How Paranoid Are We Now?

AI came in with a blaze of light, thrilling users who suddenly saw a faster way to create content, build spreadsheets, develop business plans, make PowerPoints and tackle admin work that used to take hours. Sometimes it let us do all of that with a little less thinking, too.

Then came the backlash. AI is destroying how we think. It’s killing creativity and making everything sound the same.

I disagree.

AI is a tool, and much like any tool, what you get from it depends on how you use it.

For me, AI is my friendly editor. It gives me fabulous headline ideas that I almost always combine and massage into something else. It points out where my content falls short, and I’ve specifically told it not to give me the words to fix those weak spots. I want to do that myself.

Has AI made me faster? Absolutely, but in many cases, it has also made me more deliberate and thoughtful about what I write. I’m actually glad the backlash happened because maybe it will make all of us think harder about how we're using AI rather than simply letting it do the thinking for us.

Some people may decide to go back to doing things the old-fashioned way. That’s fine.

The rest of us will keep learning how to use the tool better, while making sure the thinking, creativity, opinions and voice remain decidedly our own.

AI doesn’t have to replace your thinking. Used well, it can challenge you to think better.