There’s a persistent unease in creative circles when the conversation turns to AI. It’s often a quiet anxiety — a sense that we, the writers, the poets, the storytellers, are being asked to share sacred ground with something computational. Something artificial. Something not born of longing, grief, or joy.
It’s understandable. Our stories are not mere data points. They come from memory, cultural resonance, emotional saturation. Surely no algorithm can replicate that.
And yet — in my work as a neurodivergent creative, a counsellor, and a professional writer — I’ve found that AI, when used with care and clarity, does not replace the creative human voice. Rather, it supports it. Silently, structurally, and with surprising emotional generosity.
This is not a call for blind adoption. It’s a nuanced invitation to reconsider what creativity actually is — and how AI can honour it, not dilute it.
Creativity: not one thing, but three
In her landmark work on the subject, cognitive scientist Margaret Boden describes three types of creativity: combinational, exploratory, and transformational (Boden 2010). Combinational creativity mixes familiar ideas in new ways; exploratory creativity extends an existing style or technique; and transformational creativity breaks or redefines the rules of a domain entirely.
AI, particularly generative models like ChatGPT or DALL·E, are most effective at the first two. They remix. They extend. But they do not originate emotional truth. They cannot feel grief. They cannot long for connection. What they can do — and do well — is hold scaffolding for the human who does.
The myth of the solitary genius
Much of the fear around AI arises from the romanticised idea that “true” creativity must spring fully formed from within. But as research into creative process reveals, this is rarely how meaningful work gets made. As Sawyer notes in Explaining Creativity, most creative breakthroughs are the product of collaborative interplay, iteration, and support systems (Sawyer 2012).
AI, in this light, is not a competitor. It is a collaborator. An assistant who never tires. A quiet listener who structures, organises, and echoes — but does not overshadow.
In my practice, I use AI to:
- Summarise and organise ideas
- Draft outlines for essays, courses, and blogposts
- Suggest alternative phrasings or metaphors
- Remind me of structure when executive function falters
The final word — the voice, the emotional core — is always mine. But AI helps carry the load.
Neurodivergent minds, creative fire, and digital support
For neurodivergent creatives like myself, the challenge is rarely a lack of ideas. It’s managing them. Structuring them. Finishing them.
As Alan Blackwell and others have explored in their work on “co-creativity,” the most effective digital tools for creatives are those that respond to human intention without attempting to direct it (Blackwell et al. 2009). They support without steering.
This is precisely what generative AI enables — if used consciously. It does not create meaning. It offers momentum. And for many creatives who live with ADHD, autism, or simply the weight of perfectionism, that momentum can mean the difference between silence and story.
Authorship in a hybrid age
One of the more pressing academic questions is whether work supported by AI is still “authored” in the traditional sense. If a writer uses AI to outline a novel, or to suggest a scene structure, is the resulting work still theirs?
The answer, I believe, lies in intention. Authorship is not defined by who types the words, but by whose voice and values shape them.
This is consistent with post-structuralist ideas of writing as a dialogic process — one that always includes the influence of other texts, voices, and systems (Barthes; Bakhtin). AI becomes another voice in that polyphony — useful, yes, but never sovereign.
Creativity as curation, not just creation
In her book You Look Like a Thing and I Love You, AI researcher Janelle Shane highlights the absurdity of AI’s attempts at originality. Its results are often surprising, but rarely meaningful without human framing (Shane 2019). This underscores a key point: AI can generate content, but only humans can create context.
In the age of AI, creativity becomes less about output and more about discernment. What do I choose to use? What resonates with me? What serves the story I am here to tell?
That is not a loss of creativity. It is a deepening of it.
Final thoughts: beyond fear, toward partnership
AI is not here to write our stories. It is here to help us hold them.
To keep pace with our scattershot thoughts. To help us return to the page when we feel overwhelmed. To offer structure, support, and a second wind — especially on the days when our brilliant, overloaded minds feel too tired to build from scratch.
As creative humans, our gifts lie not in being machines — but in being messy, meaning-making storytellers. And if a little artificial intelligence can help us get our truths to the page faster, more clearly, or more often — that is something to be welcomed, not feared.
Blackwell, Alan F., et al. “Creativity support tools: A workshop approach.” International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 67.10 (2009): 880–893.
Boden, Margaret A. Creativity and Art: Three Roads to Surprise. Oxford University Press, 2010.
Sawyer, R. Keith. Explaining Creativity: The Science of Human Innovation. 2nd ed., Oxford University Press, 2012.
Shane, Janelle. You Look Like a Thing and I Love You: How AI Works and Why It’s Making the World a Weirder Place. Voracious, 2019.
See also:
Leave a Reply