Hello Musers,
Suppose, you have to write a proposal or email in office.
You know what you want to say. Sort of.
So you stare at the blank page.
Ten minutes pass.
Then, you open ChatGPT or Co-pilot.
You give it the context.
It gives you the structure.
The opening is polished.
The arguments are neatly arranged.
You change a few words.
Send.
It feels productive.
Gif by thenopecat on Giphy
But there's something you didn't get from those ten minutes of AI-generated writing:
You didn't have to figure out what you actually thought.
That messy first draft forces you to make decisions.
What's the point?
What's important?
What doesn't belong?
What am I actually trying to say?
The first draft isn't just something you produce.
It’s how you learn to think.
And, that's where the real skill develops.
If you repeatedly skip that part, something subtle happens.
You get better at reviewing ideas without getting better at forming them.
You can recognise a good argument without knowing how to build one.
You can improve a paragraph without knowing how to start it.
And eventually, the blank page becomes uncomfortable because you've trained yourself to expect something to appear before you begin thinking.
PS - I am scared to eventually stare at the blank page shackled to my AI habit. I leave you for now on this thought to muse a bit.
See you in next learning to stay human for tomorrow.
Curiously yours,
Gaurav Jain
