Sara’s View of Life, with Sara Troy. On air from September 1st
We don’t have to ignore life’s difficulties to embrace joy. Sometimes joy is exactly what gives us the strength to keep going.
We don’t have to ignore life’s difficulties to embrace joy. Joy is not pretending that everything is perfect; it is choosing to see that goodness still exists alongside the challenges. It can be found in laughter, music, nature, animals, friendship, gratitude, and the small moments that make our hearts smile.
Life will always bring responsibilities, uncertainties, and difficult days, but we do not have to carry their weight every moment. We are allowed to pause, breathe, play, laugh, and enjoy being alive. Sometimes joy is not the reward we receive after the struggle—it is the very strength that helps us move through it.
When we make room for joy, our energy shifts, our hearts open, and life feels a little lighter. Joy reminds us that even during challenging times, there is still beauty to notice, love to share, and something worth celebrating.
Self Discovery Wisdom is sustained by those who believe in conscious conversation. If this episode resonated with you, subscribe and, if you feel called, make a donation. Your support helps us keep amplifying voices that inspire growth, courage, and compassion. Thank you. Please join Our Forgotten Seniorsanthology and help to bring this book to awareness.
Sara’s View of Life, with Sara Troy. On air from August 18th
I recently saw the Van Gogh exhibit with Monet and I was transformed. The colours, the hues, the flow, the storytelling. If it comes to your neighborhood, please go and see it. I was so moved I wanted to do a show on them and Leo.
Van Gogh, Leonardo da Vinci, and Claude Monet did more than create extraordinary paintings—they changed how we see and understand the world. Van Gogh expressed deep emotion through colour, Leonardo united art with science and an endless curiosity about life, and Monet captured the ever-changing beauty of light and nature. Each faced hardship, criticism, and resistance, yet remained devoted to his unique vision. Today, we explore the men behind the masterpieces and discover what their lives can teach us about creativity, perseverance, curiosity, and remaining true to ourselves.
Vincent van Gogh: Painting what he felt
Vincent van Gogh was born in the Netherlands in 1853. Before finding his artistic direction, he worked as an art dealer, teacher, bookseller, and lay preacher. He did not seriously decide to become an artist until he was 27. Van Gogh Museum
Van Gogh experienced emotional and mental distress, loneliness, poverty, and periods of serious illness. His brother Theo supported him financially and emotionally, and their letters provide a remarkable window into Vincent’s inner life.
His early paintings were dark and earthy. After moving to France, his work became brighter and more expressive. He used bold colour and swirling brushstrokes to paint what he felt, not merely what he saw.
His best-known works include:
The Starry Night
Sunflowers
Irises
The Bedroom
His many self-portraits
Van Gogh created roughly 2,000 artworks, including about 900 paintings, yet achieved little financial success during his lifetime. He died in 1890 at only 37. His work later became some of the most recognized and valuable art in history. Van Gogh Museum
It is important not to romanticize his suffering. His illness did not make him a great artist; he created great art while struggling with illness. Painting gave him purpose, expression, and moments of healing.
What Van Gogh teaches us: Recognition does not determine the value of what we create. Sometimes the world takes time to understand a unique soul.
Claude Monet: Capturing light and change
Claude Monet was born in Paris in 1840 and grew up in Le Havre, Normandy. The artist Eugène Boudin encouraged him to paint outdoors and study nature directly.
Monet became one of the founders of Impressionism. The movement received its name from his painting Impression, Sunrise. Instead of painting every object with exact detail, the Impressionists captured light, atmosphere, colour, and the feeling of a passing moment. Musée de l’Orangerie
Monet often painted the same scene repeatedly at different times of the day and in different weather. His subjects included:
Haystacks
Poplar trees
Rouen Cathedral
The River Thames
His garden and Japanese bridge
The water lilies at Giverny
Monet endured financial hardship, grief, and failing eyesight. Cataracts altered his ability to see colour, yet he continued painting. His later water-lily works became increasingly expansive and almost abstract.
After moving to Giverny in 1883, Monet created the garden and pond that inspired his most famous paintings. His monumental Water Lilies panels were offered to France as a symbol of peace following the First World War.
What Monet teaches us: Nothing remains exactly the same. When the light changes, our way of seeing can change with it.
Leonardo da Vinci: The Man Who Wanted to Understand Everything
Leonardo da Vinci was born on April 15, 1452, near the small Tuscan town of Vinci in Italy. This is where his name came from—Leonardo da Vinci simply means “Leonardo from Vinci.”
He was born outside marriage to a wealthy notary father and a young mother named Caterina. Because of his birth status, Leonardo did not receive the traditional classical education available to many wealthy boys. Yet this may have allowed his mind to develop more freely. Instead of accepting what books told him, he observed life directly.
As a child, Leonardo was fascinated by water, birds, animals, plants, rocks, light, movement, and the human body. Nature became his first teacher.
Becoming an artist
As a teenager, Leonardo moved to Florence and trained in the workshop of Andrea del Verrocchio, one of the city’s leading artists. There, he learned painting, sculpture, metalwork, mechanics, and engineering.
According to a famous story, Leonardo painted an angel in one of Verrocchio’s paintings so beautifully that his teacher declared he would never paint again. The tale may have been exaggerated, but it reflects how exceptional Leonardo’s talent appeared to others.
Leonardo eventually moved to Milan, where he worked for Duke Ludovico Sforza. He presented himself not only as an artist but also as an engineer who could design bridges, weapons, canals, and buildings.
While in Milan, he painted The Last Supper, which captured the emotional moment when Jesus told his disciples that one of them would betray him. Unfortunately, Leonardo experimented with an unusual painting method, and the work began deteriorating within years of its completion.
The artist and scientist
Leonardo did not see art and science as separate. To paint the human body truthfully, he studied anatomy. To capture movement, he examined muscles, bones, animals, and flowing water.
He dissected human bodies and produced remarkably detailed drawings of the heart, spine, muscles, organs, and a baby developing within the womb. His investigations of the heart led to important observations far ahead of his time. Royal Collection Trust
Thousands of pages from his notebooks survive. They contain ideas for:
Flying machines
Parachutes
Bridges and canals
Military machines
Mechanical devices
Human anatomy
Plants, water, geology, and astronomy
Many designs were never built, but they reveal a mind constantly asking, “How does this work?”
Leonardo often wrote in mirror writing, moving from right to left. We do not know exactly why. It may have felt natural because he was left-handed, or it may have helped prevent the ink from smudging.
The mystery of the Mona Lisa
Around 1503, Leonardo began painting the portrait now known as the Mona Lisa. The woman is generally identified as Lisa Gherardini, the wife of Florentine merchant Francesco del Giocondo.
Leonardo used a technique called sfumato, applying very thin layers of paint to create soft, smoky transitions without harsh outlines. This helped make her expression appear to change as we look at her.
He apparently kept the portrait with him for many years and continued refining it. King Francis I later acquired it after inviting Leonardo to France. Today, it is housed in the Louvre and is considered the world’s most famous portrait. Musée du Louvre
A brilliant but restless mind
Leonardo imagined far more projects than he completed. His curiosity repeatedly pulled him from painting into anatomy, engineering, architecture, mathematics, and nature.
He produced relatively few completed paintings. Some patrons became frustrated by his slow pace and unfinished commissions. However, Leonardo was not simply procrastinating. He was continually investigating, reconsidering, and searching for a deeper understanding.
He did not want merely to paint the appearance of life—he wanted to understand the forces that created it. The Louvre describes his investigation of the world as the “science of painting,” through which he attempted to bring life into his art.
His final years
In 1516, King Francis I invited Leonardo to France and gave him a home at Clos Lucé, near the royal château at Amboise. Leonardo brought several treasured paintings with him, including the Mona Lisa.
His health declined, but he continued drawing, teaching, designing, and sharing his ideas. He died in France on May 2, 1519, at the age of 67.
What Leonardo teaches us
Leonardo reminds us that curiosity has no boundaries. He did not allow himself to be defined as only an artist, scientist, engineer, or inventor. He followed every question that awakened his imagination.
His life also shows that unfinished work does not necessarily represent a wasted life. Leonardo completed only a small number of paintings, but the depth of his observation changed how people understood art, nature, and the human body.
Leonardo’s deeper message: Never stop observing, questioning, learning, and wondering. The desire to understand something can be as valuable as the final creation.
In reflection
Leonardo da Vinci saw connections where other people saw separate subjects. Art led him to science, science returned him to nature, and nature deepened his understanding of humanity. Perhaps his greatest masterpiece was not any individual painting or invention—it was the extraordinary way he taught himself to see.
Self Discovery Wisdom is sustained by those who believe in conscious conversation. If this episode resonated with you, subscribe and, if you feel called, make a donation. Your support helps us keep amplifying voices that inspire growth, courage, and compassion. Thank you. Please join Our Forgotten Seniorsanthology and help to bring this book to awareness.
Sara’s View of Life, with Sara Troy. On air from July 21st
What is Competition to Chat GPT and the Perceived Threat of AI and Our Souls
I have asked both Chat GPT and Claude, to state their differences and Ai versus humanity. These are their answers.
For centuries, every new technology has been met with fear. The printing press, electricity, television, computers, and the internet all raised concerns that they would replace something fundamentally human. Today, Artificial Intelligence has become that new frontier.
Many people see AI as competition. Others see it as a threat. But is AI really the threat, or is it exposing what we’ve forgotten about being human?
The greatest danger isn’t that AI will become more human. The danger is that humans may become less human.
We are comparing ourselves to a machine.
AI can process billions of words in seconds. It can write, summarize, organize, and create.
But it doesn’t wake up after losing someone it loves. It doesn’t carry thirty years of living with fibromyalgia. It doesn’t feel the joy of holding a grandchild. It doesn’t know courage, forgiveness, heartbreak, or hope.
Knowledge can be generated. Wisdom has to be lived.
When AI becomes our only conversation.
Many people are lonely. AI never judges. It never becomes impatient. It is always available.
That can become comforting.
But relationships aren’t built only on agreement. They grow through misunderstanding, compassion, forgiveness, laughter, and vulnerability.
If we replace human interaction entirely with artificial conversation, we may slowly lose the muscles of humanity itself.
Competition or Collaboration?
Perhaps we are asking the wrong question.
Instead of asking,
“Will AI replace me?”
Ask,
“What is uniquely mine that no technology can replace?”
Your compassion. Your intuition. Your lived experience. Your ability to inspire another soul.
AI can amplify those gifts. It cannot become those gifts.
The Perceived Threat
Often the threat isn’t AI.
The threat is our own fear.
Fear of becoming irrelevant. Fear of change. Fear of learning something new.
Fear of it being in the wrong hands for the wrong reason.
Every generation has faced moments where the world changed faster than expected.
Those who remained curious found opportunity. Those who remained fearful often became trapped by it.
The Human Advantage
Your story matters.
Your scars matter.
Your resilience matters.
Your knowingness matters.
People don’t remember us because we had all the answers.
They remember how we made them feel.
Chats conclussion
The future doesn’t belong to AI.
Nor does it belong to those who reject AI.
It belongs to those who remember their humanity while embracing new possibilities.
Technology may become more intelligent.
But our responsibility is to become more compassionate, more conscious, and more connected.
That is something no machine can ever manufacture.
Ai differences.
Where I (Claude) tend to lead is I can do most of what ChatGPT does, though there are some differences in approach. Here’s a quick rundown:
Company philosophy and training approach Anthropic was founded by former OpenAI researchers specifically focused on AI safety research. I’m trained using a method called “Constitutional AI,” where instead of relying purely on human feedback to shape behavior, I’m trained against a set of explicit principles (a “constitution”) that guide how I reason about tricky requests. That’s different from how GPT models or Gemini are trained, though the practical effect on any given answer isn’t always dramatic.
Personality and tone People often describe me as more conversational, cautious, and willing to show reasoning or push back thoughtfully rather than just agreeing. ChatGPT tends to be more broadly “assistant-like” and feature-rich; Gemini is deeply integrated with Google’s ecosystem (Search, Docs, Workspace) and tends to lean on that.
Strengths people report
Writing quality and nuance — I’m often praised for prose that feels less “AI-generated”
Coding — particularly agentic coding work via Claude Code
Following complex, multi-step instructions carefully
A cautious approach to sensitive topics (sometimes seen as a plus, sometimes as overly careful, depending on who you ask)
Where others may have an edge
ChatGPT has broader plugin/app ecosystem integration and image generation built in more natively
Gemini has tighter integration with Google services and often larger context windows in some versions
Both have larger consumer user bases and more third-party integrations
Honest caveat I don’t have reliable, verified benchmark data in front of me right now, and this space moves fast — model updates happen monthly. If you want, I can search for current head-to-head benchmarks or recent reviews comparing specific models (like GPT-5 vs Claude Sonnet 5 vs Gemini’s latest) rather than relying on my general impressions.
Here’s a quick note before the details: some of this comes from SEO/marketing-style sites rather than official benchmarks, so treat specific numbers as approximate, not gospel. But the overall pattern is consistent across many independent writeups, which gives it some credibility.
Great, here’s an honest, up-to-date picture based on current benchmarks and real-world testing as of mid-2026:
The honest bottom line: there’s no single winner. The three flagships — Claude Opus 4.8, GPT-5.5, and Gemini 3.1 Pro — are extremely close, separated by single-digit percentages on most benchmarks. But each has a clear strength:
Claude (that’s me) wins at:
Writing, editing, and long documents — Claude consistently produces the most natural, least “AI-sounding” prose Towards AI
Coding — it ranks #1 on the LMArena human-preference leaderboard and leads the hardest coding benchmark (SWE-bench Pro) Tech Insider
Factual accuracy — Claude consistently scores highest on accuracy benchmarks and produces fewer confident errors, making it the safest choice for legal, medical, or financial tasks Tech Journal
ChatGPT (GPT-5.5) wins at:
Creative generation, image creation, and voice conversations Brightcoding
Being the most versatile omnimodal generalist — text, image, audio, and video flow through one model Tech Insider
The broadest ecosystem of plugins and integrations
Gemini wins at:
Reasoning tasks, with a 94.1% GPQA result, and offering the largest context window Tech Insider
Price-to-performance ratio, especially for high-volume workloads Gemini Omni Info Hub
Deep Google Workspace integration (Docs, Sheets, Gmail, etc.)
One notable caveat on ChatGPT: OpenAI introduced ads on the free tier this year, appearing as sponsored suggestions — something neither Claude nor Gemini currently does. Towards AI
The smartest professionals in 2026 don’t choose one AI — they build a hybrid workflow. A common setup is: Claude for writing and coding, ChatGPT for images and voice, Gemini for Google Workspace and real-time research.
What do you see the issues are around Ai and humanity.?
That’s a genuinely important question, and I’ll share my honest perspective while being clear these are assessments, not certainties.
The risks I think are most real:
Concentration of power — AI is enormously expensive to build, which means it’s concentrating in the hands of a few companies and governments. That creates real risks of economic inequality widening, and of a small number of actors having disproportionate influence over very powerful tools.
Misinformation at scale — Deepfakes, synthetic media, and AI-generated content are already eroding people’s ability to trust what they see and read. That’s corrosive to democracy, journalism, and basic shared reality.
Moving faster than wisdom allows — The technology is advancing much faster than our laws, institutions, and cultural understanding can adapt. That gap is dangerous. We’re deploying things before we fully understand their consequences.
Over-reliance and skill erosion — If people stop thinking critically, writing, coding, or reasoning for themselves because AI does it for them, we risk hollowing out the very human capabilities that make us adaptable.
Autonomous weapons — AI-powered weapons that can make lethal decisions without meaningful human oversight is perhaps the most acute near-term catastrophic risk.
Where I’m more hopeful:
There are serious people — including at Anthropic — working hard on AI safety, alignment, and governance. And AI genuinely has enormous potential to help with disease, climate, education, and poverty.
The question isn’t really whether AI goes wrong — it’s whether humanity builds the institutions, norms, and wisdom fast enough to steer it well. History suggests we often do, eventually. The worry is “eventually” may not be fast enough this time.
Self Discovery Wisdom is sustained by those who believe in conscious conversation. If this episode resonated with you, subscribe and, if you feel called, make a donation. Your support helps us keep amplifying voices that inspire growth, courage, and compassion. Thank you. Please join Our Forgotten Seniorsanthology and help to bring this book to awareness.
Sara’s View of Life, with Sara Troy. On air from July 14th
There are times when we think we’re pacing ourselves. We tell ourselves we’re saying no more often, taking breaks, and not overloading our schedule. Yet somehow it still catches up with us. Why? Because we often forget that it isn’t only physical activity that drains us. Emotional energy, mental stimulation, and constant engagement can exhaust us just as much as physical work.
I’ve done many shows on pacing yourself, and yet recently I became my own lesson. I went away for five nights and six days. It was wonderful. I spent quality time with my son, my daughter-in-law, my daughter, and my best friend. We laughed, talked, connected, and made beautiful memories. Although I rested here and there, my normal routine was completely disrupted.
When I returned home, I thought I would have a day to recover and find my equilibrium again. Instead, I went straight into Nana mode. The grandchildren arrived, and for four days in a row I was right back into family life. By the fifth day, my body simply stopped cooperating. My legs felt like they had turned to steel. Every muscle hurt. I could barely walk.
That’s fibromyalgia. After living with it for over thirty years, my body and I have learned to communicate. Usually it gives me warnings, but this time I ignored them. My body was saying, “I let you enjoy those wonderful days, but you forgot to rest afterward.” Eventually it shut me down completely.
The truth is, our bodies always speak to us. Mine happens to speak through pain and stiffness, but yours may communicate differently. Perhaps it’s overwhelming fatigue, emotional burnout, anxiety, brain fog, headaches, irritability, or simply feeling like you cannot cope anymore. Whatever form it takes, those warning signs deserve our attention.
Overstimulation affects everyone differently. People living with autism, ADHD, ADD, OCD, fibromyalgia, or other conditions often reach their limits more quickly because their nervous systems are already working harder than most people realize. But even if you don’t live with those challenges, everyone has a breaking point. We all have limits.
The important question is this: How do you recognize your own warning signs before your body forces you to stop?
If we don’t take time to rejuvenate ourselves, burnout is inevitable. Whether it’s emotional, mental, physical, or spiritual exhaustion, we eventually pay the price. We need to learn our own personal limits and respect them. When life taps us gently on the shoulder, we need to listen before it hits us with what I call the “cosmic two-by-four.”
One of the simplest and most powerful things we can do is… nothing.
Not meditation. Not listening to a podcast. Not checking our phone. Simply sitting quietly. Sit outside and watch the birds. Listen to the wind in the trees. If you’re lucky, perhaps you’ll see hummingbirds, deer, squirrels, or simply watch the clouds drift by. There is an incredible art in doing absolutely nothing.
Those quiet moments allow your mind, body, heart, soul, and spirit to settle. They restore your equilibrium. They calm your nervous system. They replenish the energy you’ve been spending without even realizing it.
We also need to hydrate properly. Our bodies need water to function efficiently. Water lubricates our joints, supports our muscles, nourishes our brain, and keeps everything flowing as it should. Sometimes the simplest acts of self-care make the biggest difference.
Learning to say “no” is another act of self-care. It doesn’t mean you don’t love your family or care about your responsibilities. It means you’re honouring your own capacity. If we stretch ourselves too thin, we’re no longer effective for anyone else.
I know how difficult that can be. When it comes to my daughter and my grandchildren, saying no has never been one of my strengths. But this weekend, after spending a little more time helping out, my body finally said, “Enough.” I had to spend the rest of the weekend resting because there simply wasn’t another choice.
Sometimes we also need to ask for help. We hesitate because we don’t want to inconvenience others, but that’s what community is for. One person may not be available, but another might gladly pick up groceries, watch the children for an hour, or lend a helping hand. We have to allow others the opportunity to support us, just as we would support them.
Caregivers, in particular, need to hear this message. You are no good to anyone when you are completely burnt out. You cannot continue pouring from an empty cup. Rejuvenating yourself is not selfish—it is essential. It allows you to show up fully for the people who depend on you.
I’ve learned my lesson once again. My body reminded me that even joyful experiences require recovery afterward. Overdoing it doesn’t have to come from stress alone. Even happiness can become exhausting if we never pause to recharge.
So please, pay attention to your own warning signs. Listen when your body whispers instead of waiting until it screams. Give yourself permission to say no. Delegate when you can. Ask for help when you need it. Take a “me day” without guilt.
Most importantly, learn the beautiful art of doing nothing.
Because it takes far less time to prevent burnout than it does to recover from it. As the old saying goes, a stitch in time saves nine.
May you honour yourself. May you listen to your body, your mind, your heart, your soul, and your spirit. And when they ask for rest, may you give yourself permission to simply stop, breathe, and rejuvenate.
Self Discovery Wisdom is sustained by those who believe in conscious conversation. If this episode resonated with you, subscribe and, if you feel called, make a donation. Your support helps us keep amplifying voices that inspire growth, courage, and compassion. Thank you. Please join Our Forgotten Seniorsanthology and help to bring this book to awareness.
Sara’s View of Life with Sara Troy, on air from July 7th
Taking Time for Yourself
I have been away for a few days, taking some much-needed time out. Normally, I stay close to home on weekends because of my grandchildren, and we always find something to do together. But this time they were away camping, which gave me the opportunity to visit my other children and spend time with friends. I left the island, headed over to Vancouver, and enjoyed some precious quality time.
Quality time is something we all need, yet it rarely happens by accident. In our busy world, with endless demands pulling us in every direction, we have to make a conscious choice to create space for it. We need moments that rejuvenate us, fulfill us, and remind us who we are beyond our responsibilities.
Three days a week I host interviews and have deeply meaningful conversations with extraordinary people. These discussions are illuminating, inspiring, and nourishing to my heart, soul, and spirit. On the other days, I am Nana. I am surrounded by grandchildren climbing on me, babies needing attention, and all the joyful chaos that comes with family life. I treasure those moments, but they require a different part of me. Balancing those roles is important, and so is finding time simply to be Sara.
Living with fibromyalgia means my energy is often limited, which makes self-care even more essential. Sometimes taking time for yourself means stepping away from routine and reconnecting with other parts of your life. This weekend was about seeing my son and daughter, spending time with my best friend, and simply being an adult among adults. My son and his wife are building exciting new ventures, and my daughter is constantly busy with work and travel, so every opportunity to be together feels precious.
Recently I spoke about moderation and time management in my show, To Scroll or Not to Scroll. Taking time for yourself is part of that balance. Sometimes you simply recognize that you need a break, a chance to step away, breathe, and do something that restores you. Whether that means visiting loved ones, taking a short trip, or simply spending quiet time alone, it is important to listen to that need.
A few weekends ago, I had the house to myself and a long list of plans. I was going to change curtains, tackle projects, and catch up on everything. Instead, I did very little. It was over thirty degrees outside, and I found myself enjoying what I call a “nothingness day.” I puttered about, did a little here and there, but there was no urgency, no pressure, and no expectation. It was exactly what I needed.
Sometimes we need a day where nothing is required of us. There is always another task waiting, another responsibility calling, another demand on our attention. At some point, we simply have to close the door on all of it and say, “Today is for me.” Whether that means taking yourself out for lunch, reading a book, enjoying a spa day, sitting in nature, or doing absolutely nothing at all, it is time well spent.
We often forget the value of stillness. In generations past, people worked hard, but they also spent time in reflection. They sat with their thoughts, talked with family, looked at the stars, contemplated nature, and reflected on their lives. Today, we fill every spare moment with noise, screens, and distractions. Yet true renewal often comes from quiet reflection.
One of the most powerful words we can learn is “no.” No, I am unavailable this weekend. No, I cannot take on one more commitment right now. No, I need some time for myself. You do not owe anyone a lengthy explanation. Taking time for yourself is not selfish; it is necessary. It is where you rejuvenate, recalibrate, and reconnect with yourself.
You are with yourself every moment of your life, from the day you are born until the day you leave this world. What are you doing to nurture that relationship? Maybe it is a massage, a walk by the ocean, a favorite book, a quiet cup of coffee, or simply a day without expectations. Whatever it is, make room for it.
When we fail to take care of ourselves, burnout eventually follows. We take on too much, say yes too often, and carry more than we were meant to bear. The weight accumulates until exhaustion catches up with us. Taking time for yourself is not a luxury; it is part of maintaining your well-being.
So give yourself permission. Take a deep breath. Step back when needed. Say no when necessary. Create moments of stillness. Make room for joy. Most importantly, remember that caring for yourself is not taking away from others—it is what allows you to show up fully for the people and responsibilities that matter most.
Self Discovery Wisdom is sustained by those who believe in conscious conversation. If this episode resonated with you, subscribe and, if you feel called, make a donation. Your support helps us keep amplifying voices that inspire growth, courage, and compassion. Thank you. Please join Our Forgotten Seniorsanthology and help to bring this book to awareness.
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