Are you still thinking, or just prompt engineering?

Look at that CEO frozen mid-sentence.

Three sentences into explaining his company strategy without his laptop, and he just... stopped. The strategy exists in his head somewhere. But the pathway from thought to speech? Gone. His brain had rewired itself as a ChatGPT terminal.

That's what we're dealing with. Not stupidity. Something scarier.

Your brain on AI looks like this

Remember struggling through a tough problem last year? That mental burn when you pushed through confusion to clarity? You don't do that anymore. Nobody does.

We traded struggle for speed. Seemed smart at the time.

Except struggle builds neural pathways. Skip the struggle, lose the pathways. Simple as that. The UCL study measured it - actual neural engagement drops when people outsource thinking to AI. Not metaphorically. Literally. Brain scans show less activity.

First you save time. Then you save effort. Then you can't remember how to think without the machine.

Watch yourself next time someone asks a complex question. That split-second reach for ChatGPT? Used to be a reach into your own knowledge. Now it's muscle memory to outsource.

The weird part starts here

AI becomes your brain's GPS. You know how people can't navigate without Google Maps anymore? Lost that internal compass? Same thing happening to thinking itself.

You stop forming hypotheses. Stop connecting dots yourself. You query, select, refine. Query, select, refine. But the generation of original thought? That motor doesn't turn on anymore.

Test this yourself. Try writing three paragraphs about something you know well. No research. No AI. Just you and blank page. Harder than it should be, right?

Six months ago it wasn't this hard. Six months from now? You won't even try.

Everyone sounds the same now

Notice how every LinkedIn post reads identical? Every executive presentation hits the same beats? That's not coincidence. That's convergence.

We're all drinking from the same probability well. ChatGPT serves up most-likely responses based on training data. Millions of people accept those responses. Feed them back into the system. The circle tightens.

Original thought doesn't just decrease. It becomes extinct. Because original means improbable. And AI optimizes for probable.

Last week I read five different "thought leadership" articles on innovation. Could have been written by the same person. Were they? Or had five different humans just converged on the same algorithmic voice?

Can't tell anymore. That's the point.

Black swans eat zombies

COVID hit and leaders who actually think adapted fast. The algorithmic managers? They kept asking ChatGPT for precedents that didn't exist.

Novel problems need novel solutions. But novel thinking requires those neural pathways you let atrophy. The ones that connect unlikely things. Make weird leaps. See patterns that shouldn't exist but do.

When the next disruption hits - and it will - the split becomes visible. Real thinkers pivot. Cognitive zombies just keep prompting their AI for answers to questions it's never seen.

Entire companies will fold because their leadership can't function outside the probability matrix.

Breaking free (while you still can)

You don't quit AI. But you restructure the relationship.

Struggle first. Two-day rule. Any problem worth solving gets two days of your brain only. No AI. No Google. Just you wrestling with it. Yes, you'll hate it. Yes, it's inefficient. That's rebuilding the muscle.

Make AI fight itself. When you do use it, never accept first answers. "Give me three arguments against what you just said." "What would someone who disagrees think?" Turn the oracle into a sparring partner.

Write bad first drafts. By hand when possible. They'll suck. Good. Sucking means your brain is working, not copying.

Talk without notes. Practice explaining your ideas with zero preparation. Fumble through it. That discomfort? That's your neural pathways rebuilding.

The workshop thing

Not doing another prompt engineering course. Those make the problem worse.

This workshop targets the dependency itself. Gets under the hood of your thinking patterns. Shows you exactly where you've gone soft. Then fixes it.

What we cover:

Diagnostic: Where you actually stand (most people guess wrong)
Friction protocols: Specific exercises for your weak points
Adversarial frameworks: Making AI strengthen instead of weaken you
Recovery timeline: 30 days to cognitive independence
Community: Others who get why this matters

What you leave with:

Personal dependency map
Daily thinking exercises (customized to your gaps)
Frameworks that build strength
Direct access to me for troubleshooting
Network of people choosing sovereignty over convenience

Fair warning: This workshop will piss you off. You'll realize how dependent you've become. How much capability you've lost. That anger? Use it.

The choice

Some people will read this and immediately ask ChatGPT what to think about it. They're already gone.

Others feel that uncomfortable recognition. That "shit, this is me" moment. Those are the ones who might make it.

Every executive I know splits into one of these camps within the next 18 months. Sovereign thinkers or algorithmic puppets. No middle ground.

The workshops fills up based on who decides they want to think for themselves before they forget how.

You interested or not?

Because honestly, if you need AI to help you decide whether you need less AI, we both know which camp you're in.

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