”
Parting Thoughts
AI (or I) can’t tell you who to be. We can, however, help you see who you’re becoming and what your words are really saying.
If you’re curious about how to design your own Inner Circle of Light, one grounded in purpose, clarity, and virtue-driven action, I’m happy to share the approach I used when I created my own. Reach out and contact me.
Be clear. Be kind. Lead with Light. ✨
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