Most of us think the biggest risk with AI is getting something wrong. But in practice, the bigger cost is getting stuck. Fear, hesitation, and perfectionism quietly inflate time-to-first-draft, increase meeting hours, and keep us doing work the slow way even when better options exist. Mistakes can be corrected. Avoidance turns into a permanent time tax. AI adoption becomes real when we build confidence, not as a personality trait, but as a workflow design. Confidence is a time strategy because it reduces friction, shortens cycles, and helps us move from “thinking about using AI” to actually reclaiming hours. ------------- Context: How Fear Turns Into Lost Hours ------------- The confidence gap usually does not look dramatic. It looks like small delays. We open the tool, we type a prompt, we delete it, we try again, then we decide we will just do it ourselves. We tell ourselves it is faster this way, but what is really happening is that uncertainty is steering the workflow. Fear shows up as over-checking. We draft with AI, then we read and reread, looking for what might be wrong, because we do not trust the output or we do not trust our ability to spot issues. That can be responsible, but it can also become unbounded. We do not know when we are “done checking,” so the time expands. Fear also shows up as meeting gravity. Instead of sending a draft, we schedule a call to “align.” Instead of proposing a direction, we ask for more input. We do this because we want safety, but the cost is time-to-decision and cycle time. Then there is the identity layer. Many of us have been rewarded for being competent, accurate, and reliable. AI introduces a new dynamic: we are working with a tool that can be brilliant and wrong in the same breath. That ambiguity can feel threatening. So we keep AI at arm’s length, and we keep doing things manually, not because it is best, but because it is familiar. The result is predictable. We miss the biggest time gains: faster starts, fewer blank pages, fewer revision loops, and cleaner handoffs. We remain in the “manual default,” and the week keeps feeling compressed.

This week, I break down some huge updates to Claude that, combined with the introduction of ads in ChatGPT, make Claude the best AI if you're on a free plan. Plus, I cover the barrage of OpenAI news and releases, discusses the evolution of the "OpenClaw" movement, and more. Enjoy!

Not whether you have them. Not whether they’re fair. Just how fast you move toward them. Every time you deal with something right away, your capacity grows. You trust yourself more. You stop carrying the mental weight. You get stronger without even realizing it. Every time you delay, it gets heavier. It takes more energy. It starts to feel bigger than it actually is. Over time, that difference compounds. Solving small problems quickly builds confidence. Solving bigger ones consistently builds identity. And that capacity — the ability to handle hard things without hesitation — is what actually allows you to build something great. What’s one thing you know you need to face this week instead of pushing it off?