How to Stay Grounded When AI Is Moving Faster Than You Can Process

The goal isn't to keep up with everything, it's to stay grounded in what matters to you and to use that as your filter, right? What are you protecting? What are you building towards? And what does one step forward look like for you in this season?

Welcome to the next evolution of the podcast, entrepreneur school in the AI era, we are here to figure out how to integrate AI into the business you've worked so hard to build in a way that still feels like you. I'm your host, Kelly Sinclair, award winning marketer turned AI platform co founder, AI has fundamentally changed how I thought about work systems and what's actually possible. This show is about navigating that new reality together. It's going to be a wild ride, my friend, but I truly believe there's a way to leverage AI in a way that's intentional, human, centered and aligned. It's an ongoing evolution. So let's explore, because AI may just be the unlock you need to achieve the life first business you truly desire.

Welcome back. Oh my gosh, I did not sleep last night, and I think my heart is still racing from the lack of sleep, the caffeine, the things that are going through my head. It wasn't my kids, it wasn't my snoring husband, necessarily. It wasn't my senior citizen dog who wakes up in the middle of the night and needs to be let out. And it wasn't because I had too much coffee, though, honestly, that's always a real possibility, but I just could not turn my brain off, and honestly, I thought about whether I should share that with you, because it's a little vulnerable, but that I remember, that's kind of the whole point of the show. So here we are. What I want to talk to you about today is the pace of the world right now and what it actually feels like to be a business owner in this space where AI is moving faster than most of us can process. How do you tell the difference between the stuff that you actually need to pay attention to and the stuff that's just going to send you into a tailspin at two in the morning? And I have a few practical ways to stay grounded when the ground keeps shifting, and I honestly, like most episodes, need to hear this for myself as well. Because if you've ever felt any version of this, even just like a low level hum of am I keeping up? Is this going to change everything? What am I even supposed to do with this. I want you to know you're not alone, and I am building something in the AI space right, which adds its own particular layer of pressure for me and for Andrew, because we're not just business owners trying to figure out how AI fits into what we do. It's also literally what we do, we're building a platform in this space, which means when something big happens in this industry, we're feeling it a little bit differently. I'm watching and I'm immediately thinking about what it means for us, what we're building, and how fast we need to move.

And lately, oh my goodness, there have been a lot of big things happening. But even if you're not building in the AI space, and you're not, you know, an AI first, or AI focused business, and you're just curious, and you're following along and trying to figure out where all of this applies to your work in your life, then you've still probably felt the energy of this moment shift. Something is different right now. The stakes are higher, the headlines are louder, and the pace is honestly unlike anything we've ever navigated before. So I just want to acknowledge that name what's actually happening, and maybe we can land somewhere useful together, because that is always the goal.

So March was insane. As far as AI news goes. We talked about this on the show before, but just in case, you need a little reminder, there was huge news back in February where anthropic and Pentagon had a bit of a breakup. Anthropic had its $200 million contract with the Department of Defense scrapped, and so anthropic is the lab behind Claude at the AI interface, which you may have now heard of, because it's it's the hot thing to talk about. Everybody seems to be moving to Claude. All of these Claude workshops are popping up. I'm watching people in my circles make literal hundreds of 1000s of dollars teaching people how to use this because they quit. Moved to showing others how to adopt this particular platform, and they did it at the exact right time. It's just that's the kind of thing that's blowing my mind right now, is that things that were not planned for months in advance, not like big business strategies or whatnot, like businesses can build insane income streams right now by just being on the right side of the wave. So that's like, sending me spinning a little bit, just like the concept that this is even happening, that we have these opportunities right now, and kind of the feeling of like, how do I make sure that we don't miss that, right? So lots of other things happening in March, too, big models dropping, meaning that, like the labs behind all of the different AI that you can use, they're just, they're just getting so much smarter. Their capabilities are unreal, and it is back to how I felt when I first started using AI, where it's like my mind is just being blown every day. I'm discovering a new way to use it. I'm discovering a new output. I figured out how to code an entire web page using quad last week, like just things that I never thought would even be possible.

And so if you're feeling that way too, just saying same, same, and it is a little bit wild, if you're watching all of this unfold, and even just even if you don't, like have your finger right on the pulse of it, there's still that feeling of excitement and overwhelm, and they're coexisting, right? And we have this shiny object spiral that is super real because there's tools dropping all over the place. It feels like we should be experimenting with or trying them out. And then we pair that with the fear of falling behind, which is very real, even when you logically know that you're not. You do not need to be following every headline and feeling the pressure of this, because it just does seep in and chasing everything means building nothing sustainable. The antidote really isn't about more information. It's about more intention behind how you move forward in this space. So I mean, I'm fighting this for myself too. We just need to take moments to pause and slow down and allow us to think about how we're going to navigate this filtering out the noise, I highly recommend you do not try and follow every single AI news source or podcast or LinkedIn thread out there. Choose one or two trusted sources that you can refer to that translate how that AI news actually applies to becoming relevant for your business, not just raw announcements, like you can be interested in it and follow it, but also it can create that overwhelm at the same time, and that's really not helpful, because then we get stuck in this paralysis, right where it's taken me, you know, three hours this morning to figure out How to articulate these thoughts into a podcast when that was probably a very poor use of my time.

To be honest, I think it's just this balance of trying to have some foresight as to what's ahead and what's coming and how things are going to impact decisions that we make now and then, actually, just like putting on that tunnel vision and making the decisions of like, Hey, here's the list to do, here's the things we have to do, and let's go Start building them intentionally without getting that feeling of input and distraction and changing directions so many times, because that truly is the spiral that I'm starting to feel where you like it's I feel like I'm like my head is above the water, and I'm Looking up and I see all of the stuff that's happening, and I'm worried about how it's going to affect the plans that I have made. And then when I put my head back down, I feel I can be focused on taking the steps that are based on the information that I currently have and what is actually true, rather than being stuck in this cycle of adjusting and switching and changing all the time. I don't know if that's making sense or coming out the way that I'm intending it to, but the more you let external factors influence how you make decisions in your own business, the more you. Probably just don't make decisions and don't move things forward in your own business. And the truth is, things are not slowing down right now. It's just the world we're in, and this is just how it's going to keep moving.

So the goal isn't to keep up with everything, it's to stay grounded in what matters to you, and to use that as your filter, right? What are you protecting? What are you building towards, and what does one step forward look like for you in this season, that clarity is what is going to make this pace feel navigable instead of terrifying. Oh my gosh, words that I need to hear myself out loud, quite honestly, because we just can't make decisions based on information that doesn't even exist, or the expectation that new information is going to change come in and change everything right? I think that overall, how we have to operate is to just be very flexible and a lot more agile than we ever were, and that is a total advantage for you when you're an entrepreneur, particularly if you are a solo preneur Who gets to make all of the decisions about how your business moves forward, and what you want to add or change or shift or do differently, if you can do something and you can move from idea to experiment to like execution in a short period of time, that's going to help. And I'm thinking about things that way too, as we're building our platform, we're definitely trying to do it in such a way where we have input and I can intentionally experiment around how it rolls out and how it works and how people interact with it. I mean, I've said this before. I certainly don't have the tech software experience where, you know, because there's lots of building and testing that has to happen, but I want to do that alongside people.

So we have beta clients coming on board right now where we are experimenting with the like, full spectrum of how they get onboarded, how their clients get onboarded, to using their tools, what that looks like, how it feels, what feedback that they have for us. And we're doing that in a very intentional way, so as to not just try and guess what everybody's going to want, and think about all of the potential ideas and all the potential ways we can do it, because I know that there's going to be, you know, 1000 versions of our platform by the time we get it really rolling, it's going to be far beyond v1 right? But getting v1 off the ground is the hardest part, and maybe you're thinking about how you can, you know, launch something new or adjust something to fit into this space, incorporating AI into what you're doing, like, what is the path of least resistance for you right now, right? And that's how you can focus so uncertainty is absolutely real right now, and this pace is crazy and also real. And the feeling that you're supposed to have it all figured out right now, while the biggest companies in the world are also figuring it out in real time, that is not a you problem, that's just the environment that we're operating in. And they hope that that feels like a little bit of relief, because we're all charting this unknown territory together. I definitely don't think the answer is to consume more like doubling down on the news that you're seeing the tools that you're trying, the courses, the summits and all of those things, although I know we're definitely moving into a season where if you were putting this off, you're about to start integrating it more.

That's definitely needs to happen, and I will definitely be sharing a lot of events and exciting trainings and opportunities that I'm participating in over the course of this quarter of the year, there's a lot happening, and there's a lot of opportunities for you to learn and get yourself into a position where you feel empowered about how you are moving forward in this industry, find a couple of trusted sources for yourself and filter the noise and then ask questions, and then close the tabs and go do the work. Oh my gosh, hands up if you have 8000 tabs open right now, at least, I feel like a little more organized, because I have started doing tab groups in Chrome. So side note, they're all color coded. And I feel like I can turn on and off different parts of my brain at the same time, which is really helpful.

So here's what to keep coming back to. Your expertise is real. Your relationships with your clients are real, and the value that you create is real. And none of the AI headlines. Not a single one of them changes the fundamental truth of what you bring to the people you serve. What AI changes is how you deliver it, how you scale it, how you protect it, and how much time and energy you get to give to the work that only you can do. And that's the invitation right now, I feel it's not to panic or to worry about being behind, but to get clear on what is yours, and then to move toward it with intention. And actually, I want to end with something that I'm super excited about, because, of course, we need a little bit of that right now.

I am, oh my gosh, it's April 6. We are 10 days away from our official platform reveal. So April 16, we will be sharing what we have been building. I've talked about it in bits and pieces. I've shared glimpses and behind the scenes. I even showed my fingernails and how I have them on brand painted in our brand colors on my Instagram Stories The other week. But on April 16, you get to see the whole thing, what it is, what it does, why we built it the way that we did, and how it might be useful for you. So if you want to be there for that reveal, the wait list for our launch event is in the show notes. Get on it. I would love to have you in the room when we pull back the curtain, because honestly, after everything I just shared about navigating uncertainty and moving with intention in the space, this is our answer, and this is what we have built, been building towards. And if you sign up for our waitlist as well, you will just be the first to know when there is an actual opportunity to jump in. You get to see all of the fun behind the scenes founder's journey that I have been capturing over the last oh, we're at a like 11 months now of building this and I'm sharing everything from silly pictures to blooper videos to how we named our company on a whiteboard on a Saturday back in December and let it sit there. And then decided, Okay, it's time to buy a domain now. So how do we feel about the choices that we put forward? And I had literally written to my business partner, Andrew, here's how he came up with these names, and the last line on the page was, and it doesn't suck. The official criteria is it doesn't suck. So let's move forward and make a whole company around it. That just is the case. Sometimes this pace is real, this uncertainty is real, and we're so excited to share what we have been building with you on April the 16th. I will see you there, and I will see you back here next week for another episode of entrepreneur school in the AI era. Bye for now.

Thank you for listening. If this episode got you thinking about how AI is impacting your business and what it might look like to integrate it in a way that actually fits, I'd love to help you think that through. You can book an AI strategy chat using the link in the show notes. It's a space to talk about where you are, what's shifting, and how to move forward with intention. And if this episode was helpful, please share it with another business owner who's navigating this evolution too, and make sure you're subscribed so you don't miss what's coming next.