Pay attention to the tension
Maxine CameronLike many people, I’ve spent the past year or so running to keep up with the breakneck pace of AI innovation.
I’ve tuned into webinars and podcasts, turned up to events and read more newsletters, blog posts and LinkedIn posts than you can shake a stick at.
Within the financial planning sector, I’ve enjoyed NextWealth’s AI Lab, and attended the lang cat’s Catwalk in 2025. I’ve even developed events and content with an AI focus.
So, you’d think I’d feel more comfortable with it.
But I’m not entirely. There’s something holding me back from relying entirely upon AI.
And it’s taken me a while to figure out what it is.
Making life difficult
In some gatherings I’ve attended, it’s felt like a shameful secret. Hearing people say things like ‘if you don’t adopt AI today, you’ll have no business tomorrow’, immediately makes me wonder what’s wrong with me? Why aren’t I just diving in wholeheartedly as others seem to?
Here's what I've realised: There is a necessary tension in the sometimes lengthy and seemingly inefficient thinking process. Removing that tension by relying too heavily on AI might speed the process up but something will also be lost.
The act of working, re-working, scrapping and re-starting an idea is valuable. I like the process and rigour of thinking something through that way. It forces me to dig deeper into a problem, make more valuable and insightful connections and find more original answers.
That’s not to say I don’t want to use AI to support. I can and have used Claude as a thinking partner and while that’s useful for initial pondering, the lightbulb moments more often come after working on something for a while, hitting up against a wall, working out what’s not working, and then starting again. It’s a necessary tension in the process which leads to a better, more original outcome.
I think that’s one of the things that’s bothered me about many of the AI debates I’ve tuned into. The focus on reducing effort and improving efficiency means that we’re not asking ‘What tension is worth preserving?’
As I consider how I use AI, I’m now asking what responsibilities do I want to cede, and what tasks will I stop doing? I’m asking myself what is valuable in my current (albeit sometimes painful) process that I want to preserve.