Reading my past notes revealed the next expression—what I started doing with AI

"Wow, that's so cute! 💖"
My friends were full of praise.

I tried turning my icon into a Fuchiko-san style character using Gemini.

The prompt came from this note by Mato-san.

Nano Banana launches from Gemini and does it naturally.
It's amazing, isn't it? Before, I used to struggle with Adobe software, spending a huge amount of time trying to master it... Now, if I just "ask" in words, the output appears in an instant.

Furthermore, when I said "try animating this," Veo launched, and it was done in no time at all.

For me, there have been many times when I felt,
"I want to start something, but I just can't seem to move."
I've had those periods more than once.

An icon I started using amidst hesitation and anxiety.
I love photography. And I want to deliver my words and thoughts through my photos.
Is it okay for me to stay as I am? Sometimes that anxiety crosses my mind.
But no matter what happens, I always want my heart to be "sunny."

And above all, I want to encourage those who are carrying similar anxieties.

That is the feeling I've poured into it.
To think that icon could be animated so easily!
It really lifts my spirits.
My friends liked it too, which makes me even happier.

I love writing.
I also love taking photos.
But precisely because I love them, there were things I couldn't shape right away.
I want to release things only after they are properly polished.
After all, I'm the one who took two years to publish my Kindle book after finishing the 20,000-character manuscript.
I want to move only after it's in a form I can be satisfied with.
While I think that way, my unfinished notes and half-baked projects just keep piling up.

What I started doing with AI this spring wasn't a new hobby.
It's something smaller, but for me, it's a big step.

Having AI read through the notes I've written until now.
And trying to create the next expression from there.
Finding myself while brainstorming with AI.

The first thing I used was NotebookLM.

It had become tough to look back on my own note articles.
Previously, if I entered my name, Bunbun, and a keyword into the search bar, the articles would pop up, but as the number of articles increased and crossed the 1,000 mark, they stopped appearing.

Since I've written about things I love whenever I felt like it, my note articles are, in a sense, "scattered."
About photography. About outings. Interview articles of people I want to support.
About the confusion I felt after turning 50.
About the time that had stopped.
About finally being able to move forward.
Even though I think I remember each one, it's surprisingly difficult to line them all up and look at them as a whole.

When it comes to ourselves, we don't see things as clearly as we think we do.
Even if we think we've written about them, it's vague what we've been writing about repeatedly.
I get depressed feeling like I haven't made progress, or I end up counting only the things I couldn't do.

So, as a first step, I did a review last year. I put my past note articles into NotebookLM.
Because I wanted to analyze my past articles as data, not just through my own memory.

Then, clearer trends emerged than I had expected.

I provided the following input to NotebookLM.
1. Read this entire document and summarize the characteristics of my activities this year into three points.
Please base this on facts and refrain from emotional evaluation.
2. Tell me if there are any discrepancies between my behavioral tendencies as read from these records and the perceptions people generally tend to have when self-evaluating.
3. Tell me about the themes, actions, and interests that have appeared particularly repeatedly over the past year. Please explain them so that the frequency and trends are clear.
4. If there are any periods where activities seem low or stagnant,
please objectively analyze the characteristics and meaning of those periods.
5. Based on the records of this past year, organize which actions I should continue next year and which I might be better off stopping, including reasons.

This is what I tried at the end of last year.
What I learned from this is that AI also has its strengths and weaknesses.

At first, I only used ChatGPT, which I was accustomed to, but when I wanted to analyze my own note articles, NotebookLM was overwhelmingly easier to use.

I thought I was writing about something different every time.
But in reality, I was returning to the same places over and over.
Photos and words.
Movement and discovery.
Hesitation and recovery.
Tidying up.
And the small lights within everyday life.

Even though I thought to myself, 'My topics aren't fixed, they're scattered,' when I had AI look at them from the outside, there was a clear axis.
Moreover, that axis wasn't just a whim; it had appeared repeatedly over and over.

This was quite a major discovery for me.

When people are unsure about what to share, they tend to think, 'I don't have an axis yet.'
But it's not that it doesn't exist; sometimes it's just not visible.
NotebookLM laid it out and showed it to me.

And if I had stopped here, I would have been the same as before.
Nodding along, 'I see, I see,' and finishing there.
Satisfied with organizing it.
But this time, I didn't stop there.

Could I express this axis of mine that had become visible in a different form?
Beyond just text and photos, isn't there a form that conveys things more briefly and intuitively?

That's when I used Gemini next.

I threw whatever came to mind directly at Gemini.
What kind of worldview flows through my notes?
If I were to turn that atmosphere into a short video, what direction would fit?
If I were to replace what I had conveyed in words with visuals, what should I keep and what should I cut?

When I think alone, I get stuck immediately. Words come to mind, but when it comes to visuals, I stop.
When I move what is inside me to a different form of expression, I always get a little scared.
Is this right?
Will my 'self' disappear?
Will it just become something superficial?

Bouncing ideas off Gemini helped refine my questions.
What do I want to create?
What have I been drawn to?
What kind of atmosphere feels like a natural extension of my own expression?
As I put those into words one by one, what had been blurry began to take shape little by little.

From there, I also reached out to image creation.
While consulting with Gemini, I explored the visual direction with Nano Banana 2.
I wanted to first verify the atmosphere in my head as a still image.

An illustration I made for a photo course. This is from 'Daijo-bun!', an illustration I drew myself a long time ago.

Things that weren't visible when I was holding onto them only with words sometimes become suddenly clear when they become images.
Ah, so this is the kind of story I liked.
This is the kind of negative space I wanted to leave.
This is the kind of stillness I wanted to express.

Furthermore, beyond that, I can also create short videos using Veo.

When I was bouncing ideas off Gemini, it created this visual for me.

This was quite a new challenge for me.
I, who thought of myself as a person who writes, am now even making videos.
If it were the me from a little while ago, I surely would have shied away.
It looks difficult.
It takes a tremendous amount of time.
It's too early for me.
I'm still unprepared.
I would have lined up words like that and probably put it off.

But this time, I was able to think that it's fine if it's short, just try to give it a form.
Even if it's not perfect, try making it once.
Because I tried making it, I can also see what's missing.
I wanted to experience that feeling together with AI.

What I realized after actually trying it is that AI is not magic that creates works for you.
NotebookLM organized the themes that flowed through my past posts.
Gemini became a sounding board for thinking about my next steps.
Nano Banana 2 helped bring the atmosphere in my head closer to a visual form.
Veo became an entrance to video expression beyond that.

But no matter how far I go, the underlying experience is mine.
Going out to take photos.
Accumulating words over time.
Getting lost, stopping, and then reorganizing again.
What I felt there.
What I want to leave behind.
Deciding that is, after all, up to me.

That is why the biggest thing about this experience was not that AI gave me the correct answer.
It was that I felt I could start something new with what was already inside me.

Until now, I had partially thought of writing and photography as separate things.
But by having NotebookLM read my past notes, brainstorming with Gemini, and even trying out images and videos, I realized they are all connected.

What I learned with the help of AI was that while I thought I was searching for myself amidst my confusion, what I was really searching for was not "myself," but "what I want to convey" and "the means to convey it."

Perhaps what I really wanted to start was not the new technology itself.
It was not just talking about myself, but re-examining myself from multiple angles.
It was moving my expression forward.
It was moving beyond just writing or just photography, and advancing to the next form through a combination of both.
AI was a partner that took that first step with me.

Having it read the notes I have written until now.
Finding my own core from that.
And even creating a new form of expression like short videos.

This spring, what I started with AI is that kind of small, new fresh start.