I need to be honest with you about something I’ve been seeing everywhere lately – and I mean everywhere. In my own work, with my clients, probably in your world too if you’re paying attention.
I got lost in ChatGPT.
Not the kind of “lost” where you fall down a research rabbit hole for an afternoon. I mean properly lost. The kind where you start second-guessing yourself at every turn, where you’ve got this eerily sophisticated tool open in another tab all day, where you find yourself typing in questions you absolutely already know the answers to.
I was treating it like some sort of digital oracle that somehow had more wisdom about my own business, my own expertise, my own life than I did.
And here’s the uncomfortable bit: it felt like an addiction.
The Gradual Slide
You know that pull you get with social media? Just one more scroll. Just one more check. That dopamine hit dressed up as connection or information or keeping up with what’s happening.
This was the same thing, except it crept up on me more gradually because it felt productive. I was “getting things done.” I was “being efficient.” I was “leveraging technology.”
But really? I was self-sabotaging in real time.
I was playing down my strengths. Clouding my own power. Feeding comparison and procrastination in ways I didn’t even clock at first. Every time I opened that chat window and typed in another prompt, I was essentially telling myself: “I don’t trust my own knowing here. Let me check with the machine first.”
The irony isn’t lost on me that as a coach, I spend my days helping other people trust themselves, back themselves, stand in their power – and there I was, outsourcing my own decision-making to a language model.
When Help Becomes Hindrance
Don’t get me wrong. AI is extraordinary. The technology is brilliant. It can be genuinely useful for certain tasks – research, brainstorming, technical problems, getting unstuck when you need a different perspective.
But somewhere along the line, I’d crossed a threshold I didn’t even realise existed.
I wasn’t using it as a tool anymore. It was using up my mental energy, my creative bandwidth, my confidence. It had moved from my toolkit into my headspace, and it was living there rent-free, making me question my every move.
I’d hit my edges – those uncomfortable places where growth lives, where you’re stretching into something new or challenging – and instead of leaning into my own capacity, I was reaching for external validation. Every single time.
“Is this email good enough?”
“Should I approach this differently?”
“What’s the best way to handle this situation?”
Questions I was perfectly capable of answering myself. Questions I’d answered hundreds of times before in my work. Questions that, frankly, nobody could answer better than me because they were about my business, my clients, my unique approach.
The Moment Everything Shifted
The beautiful thing about awareness is that once you see something clearly, you can’t unsee it. And once you’ve seen it, everything shifts.
I started paying attention to when I was reaching for ChatGPT and, more importantly, why.
Was I genuinely stuck and needing a fresh perspective? Or was I avoiding something? Procrastinating? Looking for permission? Seeking validation for a decision I’d already made? Dimming my own frequency because staying small felt safer than backing myself?
Most of the time, it was the latter.
I noticed I’d reach for it when I was:
- About to do something that felt vulnerable or exposing
- Second-guessing my expertise (even though I’ve been doing this work for years)
- Wanting someone else to tell me I was “doing it right”
- Procrastinating on the real work by staying busy with the pseudo-work
That awareness changed everything.
Finding Clean Power with AI
Now I have what I call “clean power” with AI.
It’s like a helpful cousin I pop round to visit for specific things – technical questions, formatting help, pulling together research, that sort of thing. Not someone living in my head, certainly not someone I’m asking to validate my every thought or decision.
The relationship has boundaries now. Clear ones.
I know the difference between using a tool and being used by it. Between genuine collaboration and compulsive checking. Between “this will actually help me” and “I’m avoiding something uncomfortable.”
And my work is so much better for it. Stronger. More me. Because I’m backing myself again. I’m trusting my knowing. I’m not diluting my voice or my instincts by constantly filtering them through someone else’s perspective – even if that “someone” is an algorithm.
What This Means for You
If any of this is resonating, I want you to know you’re not alone. And I want you to know it’s fixable.
Start by getting curious about your own relationship with AI. Not from a place of judgement, but from genuine curiosity.
When do you reach for it? What are you actually looking for when you do? Is it serving you, or are you serving it?
Are you using it to enhance your work, or to avoid your edges? To support your thinking, or to replace it?
There’s no shame in realising you’ve slipped into unhelpful patterns. We’re all navigating this technology in real time, working out what healthy engagement looks like. We’re making it up as we go along because there’s no roadmap for this yet.
But here’s what I know for certain: when you stand strong in your own playground, when you trust your knowing and stop diminishing yourself, that’s when the magic really happens. That’s when your best work emerges. That’s when you create things that are genuinely, unmistakably yours.
Coming Back to Yourself
If you’re at your edges right now – and honestly, if you’re growing at all, you probably are – and you’re reaching for external validation (AI or otherwise), this is your invitation to pause.
Come back to yourself first.
Ask yourself what you already know. Trust that you have the answers, or at least the next right step. Back yourself, even when it feels uncomfortable. Especially when it feels uncomfortable.
Use AI when it genuinely serves you, absolutely. But don’t let it replace your own brilliance, your own instincts, your own hard-won expertise.
You’ve got wisdom that no algorithm can replicate. You’ve got knowing that comes from your lived experience, your unique perspective, your years of learning and growing and doing the work.
Don’t dim that. Don’t outsource it. Don’t let anything – no matter how clever or convenient – make you smaller than you are.
The technology isn’t going anywhere. But neither is your power. The question is: which one are you feeding?
What’s your relationship with AI like right now? I’d genuinely love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
Charlotte Carter is a Mindset and Energetics Mentor and the founder and CEO of I Dare To Leap. She hosts the global The Energy Of Success podcast and has written for many publications including Grazia, Hello!, The Daily Telegraph, Metro and Marie Claire.
Connect with Charlotte on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook
Book your free, no obligation call with Charlotte here