In this post, I’ll describe my updated strategies for how I use AI for writing.
Before ChatGPT became available to the public in November 2022, I wrote everything manually.
There were probably AI chatbots and AI text generators available before ChatGPT, but I wasn’t aware of them.
I wrote the old-fashioned way: think of an idea and type out the words.
Now that’s changed.
With AI, writing is quicker and easier than ever before.
But you have to know how to use AI to write well with it.
I didn’t realize this when ChatGPT first came out.
I made the mistake of thinking, “Oh, AI can just write anything for me and all I have to do is press a button.”
I was wrong.
Now that I’ve been using various AI writing tools, chatbots, and text generators over the past year, I’ve learned a lot about the strengths and weaknesses of AI when it comes to writing.
In this post, I want to share with you how I use AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Pi for the “middle” of my writing process.
AI can’t come up with the initial idea for you
At least one part of writing that will probably always be done by a human is coming up with the initial idea.
Is AI capable of coming up with ideas?
Sure.
I can ask ChatGPT, “Can you give me five ideas for a blog post about the health benefits of yoga?”
And ChatGPT gives me:
- Stress reduction
- Improved flexibility
- Mind-body connection
- Enhanced respiratory health
- Balanced mental health
But the prompt came from my brain.
I had to come up with the initial idea of “a blog post about the health benefits of yoga” without help from the AI.
You have to give the AI enough context
Just 1-2 words isn’t enough context for the AI.
Ideally, you should give the AI 3-4 bullet points so that the AI has a good enough understanding of what you’re trying to say.
These bullet points don’t need to be written well. Don’t worry about grammar, spelling, capitalization, or punctuation.
But you do need to explain with a certain degree of accuracy so that the AI gets your point.
AI can fill in the details
If you can at least come up with a descriptive header for each section, AI can probably write all the sections for you.
AI is also good at examples.
For example, if you’ve written a blog post about cheeseburgers and you want to recommend some cheeseburger restaurants, you can ask the AI for some of the best cheeseburger restaurants in a certain area.
And the AI will take care of spelling and grammar.
Even if the prompt you gave the AI was poorly written, the AI will fix your mistakes and generate a response with correctly spelled words and proper grammar.
Overall, AI can add more volume to your writing.
If you can come up with the initial 3-4 bullet points to describe what you’re trying to say, AI can take that and turn it into 3-4 paragraphs.
You’ll still need to make some edits
The last part is making sure the AI got your point and cutting away any excess.
You might need to cut a whole paragraph and ask the AI to rewrite it differently.
There are also parts of the writing that will sound “robotic” or just not your style. You can make minor edits to these parts to make the writing sound more human and more you.
Editing AI-generated text is a skill in and of itself.
To be talented as an editor in this way, you probably need to acquire some skills from having been a writer yourself.
You need to understand the fundamental problems of writing. How to decide on words. Being able to recognize where a sentence doesn’t flow, where it’s chunky, where it’s hard to read, where it doesn’t evoke the feeling you want it to.
Think of it like a manufacturing line.
You start as a worker on the line, learning the basics to assemble the product.
Once you know the basics, you can replace yourself with AI.
Then you become a manager. You can watch the whole production from your office.
Most of the work on the line is done by the AI, but you’ll occasionally need to come down and assist the AI when it makes mistakes. Having your own experience on the line is the only way to know when the AI is making mistakes, what mistakes are being made, and how to fix them.
Conclusion
Now that AI has made writing easier than ever, the most valuable skills for a human writer have changed.
It will be increasingly difficult to compete with AI on the parts of the writing process that AI excels at.
Rather than trying to compete with AI, human writers will have a better chance at success if we learn how to use AI, which means learning the parts of the writing process that the AI can do better and the parts that we can do better.
Coming up with the initial idea for the writing and editing the AI-generated content are the parts of the writing process that are better done by humans.
The bulk of the writing in the middle of the writing process can be done by AI.
To learn more about the strengths and weaknesses of AI compared to human writers, read this.