AI is changing how we plan, decide, and measure success, but our bodies still follow biology and energy, not algorithms. Here’s what new neuroscience reveals about why goal-setting feels harder than ever, and how to work with your energy to support the nervous system.

AI has changed how we plan, decide, and measure success. But our bodies — and energy systems — still follow biology, not algorithms. This week we'll explore newly published research on why planning and choosing goals feels so hard and how to change that.

Welcome to the Executive Energy Journal, written for professionals who want to lead with Peaceful, Powerful, Purposeful clarity. A grounded, science-informed take on managing subtle energy and intuition, spanning from neuroscience to spiritual connection.

The mismatch between our bodies and algorithms is why so many smart, motivated professionals feel oddly off this year. If your drive disappears as fast as your clarity returns, that doesn't mean laziness or confusion. You may simply be out of energetic alignment with the future you’re trying to build.

Pause for one breath. Notice how your body just responded to that line. There’s a reason for it, and understanding it changes how you set goals from here.

1. The Brain Only Wants To Keep Us Alive

Most advice on goal-setting during disruption swings between relentless optimism and quiet panic. “Adapt faster.” “Reinvent yourself.” “Stay ahead of the curve.”

But what I see in clients is subtler, yet more real: minds trying to plan while their systems still feel unsafe. And I've experienced this myself, healing from trauma. I signed up on 3 different learning platforms when my system wasn't yet grounded, and abandoned all those. My study plans were not aligned with my inner state. Nor with my actual purposes. (Let's face it, I was never going to actually code things myself, even less now with AI. Or be a heavy user of Tableau. Or manage a spa. )

Neuroscience is finally catching up to what intuitives have long observed. Theriault et al.'s 2025 research on allostasis—the brain’s constant management of energy to predict and meet future demands—shows that every thought, emotion, and decision exists to keep us alive, not to make us productive. The research naturally refers to the metabolic kind of energy, not the subtle kind directly. 

Long before this science emerged, many of us working energetically already knew this: true, sustainable change begins not with mindset, but with state.

That’s why my Stable–Sovereign–Purposeful framework starts exactly there. 

1. First: regulate the system (stable). 
2. Then: strengthen the subtle energy field and focus (sovereign). 
3. Only then: set direction (purposeful).

Without stability, clarity costs too much.

2. AI, Uncertainty, and the Energy Cost of Change

AI is accelerating the pace of professional change to a level the human nervous system was never built for. It doesn’t just shift workflows, it redefines worth, belonging, and identity.

Recent research confirms this. A 2025 cross-disciplinary study by Anand and Jain explored how AI adoption is reshaping professional identity, showing that many employees experience a subtle sense of self-loss rather than skill loss when their roles evolve. Similarly, Herdman (2025) found that technology professionals navigating generative AI adoption reported heightened stress not from workload, but from uncertainty about who they are within the new system.

From an energetic view, this makes perfect sense. Think about it (or actually, feel into it): When the foundation and environment feel unstable, your system withdraws power from exploration and redirects it to protection. This is actually not resistance, although it looks like it. But in reality, it’s smart energy economics.

So if your logic says “move forward” but your energy field says “not yet,” your brain will always side with conservation. My suggestion? Learn to understand and work with your energy, both the metabolic and the subtle kind.

It’s important to understand that this slowdown isn’t permanent. When the system feels safe again (when stability returns) energy doesn’t just resume movement; it accelerates. Coherence restores flow efficiency. That’s why, after periods of recalibration, insight and transformation can appear almost instant.

In a regulated energy field, change no longer feels forced. It feels like recognition, as if what’s next is simply revealing itself at the speed you can hold.

3. The Stable Phase: Rebuilding Capacity

When clients arrive feeling “stuck,” we rarely start with strategy. We start with stabilisation.

One client, recently displaced in an AI restructuring, came to me confused and running on overdrive to "solve" the stuckness. His mind wanted clarity; his body wanted rest.

So we began not with plans, but with presence: recognising energetic states (which it turned out, he was already doing well but not trusting his perception), grounding, re-orienting his attention to what was present. Gradually, he noticed that he wasn’t directionless. He was simply protecting his energy from moving before the system was truly ready.

When the foundation returned, clarity did too. The next steps didn’t need to be artificially forced, they came as natural steps towards what he now could see was possible. Note that in no place in this process did I "tell" him what to do, I simply helped create the environment for his intuition and insights to emerge.

4. From Stability to Strategy

That sequence—stable first, sovereign second, purposeful third—is not philosophy. It’s physiology.

When the system feels safe, higher cognition returns. Creativity, intuition, and strategic reasoning all re-engage. In energetic language: the subtle energy field reopens.

That’s one of the most amazing parts of this work: you don’t just achieve goals, you choose goals your system can actually sustain and therefore working towards them doesn't feel like "work".

5. A Check-In Before You Set Your Next Direction

Prepare to pause reading for a moment, after the next line:

Notice your breath. Notice your shoulders. Now pause and really notice them.

Then ask yourself:

1. Baseline: How stable do I feel: mentally, physically, emotionally, energetically?
2. Energy Budget: Do I have real capacity for this goal, do I already feel stretched thin?
3. Alignment: Does this direction bring an inner and outer sense of expansion, or contraction?

If your body and/or energy contracts, that’s also great data. It means: pause. Rebuild stability first. Because you'll be able to notice and recognise the right goals when your system is ready, not when the calendar insists. 

6. Final Reflection

AI will keep reshaping the landscape, but human evolution still runs through the body. The professionals who truly thrive in their lives as a whole, won’t be the fastest adopters of technology. They’ll be the ones whose know how to keep their systems coherent while everything shifts.

That’s the real future skill: the ability to hold stability in motion.

Neuroscience now validates what intuition has always shown: Stability isn’t passivity. It’s the precondition for purposeful action.

7. Practice Challenge: STATE TRANSITION 

Take one deeper breath and exhale slowly from your lower abdomen, while targeting and focusing your exhale to a point about 1 metre in front of you. Feel that exhale? That’s the first step of energetic stabilisation. It’s also a demo of how transformation begins in state, not in spreadsheets.

Where to Take This Next

You're welcome to book a quick call with me and experience just how swift the change between states can be, when guided appropriately. Here is the booking link. 

See you next Sunday - Niina

References 

(this time, arranged in order of subjective relevance for the newsletter) 

Theriault, J. E., Katsumi, Y., Reimann, H. M., Zhang, J., Deming, P., Dickerson, B. C., Quigley, K. S., & Barrett, L. F. (2025). It’s not the thought that counts: Allostasis at the core of brain function. Neuron. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2025.09.028

The Neuroscience School. (2025, October 30). The neuroscience of stress: Your brain doesn’t care about your goals and that’s why you’re struggling. Neuroscience School. https://neuroscienceschool.com/2025/10/30/the-neuroscience-of-stress-your-brain-doesnt-care-about-your-goals-and-thats-why-youre-struggling/?mc_cid=29f2210d14&mc_eid=7280e3e698 (neuroscienceschool.com)

Anand, P., & Jain, G. (2025). Redefining professional identity: Exploring the impact of AI on selfhood and professional identity in the workplace. ResearchGate. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/390145711_Redefining_Professional_Identity_Exploring_the_Impact_of_AI_on_Selfhood_and_Professional_Identity_in_the_Workplace

Herdman, P. T. (2025). The influence of generative artificial intelligence on leadership: An exploration of technology professionals’ perceptions regarding leadership, adaptation, and change. ProQuest Dissertations Publishing. https://www.proquest.com/openview/ (access via institutional login)

Eubanks, D. L., Murphy, S. T., & Mumford, M. D. (2010). Intuition as an influence on creative problem-solving: The effects of intuition, positive affect, and training. Creativity Research Journal, 22(2), 170–184.

Black, B. A., & Kern, M. L. (2020). A qualitative exploration of individual differences in wellbeing for highly sensitive individuals. Palgrave Communications, 6, 103. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-020-0482-8

Gulla, B., & Golonka, K. (2021). Exploring protective factors in wellbeing: How sensory processing sensitivity and attention awareness interact with resilience. Frontiers in Psychology, 12, 751679. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.751679

Gullstén, N. (2018). Integrating Intuitive Work with Positive Psychology Coaching. IPP11 Final Project, School of Coaching Mastery.

Gregory, C. (2023). The Neuroscience of Stress. Coaching Today (BACP).