A year ago, a lot of my time was spent writing code in a code editor. Today, AI writes all of my code, and I rarely ever look at the code it writes. It's hard to overstate how dramatic of a transformation this has been, and I think this same transformation is coming to other industries, like design, copywriting, and photo and video editing. If you're in these industries, you'd be justified in being concerned!
I think a lot of the fear around AI is valid, AND there's a real opportunity on the other side for those who want to take it.
For me, the scariest part of dropping code writing was figuring out what else I would do with my time. Writing code felt pretty high-value to me, and people paid me for it. Letting go of that, and figuring out what replaces it, has honestly been exhausting.
But here are two things I'm realizing in retrospect.
First, writing code was satisfying and I enjoyed it, but it was hardly my favorite use of time. It was tool work. No one saw the code except me. People cared about what it did, not how I built it. And I think clicking around in a piece of software to create something is the same thing. It's satisfying because you're good at it, and it eats up hours, but nobody cares how you built it. They care about the result. I wonder how much of your work is that, and not actually what you enjoy doing most.
Second, I'm able to think on a much higher level and explore a vastly larger number of options now. Because I don't have to be concerned with the time-consuming task of writing the code, I can spend that time elsewhere. I can talk to friends / customers / partners about what would be exciting to build. I can view 15 different versions of a design, instead of just one or two, before committing to it. This is wildly more fun.
It turns out there were better things for me on the other side. And I promise you, you're more creative than the tools you use today.