Latest / RHYTHMS OF REST℠ Leadership Podcast / Episode 7: Why I Refuse to Let AI Write My Newsletter — Even When I'm Drowning
Transcript
- Kent Murawski: You don't need balance. You need the right rhythms, much like a heart where all four chambers work together. Real success, sustainable success depends on four key rhythms working in harmony, relational, emotional, spiritual, meaning your purpose beyond your achievement and then tangible rhythms. I'm your host Kent Morosky and welcome to the rhythms of rest leadership podcast where we build the right rhythms for sustainable success. the kind that doesn't cost you your sanity. Well, before we dive in, if you're achieving by every metric that matters, and you still feel like something's off, the rhythms of rest assessment will show you which rhythm is silently draining you and your performance. It takes less than five minutes, and you'll have real clarity. You can find that at KentMoroski.com forward slash assessment. It takes less than five minutes. And today make sure you stay tuned until the very end because I have a free resource for you that's going to save you at least four to five hours per week. Let's go. Well, I've got my Mr. Rogers sweater on if you're watching on YouTube. I've got my essential oil diffuser going with creative juice. It's essential oil that looks like that. I love the smell and I'm ready to go. Well, I want to start by saying something I've never said out loud in this format before. Though I've given myself clear rules about AI, I still feel tempted to use it for things that should belong solely to me. Let me tell you my rules for AI. I use AI to ideate, to research and to edit, but not to write for me. I treat AI as an assistant, not a replacement. Now I didn't expect that the hardest part of those rules would be reminding myself of them, not the tool. And the tool I use most often is Claude. Now, one of the things I'm most tempted to use AI for to replace me is my writing, especially my rhythms of rest newsletter. When I have a million other things going on, that's when I'm most tempted to use it to replace me. ⁓ I don't use it for that, but at times I'm definitely tempted. Like April felt like that the whole month. I touched on that in episodes five and six. It felt like an overwhelming month, family stuff, personal stuff, work stuff, it all collided. And I felt like I was drowning. That's when the, that's when the temptation to farm things out to AI is the strongest for me, because what takes me four to five hours in specific, my rhythms of rest newsletter would take AI about two minutes. I could feed it my writing. And it might even sound somewhat like me. The problem is, what do I lose in the process? I lose a lot of things if I farm out my writing to AI because that's how I clarify my thinking. I lose that in-depth thinking that it takes to clarify my thoughts through writing. And I also lose my integrity in the process. How about you? I want to ask you today, where do you feel the tension to use AI for things that solely belong to you. ⁓ the tension I felt in April and even felt this week is exactly what this episode is all about. I'm not here to tell you that AI is good or bad. I'm going to tell you what I actually think about AI and how I use it to gain four to eight hours of my week back. So when we think about AI, you know, depending on who's talking, AI is either the savior or it's the devil. And I don't believe it's either. You know, like money, like the internet, AI is just a tool. It's a very powerful one. But at the end of the day, it's still a tool. And when you listen to the all the noise happening about AI and culture, that doesn't help either. We're hearing reports of mass job loss and layoffs, ⁓ doomsday scenarios and the coming singularity where AI becomes this all knowing sort of digital god, right? And I want to be honest, I've logged dozens of hours listening to podcasts from experts on AI. I've read a book on AI. I read newsletters every week. One of them is called the rundown AI. There's different and one of my favorite ones is by Ethan Malik. It's called One Useful Thing. He's a professor at the Wharton School of Business who really dives deeply into AI. So I've done a lot of research and a lot of reading and I I do believe some of the warnings are legitimate. So I don't want, I don't want it. I don't want it to be said that I don't think that. ⁓ and I do believe that AI needs more regulation and guardrails, especially for young people. But as someone who's spent a considerable amount of time using AI, researching AI, reading about AI, a lot of the doomsday scenarios feel overblown. Cal, Cal Newport is also another good voice on, ⁓ how, how the doomsday scenarios of AI are overblown, at least right now. And that noise doesn't help anyone make a clear decision about how to actually use AI in your day to day life. Okay. Now there's one thing that AI will never be. And this is what I keep coming back to as good as AI gets, and it's getting better all the time. even if it becomes, you know, quote unquote, sentient, whatever that means for a piece of technology that doesn't have a soul, AI will be can never be human. Now, if you're worried about your job, ⁓ and that's a legitimate concern when it comes to AI, my advice is twofold. First, get more human. ⁓ Things like upskilling your leadership, growing your people skills, becoming a master at human connection. You know, a lot of people hire a coach to do these things, and that's a great way ⁓ to upskill your leadership, grow your people skills, et cetera. Second, if you're worried about your job, learn to use AI effectively. I heard Scott Galloway recently say something on the diary of a CEO podcast that stopped me cold. He said this, he said, AI is not going to take your job. Someone who understands AI will take your job. So yes, it will replace jobs, but it's also going to create a number of new opportunities. one thing that it will never do is replace human to human connection. You know, I call this, ⁓ AI fatigue, ⁓ in a similar way to binging too much TV and feeling empty, you know, like when you just zone out on Netflix and you binge eight episodes of a show or or several movies overusing AI has the same effect. After a while, you start to feel hollow and empty. I know it because I've done it. ⁓ but on the other hand, ⁓ this human, human, human to human connection we're talking about when you're with the right people, like I was last Friday with one of my best friends and we went for a walk, we, we prayed together and we just had some heart to heart conversation. left feeling full and energized. That's what the right human to human connections do that AI can never replace. Now, I want to pull back the curtain a little bit on some of my own workflow with AI and be honest about the tension. I want to tell you about what I've actually landed on with AI, not a philosophy, but my decisions around AI. So decision number one. fully understanding AI is impossible. And I'll tell you why in a second, but making the effort to understand it really matters. Now, the reason I say it's impossible to fully understand is because even the experts that you listen to, I haven't talked to any personally, but I've listened to a lot. They don't fully understand what they've created and what they've released into the wild, ⁓ which I think is a problem in and of itself. But if I don't try to understand it, I can't join or influence the conversation around AI. And as a leader, I want to be, I need to be a part of that conversation, whether it's for teams I'm leading, for a company I'm leading, or just in the greater culture to have ⁓ a nuanced and thought about voice behind AI. I can't be that. I can't do that if I don't learn about it, if I don't experiment with it. Decision number two. And I said this earlier, but I want to delve in a little deeper. AI is a competent assistant. It's not a replacement. Now I'm not exaggerating when I say it saves me four, some, sometimes up to eight hours a week of work. And that's very real, but the temptation is to let it have things that belong to me. That temptation is always there in the background. So keeping AI in its lane, sounds really simple until I'm tired, until I'm overwhelmed, until I'm behind on a deadline. So I'll give you an example this week. I did a five day challenge ⁓ with a business coach, Graham Cochran. It was two hours every day. It was wonderful. ⁓ But it compressed my time for the week, not just the 10 hours, you two hours each day, but you know, different homework assignments and thinking about it and all that stuff. Now it's Friday and I just finished my newsletter to be released Sunday and I'm doing the podcast today. ⁓ right now and, and about to get it to my son for production. I usually have it done before this, if not a day before a week before, but man, I was tempted to have AI write my newsletter this week, but I didn't do that. And here's what I've realized. When I feel most tempted to hand things off to AI, that's not usually a productivity problem. That's a signal to me. It's a signal that, ⁓ that I'm overwhelmed and my overwhelm is telling me that I've probably taken on too much. I've bit off more than I can chew. And the answer isn't to outsource my integrity. The answer ⁓ is to pull back. See the overwhelm is just a symptom. It's not the root cause. So, but here's what I tell myself in those moments when I'm tempted to use AI, when I feel overwhelmed and pressed and, ⁓ you know, compressed, I tell myself, Kent, your integrity is worth more than a deadline. I create one real piece of content that drives everything else. That newsletter that I write, that I think about, that I take four to five hours on, that comes from hard earned experience, hard earned thought. And then that, that creates the script for my podcast and all the scripts for my social media for a couple of weeks. And it allows me to clarify my thinking about what I'm really trying to say. It's worth more than a deadline. Well, we've come to that part of the podcast where we talk about how, what rhythms this intersects. So where does this fit in my rhythms of rest framework that REST? It fits within two chambers and it's at the intersection of both the T for tangible and the R for relational. Now here's how it fits. Let's talk about tangible first. Your tangible rhythms govern what you give your time to. They govern how you protect your energy and whether the tools in your life actually support your capacity or they drain it. All right. Now, if AI can really return four plus hours to your week and you never embrace it, you don't just lose the hours you're making a trade off for later days for more stress. for less time spent on things that are actually in your zone of genius, those things that energize you and that you're really good or world-class at, ⁓ those things that will move the needle for your company and for your teams. At the same time, if you use AI ineffectively or overuse AI, it can be just as costly. It can drain your time and your energy as easily as it saves it. So the question isn't just, should I use AI? The question is, how am I using it? And is it serving my work or is it taking from it? So that's the tangible rhythm. What about your relational rhythms? These are the things that AI can't touch. Your relational rhythms remind you of what no digital tool can replace. AI can't replace the conversations that change someone's direction or give them a breakthrough. AI can't change the meeting. where your presence matters more than information. can't change the relationship that only exists when you show up, like with one of your kids or your spouse or a friend. It can't replace those things. I like to say it this way. Relationships are not efficient. They were never meant to be. And if we treat them that way, we lose something. They will always cost you something, but they can be Though they can't be efficient, they can be effective. And relational effectiveness is the difference between things like getting the deal or not getting the deal. Having a deep connection with your friend or spouse or having a shallow one. It's the difference between throwing water or gasoline on a situation at work that requires your presence and your attention. Or in the case of the business owners I coach, spending an hour with me or an hour and 15 minutes It takes time. Sometimes it probably feels like I don't have an hour and 15 minutes. ⁓ but spending that time with me and getting the breakthrough they need, or they can spend more time in their own head spinning their wheels about a problem that they just can't seem to solve on their own. As I recently heard Graham Cochran say, he said, clarity doesn't come from thinking. It comes from engaging. Now, I personally think it comes from both. I don't think Graham's wrong on that, but I think it comes from both. But thinking by ourselves can only take us so far. We then have to engage. And part of that engagement means engaging with the right people. I was with Graham this week in this 10K offer challenge that he does with people. And I had some breakthrough moments. I had some things that that I never would have gotten had I not been there that are going to move my business forward. AI can never do that. And if we're not careful, we will let efficiency crowd out the very things that make our relationships and our leadership. Well, take a deep breath. We made it to the end of the podcast. I call this last section your rhythms check and each week we take just a moment to focus on a concrete action step that can take that you can take in the next 24 to 48 hours. That's going to move the needle forward and a reflection question that's going to help you get to the core or essence of the real issue. Are you ready? Okay, here's your action step. Pick one admin or research task that you do every week manually. It could be preparing for a weekly meeting, preparing a weekly report, organizing your schedule, could be a number of things, personal or professional. What matters is that you do it regularly. So pick one admin or research task you do every week manually ⁓ and spend 20 minutes this week setting up a Claude project to handle it. Okay. One task. 20 minutes, that's the whole assignment. Is it worth spending 20 minutes to potentially save you four or more hours a week? I'm going to give you a resource in a minute to help you do that. But before I do that, here's the reflection question for this week to help you get to the core of the issue. What's one task you're doing every week that you know isn't the best use of your time? And what would you do with that hour or more if you get it back? I want to hear your answer to that question. Drop it in the YouTube comments, send me a DM on Instagram or a message on LinkedIn, shoot me an email if you're part of my email list. I read every single response and your answer might show up in a future episode. So I would love to hear from you. Don't keep it to yourself. Other people will benefit by what you have to say and how you're ⁓ engaging with this issue of AI and the temptations you feel around it. So what would you do that hour? Tell me. And maybe if you want to go a little deeper, tell me what temptations are you feeling around AI? Well, I told you to wait till the end. ⁓ It's going to be worth the wait. I have something I built for you that's really going to help you. It's built for leaders. It's a free step-by-step guide on how to set up a Claude project that actually works and will save you four plus hours a week when you start to implement it. So this Claude project knows your context, it runs on your instructions, and it doesn't start from scratch every time you open it. And it's yours just for being a part of the Rhythms of Rest community. I'll drop the link in the show notes and you can download it there. Okay. Hey, if this episode hit home for you, I want to keep that going. I put out a newsletter every other week. It's practical. It's honest. It's no fluff. It's built around what I call the rhythms of rest framework where every week I share stories of my own breakthroughs and failures, as well as that of my clients, ⁓ four rhythms, four chambers. And when they're working together, you stop running on empty and you start leading from a place of genuine rest and wholeness because whole people make better leaders. It's free. It's good. It's probably going to be the most useful thing in your inbox. ⁓ you know, when it comes out next week, go to Kent morosky.com forward slash newsletter and sign up now. I'll see you there. Have a great.