The Sacred Ache of Inadequacy
Let me be honest with you. There's a strange moment happening in our world—where the tools we’ve created – the technologies and artificial intelligences we once imagined as helpers – are starting to look a lot like replacements. And it’s not just about jobs or art or liturgies. It’s about something deeper, more personal. It’s about what it means to be human when a machine can do what we once thought made us... us.
This month on Prepared to Drown, our conversation took us deep into the waters of artificial intelligence—not just its capabilities, but its implications. We talked about art and poetry, history and theology, memory and love. But underneath it all, a current kept pulling at me, a theme that felt far more intimate than technological: our deep, often quiet, struggle with feeling like we're not enough.
Because that’s what all this advancement does, doesn’t it? It offers perfection—or at least the illusion of it. The perfect essay, the flawless image, the eloquent prayer. And in doing so, it shines a harsh light on our own rough edges; our spelling mistakes, our messy syntax, our inability to remember the right quote at the right time, our emotions that sometimes get the better of us. It whispers, “You could be better.” And in some cases, much louder than a whisper, we hear: “You’re not enough.”
We already live in a world that thrives on that whisper. Social media rewards the curated and punishes the vulnerable. Workplaces value output more than presence. And now, a machine sits beside us, not needing sleep, not fumbling over its words, not questioning its worth.
But here’s the thing: to be human is to be unfinished. It is to trip over your shoelaces and to write terrible first drafts. It is to love imperfectly, to say the wrong thing, and to cry in places that aren’t meant for crying. It is to feel regret and shame and hope and longing—all the things that no machine will ever truly understand.
And yet, those are the very places where the divine so often meets us.
Joanne said it best when she reminded us that the truly human moment is the truly sacred moment. That it's not the perfect prayer or the flawless liturgy that connects us to God, but the fragile moment of standing in a room with others, heart broken open, uncertain, but still showing up.
So let’s say this clearly: you are not inadequate because a machine can outpace your productivity. You are not falling behind because your art is less polished or your words less smooth. You are not less valuable because your story is full of false starts and blank pages.
In fact, that’s what makes you holy.
In case no one has told you lately: your worth is not tied to the shame, the fear, or the impossible expectations that others—or algorithms—have placed on you. You are beautiful. You are beloved.
Just as you are.
So maybe we use these tools, and maybe we don’t. Maybe we experiment, because to be human is to be curious. But let’s not hand over the sacred ache of being human. Let’s not forget that the goal of life is not perfection, but presence. Not efficiency, but relationship. Not being better than others, but being authentic with one another.
Because the only thing more powerful than artificial intelligence is the real, raw, resilient grace that lives inside us— even in our imperfection – and that’s the unprogrammable divinity of humanity I hope we never let go of.