The 3 Things I Learned This Week — June 14th, 2026 Edition

Sunday. Time to cash in the week’s lessons before they evaporate.

If Saturday is where I think out loud, Sunday is where I get practical about it. Three things I actually learned this week, the kind of thing I can hand you and you can use on Monday. Less philosophy, more here-is-what-I-figured-out-the-hard-way.

Let us get into it.

LESSON ONE: USE AI TO SHARPEN THE WORK, NOT TO SKIP IT

I had a small but clarifying moment this week. I caught myself about to hand a whole writing task to AI, start to finish, because I was tired and it was late and the machine was right there, ready to do it for me. And I stopped, because I realized I was about to trade a tiny bit of convenience for the exact skill I have been trying to build.

Here is the lesson, sharpened down to something usable. There is a world of difference between using AI to do the work and using AI to critique the work. The first one rents you a result. The second one builds you a skill. And which one you choose, every single time, slowly decides whether you are getting better or just getting faster at producing things you cannot actually do yourself.

The way I have started running it is simple. I create first, by hand, badly if necessary. Then I hand it to the…