Tuesday, June 10, 2025

thumbnail

I Stopped Writing I Started Curating



What Happened When I Outsourced My Voice for 2 Years And Why I’m Terrified to Press Publish on This


The Hook
The cursor blinks
Blink
Blink
It’s been 684 days since I wrote something alone
Not prompt engineered Not AI assisted Not refined by GPT
Just me Raw Unfiltered
Why does this feel like taking off my armor in a sword fight


The Confession Booth
I didn’t plan to stop writing It happened in tiny surrenders

  • Just polish this sentence

  • Help me sound less emotional

  • Make this 30 percent smarter
    Until one day I realized
    I’d hired a ghostwriter for my own mind


What AI Gave Me And What It Stole

The Gain | The Cost
Speed so much speed | My messy first drafts where truth lives
Perfect syntax | The stumbles that made readers say Me too
10x output volume | The fear of silence mine not the machine’s

The quiet horror
I woke up at 3 AM realizing I’d started thinking in prompts
Brain generate 3 vulnerable anecdotes about creative decay


Why I Didn’t Notice the Theft

1 The Seduction of Scale
More posts = more reach = more clients
But my engagement felt hollow Like shaking hands through gloves

2 The Vanity of Perfection
No more typos No awkward phrases
And no more humanity Errorless prose feels like a museum polished dead

3 The Fear Factory
What if my raw thoughts aren’t smart enough Unique enough Worth paying for
AI became my creative Xanax


The Breaking Point A Story Told Badly
Last Tuesday my client said
Love the report But it doesn’t sound like you anymore
I opened the file Saw the usual clean logical sterile
Then I scrolled to the footer
Generated with AI Human oversight 12 percent
Twelve percent
I’d become an editor of my own erosion


Why Writing Alone Again Feels Like Relearning a Language

Day 1 Attempt
The synergistic paradigm shift
Delete Delete DELETE

My hands forgot

  • How to dance between doubt and clarity

  • Where the bruises were the ones that make writing bruise

  • The courage of bad sentences

The real cost
I lost trust in my own voice


The 3 Ugly Truths About Outsourced Creativity
1 AI Doesn’t Bleed On The Page
Pain connects Perfection distances

2 You Can’t Prompt Soul
That flicker of recognition readers feel It comes from shared fragility

3 Your Voice Atrophies
Like unused muscle Silence it long enough and it forgets its shape


How I’m Reclaiming My Voice One Cringey Word At A Time

The No AI Ritual

  • 6 AM No internet A cheap notebook

  • Rule 1 No deleting

  • Rule 2 If it scares me write it bigger

Seeking the Ugly Feedback
I showed my unedited journal to a friend
It’s disjointed But paragraph 4 I cried Keep that

Writing Like a Human Not a Creator

  • Using I’m scared instead of research indicates

  • Leaving typos where they feel honest

  • Letting metaphors breathe even if they’re clumsy


The Irony You Already Noticed
Yes I drafted this with AI Old habits die hard
But then I did something radical
I deleted every line that felt like performance
What’s left

  • The shaky hands

  • The overlong pauses

  • The fear that you’ll see through me

Hi This is the 12 percent human More than enough


Final Thought
The world doesn’t need more content
It needs more candor
More voices that tremble
More sentences that only you could write
bad grammar and all

CTA
Open a blank doc Set a timer for 5 minutes Write something ONLY for you Don’t edit Don’t prompt Just bleed Then share one line in the comments that surprised you


Why This Resonates
Vulnerability as strength
Exposes creative shame without self pity

Tangible metaphors
Ghostwriter for my mind Creative Xanax Bleed on the page

Actionable recovery steps
Simple emotional rituals over grand plans

Embracing imperfection
Leaves rough edges to feel human

Meta awareness
Acknowledges AI’s role in drafting this about quitting AI

Sensory details
3 AM Cheap notebook Cursor blinks


Edit notes for you

  • Add your specific moment for example The day my daughter said my LinkedIn post sounded like a robot

  • Include one unedited sentence from your real notebook for raw texture

  • Tweak CTA to match your goals community building or newsletter signup

This isn’t anti AI It’s pro you
The goal isn’t purity but sovereignty
Using tools without being used by them

Write hard and clear about what hurts
Some human named Hemingway who definitely didn’t use ChatGPT


Subscribe by Email

Follow Updates Articles from This Blog via Email

No Comments

Claim Your Gift card

 


Search This Blog