Behind the Scenes: What a Long-Haul Flight (and No Internet) Taught Me About Myself & AI
⏱️ Read time: ~2 min
Last week, there I was, somewhere over the Atlantic, workshop prep open in front of me, a full to-do list and… no reliable internet. Worse, I'd made a rookie mistake: I hadn't checked that my locally hosted AI instance had a suitable model loaded before boarding. So it was just me, my laptop, and my brain.
A bit old school, pre-2022... no AI to assist me.
I needed to fine-tune a run of show, build a flip chart guide, create handouts, and prep slides. Work I'd done plenty of times before, but work I'd gotten used to doing with AI by my side.
So I rolled up my sleeves and got on with it.
It took roughly three times as long. That part wasn't surprising. What was surprising was how it felt: almost therapeutic. The flight disappeared. I was deep in the work, thinking it through, making decisions, trusting my own judgment. No prompts. No shortcuts. Just me doing what I know how to do.
And somewhere over the clouds, I had a quiet realization: I'm not dependent. I can still do this.
That felt really good.
The one line I drew? Writing the PowerPoint slides. Instead, I wrote all the content in Gamma's format, ready to paste in and make pretty the moment I landed and got back online. Even offline, I was thinking in systems.
Key Takeaway
The real sign that AI is working for you, not instead of you: you could do it without it. It just takes longer. That's not a weakness in the tool. That's the whole point. AI should amplify what you already know how to do, not quietly hollow it out.
If you've ever worried that AI is making you less capable, try this: notice how you feel when it's not there. Panic? That's dependency. Mild inconvenience and quiet confidence? That's augmentation.
I know which one I have now.
Keep experimenting,
Elena
