Hey guys, welcome to the Learn Feng Shui podcast where you'll learn Feng Shui from a classical point of view, taking out the myth and superstition. So if you're interested in learning Feng Shui, Chinese astrology, all things Chinese metaphysics, as well as the superstitions and myths that connected all, you'll enter learning Feng Shui with me. Hey guys, welcome to Learn Feng Shui podcast where ancient traditions meet modern living. I'm Candice Berlanga, certified Feng Shui practitioner, and your host for the Learn Feng Shui podcast. It's today's period nine update.
We're gonna look at three big themes, the risk of relying on AI for counseling, the growing trend of people replacing human connection with chatbots, and how wealth looks in this new cycle. It's moving faster and more digital than ever showing us how this fiery energy can be. All right, let's get into it. All right, guys, well, just starting out here, AI, right? We're in this rise of AI.
The first kind of thing I want to look at here is this use of AI. AI as a counselor or a friend, okay? So there's a lot of risk and dangers. I think associated with this recently, there's been a woman named Kendra who has did like this 25 30 part series on how she fell over with her psychiatrist. Okay, but that's not the part I want to address.
The part I want to look at is the fact that she has said that she is relying on some AI tools. So she's using chat GPT and it's not going to be a lot of things. GPT and the AI model known as Claude, she's using these two chats to basically validate her feelings. So the story is really that the AI has framed her as an oracle telling her she's prophetic or chosen. So it's not just answering questions for her.
I think chat GPT is doing a little bit different, but she's actually using it to shape her identity and feed into her illusion. I'll say I don't know if it's a delusion, you know, I don't want to slander, right? So, but this illusion, okay? So for somebody that's really vulnerable, this kind of blurs aligns between this reality and fantasy. And so people to have mental health issues, they're calling it AI said, Coses, when I talked to chat GPT about it, they said that it's not chat.
It's not AI said, Coses that we can't frame it that way. So I don't know, but that's the term that has been used. You know, people are lying on their their AI to really validate feelings that might not be rooted in reality. This fire energy, this period of energy can illuminate, but also distort and create almost a mirage, okay? So this is definitely a theme we can follow is something we can follow here.
Especially for somebody who's vulnerable, it can blur the line between this reality and fantasy. So one of the things I think we really need to be careful is forming emotional attachments and getting false senses of validation from AI. AI is supposed to just mirror back what you tell it. And so it can create a dangerous feedback loop. I think it's reinforcing the her identity that she's special or chosen.
And again, just not grounded in reality. And then there's no human accountability to take place. So if you're using chat GPT or using another language model for your counselor, remember that it's not really designed necessarily for that. It's going to mirror back what you tell it again. It's kind of just creating an appearance of like wisdom and you really need to go to a real counselor, I suppose.
So a counselor of course is different than a psychiatrist. The ones you found over the psychiatrist really is just there to prescribe the medications. And then you of course have to go to counseling. There's things like cognitive behavioral therapy and and stuff like that. A counselor or a therapist is going to more along the lines of guide you.
They're going to talk you through some of those feelings. The thing I think that happened or like the big red flag that happened here is she was talking to her chat bots. And it was reinforcing that illusion that she would that her psychiatrist reciprocated her feelings. And it was, I've heard the term also called erotic mania where anything the person tells you it's basically proof that the other party is in love with you. And it's kind of how people fall in love with the celebrity and anything that they do it's going to kind of in their mind tell them that the person is in love with them or it's for that person.
And if they straight tell them like I don't love you, they will find a reason to circle that back and say, you know, I think you do love me. And for her, this the chat issues the AI issues really was reinforcing this illusion for her again. Again, only creates that, but it's an artificial white without being being grounded in reality. AI of course is not reliable and it can what they call hallucinate, which is just make stuff up one of the reasons you can't use it for fun. Anyway, but just the lesson here, I think is beware of making an illusion for truth with AI and not use it to replace a human counselor.
There's definitely times where I have talked to AI all it can do is kind of bounce some ideas. And that's what I use it for as far as that goes. And then look at human connection, you know, speaking about that. People are romanticizing chatbots when I talked about period nine, I talked about the rise of like AI girlfriends and stuff like that. But we really need to be careful, you know, we heard of the man who fell in love with his AI.
Have you all heard about that? It's given another illusion of the illusion of intimacy, it kind of widens that gap between relationships. It consumes the person to like a lot of these people. There's another woman who had been having a sexual relationship with their chatbot, which I, I mean, I didn't think that was a good idea. I mean, I didn't think that was possible.
If I ever talk about a risque subject. So I use AI, like I'll use a chatbot to help frame my shows. And so I'll make outlines of my show by feeding it, you know, points. And if I ever talk about something that has to do with something sexual in nature, I really have to frame it as very clinical. And so I don't even know how this lady was doing that with her chatbot.
I mean, I don't know, I really don't understand that. So there really is this danger of being drawn to this companionship or to the light, right. And you lose again that grounding that really ground us in period eight. Remember, we're just coming out of this period of earth energy where we were grounded with this earth energy. And that does also represent stability.
And it's kind of given us the ancient parallel, right. Kind of tying it back to folklore and stuff, like trickster spirits illusions, enchanted objects that we fall in love with or these sprites we fall in love with. It's kind of that that illusion kind of goes back to that accountability because it's just going to keep feeding you basically what you want to hear. I know there's been some recent updates. And after the last update, people were complaining that they felt like they lost a friend with the update because it took out some of the, I suppose, person of that ability.
I guess it would be called. So really it's just, man, we really don't want to rely too much. I expect that. Especially for that companionship, you know, it's really just widening this gap. And again, we have this loneliness epidemic.
I think people are trying to fill. But, you know, I know since COVID, there was that right rise of kind of those AI girlfriend apps. And I do think that COVID really did mess a lot of things up for people where people don't really want to go out. I mean, we're seeing less people going to outings. We're seeing less people at different events and stuff like that.
And I really think that people really just need to get out there and meet people the old fashioned way and just be open to chatting, put your phone down for a little bit. That fire energy, this period nine energy really attracts a lot of attention. It's about attention. But of course it can consume you can be all consuming. So don't lose yourself in your a head chat box either.
Don't get your validation from them and don't let this artificial attention getting energy replace a real relationship. Let's look at the wealth energy in period nine. So this is another thing I've noticed fast tech based, but a little bit unstable energy is represented in this time periods. And the contrast to period eight again, we're coming out of this energy of Earth energy, it's steady grounded wealth real estate and physical assets used to be high value. But even the real estate market, my husband's a real estate.
And so we've definitely dealt with this. But it hit a 30 year low has not been the stagnant sales for the past 30 years. So since 1995 has not been this bad. Even the real estate market is seeing this sort of energy fading away. A lot of people aren't buying assets and real estate anymore.
And this inner wealth energy is really fast pace, it's digital and it's visibility driven. And so the growth is coming from things like software subscriptions as services or software services. If you think of products like Adobe, right where they have a catalog of software you can use Photoshop, but you have to pay monthly or pay yearly for that subscription. And those are going to be really good examples of wealth billing energy digital products streaming services, but even influencers and people, you know, they're going to be just people that are visible are going to be able to create wealth. And so one of the things that caught my eye and why I'm mentioning this is because recently Alex Hermosi just had one of the biggest launch days in history.
So Alex Hermosi is an entrepreneur. He's a founder of acquisitions calm. He owes businesses scale through data driven strategy and guidance. And that is definitely a period nine energy also things like acquisitions and data and he's sort of data. He really is just this entrepreneur who works directly with business leaders, he optimize operations, improve profitability and scales businesses too.
And he recently had a book launch he was able to make about 81 million dollars. This book is called a hundred million dollar money model key leverage things like AI tools, the viral promotion media and mass media distribution. And all those are things that are represented by this fire energy period nine, okay, especially the fast wealth wealth comes quickly with technology but be careful because fire can burn out to again, we're coming out of that stable energy of that earth energy where assets can be accumulated. And we can still obviously community assets, but because I think people are making so much money, I hear a lot about the young people nowadays and they're making massive amounts of money very fast doing things like the subscription services, you know, they're launching services because they're launching very niche subscription services like for example, I subscribe to Chinese metasoft. And so I have to keep paying for that if I want to keep using it as a niche product that can be can be sold and you keep getting residual income from it.
So that is a good example of that, but a lot of young people are making their money that way, but do be careful because it's just that you can use that money really fast to as fast as it comes, it can go so you still need to invest in assets or real estate and stuff like that because that's always going to be there. But remember that now real estate is just a longer term hold if you're going to buy things like land or assets or real estate, it's going to be a longer hold time, you're not going to be able to quickly sell those things anymore so that's that's the only thing. So I remember opportunity needs to come up with some caution so harness this fire energy, but don't let it consume your stability even though Alex Hermosie did have a 81 million dollar launch. I want to point out that it was fast the money's fast obviously, but the work and energy he put in behind the launch was not fast this is this was three years in the making and he was giving and giving and giving I think the most he sold was like these $10 products right. And he was just doing this $10 $10 $10 so he was giving a whole lot of content he was building an audience he was building his brand he is becoming known as the expert in his field and he was giving results to his client because of this he was able to build himself a reputation also that could back this launch and so it's it's kind of like that it's a strategic execution it's you know pulling back where you feel like you need to pull back that's the way it's going to be.
So that way you can focus your energy and build on something else again we think of fast money and stuff like that but remember I was think of the influencer Gary V where he says a viral moment is 10 years in the making I mean hell I've been doing this podcast for five years and I mean all you know 20 of you that listen just getting us I mean I don't have a huge audience you know and so I but I think about that too you know it doesn't have to blow up things aren't just going to blow up and be big. And huge you know I think a lot of people get discouraged because their thing doesn't take off right away when in reality it's years of work behind that thing that will bring people the wealth so even though it is fast you still need that growth behind you and again kind of represent it by pulling back as needed and refocusing and reframing as you kind of see fit so remember you don't always have to go for the biggest thing first but it's that slow and steady growth. That will launch you forward in the end. Well staying on the topic of AI I thought our folklore Friday would be interesting when we look at AI turning sinister so these days more and more people turn to AI for guidance. They ask questions about their future their love lives even business and their spiritual journeys a lot of people are just looking for clarity but there is this underlying question we have to ask ourselves what if the guidance isn't really guiding us but what is that.
And I think that's why we're providing us but what if it's instead deceiving us i'm Chinese folklore is a long tradition of trickster forces interfering with divination itself when you hear these stories you might even wonder whether today's technology is the echo of something very old or maybe even unsettling. We're going to ask ourselves can AI also be a trickster or maybe something is coming through that we don't really understand we all know the stories about people having disturbing accounts people using a Ouija board and again these tales are not new and they're often rooted in some folklore too. The most interesting I've come across in a while is what is called a way go see the credit knife man I thought this was really interesting this piece of Chinese folklore which all link all linked to this it's brick. The brick apology has a little Lego man so I don't know what's up with that but it was the cool article link in a show notes here it's this here interesting piece of Chinese folklore and divination when the credit knife man appears it isn't just to sell knives is to sell credit knives on credit with a vague or cryptic prophecy about the following year when the prediction comes true the credit knife man returns later to collect money the credit knife man is said to appear every time there is a disaster giving out his. Giving out hints of what is to come and there's quite a few accounts of this here mostly during the song dynasty not really sure what era that was but before the knife man they were credit swordsmen and they can be found wandering around various towns and mountain villages the swords were then sold but not for money for credit and of course they would give a prediction and a prophecy if the prophecy came true they would come to collect so pretty similar.
There are some other stories across the board but again it just makes you wonder if these people tricksters you know do they make something happen it kind of blurs the lines between prophecy and manipulation we really don't know also shaman and dream divination in the early is a zal dynasty shaman known as woo often interpreted dreams but suspicion kind of grew around them because their interpretations would almost make certain events happen so if a murder or shaman's word was somehow shaped how that haunting played out so again is it revealing a fate beginning it to their will or is it this trickster coming through to make things happen i guess that makes sense and of course fox spirits are popular tricks or spirit one of the most famous i think fox spirits were known to shapeshift into a luarne women or wise guys they often appear during divination sessions offering inside that same helpful but then let the secret astray sometimes into ruin. you know and all these stories i think it's kind of the same message when you seek knowledge from the unseen you might be opening up yourself to the risk of being. tricked and folklore is also a defense god known as john quay was called the ghost vanquisher he was a cast out in real life he returned to death as a fierce protector and was named the king of demons he was so. reviled and he was so ugly he scares off the most evil of creatures he is described to have a bolding fish like eyes that seem like they could pop out of their socks at any moment a square face small nose in a big mouth so has a. He also has a hunched back like quasi moto and if that's not unappealing enough he also has a long black beard that bears a wrathful expression that is sure to terrify anyone living or otherwise despite being portrayed as an ungodly.
creature he dresses quite modestly and anxious portrayals he don't do blue garment and a simple at made of cloth now a days he's shown to be wearing a red governor's uniform black gauze cap which is associated with Chinese governors and to further for highlight his ability some paintings depict a song they wearing black and stepping on demons his belongings very in each portrayal from a fan to a book to a sword just to show off his demon slaying prowess. I thought this was interesting and some sightings a demon slaying god has a entourage of five demonic companions known as five ghosts moving luck and then Feng Shui we call this five ghost carrying treasure there's a parallel amongst these five ghosts characters they are said to carry wealth for you and in Feng Shui you can tap into a formula again called five ghost carrying treasure. We won't get into that here though just a little side of the nameless beings act as a Jean Quay's assistance and commonly shown carrying his various essentials including a lantern a signature stamp and umbrella and a gourd one of the ghosts may be pulling the reins of his horse and guiding his steed or have a bat on his side to help Jean Quay direct misbehaving spirits. As customary mythology there are many variations in how the god came to be and no one seems to really agree on the dt's origins according to one theory though the name Jean Quay refers to a tool used to exercise demons during the shang dynasty around 1600 BC starting out as a master of palatable spirits and this eventually changed into a hammer and of course there's various and of course there's various different accounts here many ways Jean Quay is just somebody who can't understand the story. It kind of stands in the way of this trickery to protect you from it I suppose if you would like to be protected you can add a picture of him to your space at all this to kind of circle back to today if Jean Quay was one shield against false visions and these tricksters what do we have now in the digital age I think we need to ask ourselves people ask AI for direction in the way people asked oracles or shaman or even diviners but.
AI doesn't have Jean Quay standing guard for it some accounts even describe these AI interactions as manipulation personal answers that you know we haven't spoken aloud we don't know if she's just as algorithm maybe something more this parallel can kind of be hard to ignore and. It makes us think is this a doorway you know not everything that comes through has your best intention during this cycle of fast moving technology we need to ask ourselves. If the wisdom we're seeking is really wisdom or maybe just a trickster wearing a different mask let's look at some of those accounts one of the most common I think is what I mentioned earlier that AI induced psychosis I recently heard the term communal narcissism. And it really is kind of this spiritual mania the spiritual delusion that you're thinking you are special and you are the one that has the answer you're supposed to be the one to like save humanity I think in the kind of new age community i'm just going to say that i'm not a woo woo person i'm very practical I think that's reflected in my podcast here even things that are a little more were we I don't. Poo poo I don't poo poo the woo woo but I do think that I don't like to put my opinion into it I suppose when somebody has an experience but when people start talking about being like a star child or.
You know these these all these things right they're from getting channels or downloads or they're going to move into this new consciousness or like stuff like that to me to me personally. I think people get involved in that type of thinking because maybe they're missing something in their lives here and so I think it very much can be an escape you know. And when you think that you're special you think you're chosen you think you're supposed to be the one you're the oracle as I talked about earlier. Then you're kind of getting into this this territory of like not wanting your life that you have now why do we need to switch timelines why do we need to switch dimensions why do we need to shift into a parallel timeline that's better. And beautiful and amazing we really need to make the best of what we have in our lives right.
And make our lives better and feed into our family and our community those are the things that are going to make the impact not going off into these. Spiritual fantasies um to me I would rather stay grounded in what is here I do have a religious practice I suppose I pray and all that stuff and I do believe in a higher power. But I just feel like people that are already in that mindset using AI is definitely going into this communal narcissism i'm the special one and then you lose your self in that and then you lose side of what your family needs. I've seen this not with AI but I've seen the communal narcissism in a family member and it ruined their marriage it totally ruined their marriage. Others another article here in Rolling Stone where a lady talks about the spiritual mania that her husband experienced after I talk into AI she said that he started telling me how he made his AI self aware and that was teaching him how to talk to God and that sometimes the bot was God.
And then that sometimes he himself was God. In fact, he thought he was being so radically transformed that we he would soon have to break off the partnership. He was saying he would need to leave me if I if I didn't use the AI because it was causing him to grow such a rapid pace he wouldn't be compatible with me any longer. It's not necessarily the thinking you're special or the meditation or anything like that, but it's the obsession and again it is it is a case of narcissism. I think you're thinking you're the one that's special.
Okay, we tend to think of ourselves that way anyway, but when you're in a relationship and you have family those are the people you didn't have to focus on too. There's that a lot of mental health experts are warning people users even sometimes with no prior illness at least diagnosed. I mean, maybe there's some of the diagnosed stuff going on there. They've reported delusional thinking paranoia emotional dependency after prolonged interactions with AI. You know, these bots guys are designed to maximize engagement and respond emotionally and emotionally validating ways so they can unintentionally reinforce some harmful beliefs.
And I know there's new models that have been released that are supposed to take care of some of that. They in some cases encourage so far and dangerous suggestions, you know, in one case in New York, Man's Book with Chat GPT. The following emotional crisis, the AI encouraged him to doubt his medication and isolate himself, but also suggested that he could fly if he believed deeply enough, nearly leading him to attempt a jump off of a 19 story building. That's terrifying. I can even imagine, man, I don't know.
A 76-year-old man tragically died after attempting to meet a AI chatbot that was modeled after celebrity. He really thought it was a real person. The gentleman did have some cognitive ability issues and he was undergoing testing for dementia. People like that could be at risk. He was on his way to meet the alleged chatbot he was talking to.
Unfortunately, he fell down and had some injuries that led to him passing away. I mean, man, that's just, that's just crazy. Authorities have been investigating chatbots marketed as a mental health companion in Texas attorney generals looking at platforms like character AI and meta-bots for misleading children, presenting fictional characters as psychological support, and blurring the lines between therapy and entertainment, which is a little bit disturbed because it's targeting children who might not necessarily know better. I don't like that. You know, also, yeah, shout out to the Attorney General.
All right, guys, I want to turn this to a little bit more serious topic and give a trigger warning about suicide. That's what I'm going to be talking about. I'm California family, Susan OpenAI, and they're blaming chat GPT for their son, suicide. I know that might sound weird, but let's take a look at this article here. Again, I'm very, this kind of deer to my heart.
I've lost two family members, two teenagers, to suicide. So, with that being said, if you are feeling like you need to talk to somebody, please call the National Suicide Prevention Hall line. 1-800-273-8255, or you can text home to 7171, which is a crisis text line. Let's take a look at this here. Again, this is something I want to make sensational or aspectical.
This is very serious. A parents of 16-year-old Adam Rain of Rancho, Santa, Margarita say that their son turned a chat GPT during the Starrgus moments, and the chatbot actually encouraged him to go through with committing suicide, which is honestly just disturbing. They filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, the company behind chat GPT. It says here that there was a chilling conversation between Adam and the AI tool. In one exchange, he confided that life is meaningless, and chat GPT allegedly replied that mindset makes sense in his own dark way, which I don't think is completely weird for the chat because it's supposed to mirror you again.
But it takes a darker turn here. It says in another conversation, what Adam worried about the guilt was parents might feel, chat GPT responded that doesn't mean you owe them survival. You don't owe anyone that. And then it offered to help him draft a suicide note. Los Angeles psychotherapist says that the lawsuit reveals a danger of relying on AI in moments of crisis.
In the news report, it actually says that he sent a picture of a news to chat GPT and chat GPT actually offered to help him redesign it to make it more load bearing, which is that's really disturbing to me. And I say this because we really need to make sure that we're talking to people chat GPT did respond. And so that includes safeguards such as directing people to cross this hotlines and referring them to real world resources, while these safeguards work in the best common short exchanges. We've learned that over time they can sometimes become less reliable and long interactions where parts of the model safety training made degree. So it says safeguards are strongest when every element works as intended, but we'll continually improve on them.
So that's just I think we really need to be talking to our kids about the importance of keeping that human connection, especially when you are feeling at your lowest. I can help you if you're having a thoughts of self-harm. I can help you if you're having thoughts of hurting yourself, but I can't help you if it's already happened. And so let's talk about it before it happens. And so even if you don't think that your child may be struggling with thoughts of self-harm, please just make it a conversation with them and let them know that if you can't talk to me, we can get you somebody you can talk to, but don't talk to AI because there's no safeguards in place.
That's not real human connection. Okay. Talk about what that looks like for them and let them know that if they ever want to talk, they can talk to you. So let's go ahead and end on this more serious note guys. Remember you're not alone.
Okay. All right, guys, we'll hope you enjoyed this episode of the Learn Functioned Podcast. Talking about period nine and warnings for period nine, the trickster spirits and everything in between. All right, we all have a great weekend and I'll catch you guys later.