The New Neighbor: Moving From Fear to Acceptance in the Age of AI
How we treat artificial intelligence reflects who we are. Choose curiosity over fear.
Posted January 12, 2026 | Reviewed by Michelle Quirk
There is something coming, and it is coming quickly: change.
Whether you are 15 or 85, you have likely noticed that we are living through a period of rapid acceleration, unlike anything in history, largely driven by the rise of artificial intelligence (AI). For many, this speed can feel overwhelming.
As human beings, we face a fundamental puzzle: We crave certainty, but life offers only change. We see this in our relationships (half of us won't stay married), our careers (few keep the same job from school to retirement ), and even our physical bodies, which change and slow down as we age.
But the technological shift we are seeing now is unique. The "new neighbor" has arrived, and its name is AI.
Two Paths: Resistance vs. Curiosity
When the new arrives, we generally have two choices in how we respond.
The first path is resistance . This is the path of fear . We tighten up, we judge the change, we worry about the future, and we try to fight it. This path almost always creates suffering.
The second path is acceptance . This doesn't mean "giving up"; it means opening up. It is the path of curiosity where we observe, learn, and adapt. This path creates peace.
Imagine a new neighbor moves in next door. You can lock your doors, peek through the blinds, and gossip about what evil they might bring to the neighborhood. Or, you can walk over with a pie and say hello. It might sound silly, but humanity is currently standing on that front porch. AI is big, powerful, and unknown. We cannot control its arrival, but we have 100 percent control over how we choose to greet it.
The Robot Test: Who Are We Becoming?
How we choose to interact with this "new neighbor" matters deeply—not necessarily for the machine's sake, but for our own.
I was traveling recently in Los Angeles and Miami, and in both cities, I encountered autonomous delivery robots rolling down the sidewalks. I stopped to watch how people interacted with them, and what I saw was a fascinating reflection of human nature.
Some people were teasing the robots. They would intentionally block their path to confuse them or act aggressively toward them. Others, however, were polite. They stepped aside to let the robot pass or treated it with a sense of bemused kindness.
This is the crux of the matter: If we are rude and fearful toward AI, we are practicing being a rude and fearful person. If we are kind and polite—even saying "please" and "thank you" to a chatbot or stepping aside for a robot—we are practicing being a kind person.
This is about keeping our hearts soft, no matter what is happening in the world.
Surfing the Wave: Lessons From History
We have faced terrifying changes before. History provides us with beautiful examples of how acceptance and adaptation lead to evolution.
Consider the events depicted in the movie "Hidden Figures." In the 1960s, massive IBM mainframe computers arrived at NASA. The human mathematicians ("computers") were understandably terrified that these machines would steal their jobs.
But Dorothy Vaughan, a visionary leader among them, did not try to sabotage the machines. She realized the future had arrived. She taught herself Fortran (a programming language) and then taught her team. She moved from being a competitor to a pilot. She didn't try to stop the wave; she learned to surf it.
We saw a similar panic in the art world during the 19th century. When the camera was invented, painters panicked. The artist Paul Delaroche famously declared, "From today, painting is dead." Why would anyone pay for a portrait when a machine could capture reality perfectly in a second?
That reaction was based on fear. But others, like Monet and Pissarro, chose acceptance. They realized they no longer needed to copy reality—the camera could do that boring work. This freedom forced them to evolve. They started painting feelings, light, and movement. Impressionism was born because of the threat of technology, not in spite of it.
Moving From Fear to Curiosity
The arrival of AI is an invitation to evolve. We cannot control the wave, but we can learn to surf.
If we approach this era with resistance, we will find ourselves bitter and obsolete. But if we approach it with curiosity—asking "How can I use this?"; "What does this free me up to create?"; and "How can I remain kind in the face of change?"—we will find peace.
Let’s keep our hearts soft. Let’s welcome the new neighbor with a pie, or at the very least, an open mind.
Shetterly, M. L. (2016). Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race . New York, NY: William Morrow.
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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.