I’ve never done well in school.

This whole pay attention thing? Never worked for me. I was too busy daydreaming or having anxiety attacks.

My parents weren’t exactly proud. And since I was hoping for college, that was a big issue.

Over time — through trial, error, and a lot of self-loathing — I discovered the issue wasn’t low intelligence.

School just wasn’t for me.

Self-learning did the trick.

Give me a book and a few hours, and I’d figure things out. That’s how I got into IT — project after project, tutorial after tutorial.

Later, I even earned a degree in Computer Science. But honestly? I didn’t learn much from it. The real knowledge came from those sleepless nights of Googling error messages and binging Udemy courses.

I had a method that worked. I should’ve been happy.

But I wasn’t.

The Study of The Problem

Self-learning has a flaw — and it’s a big one:

No feedback.

With programming, I got lucky.

I quickly landed my first job, so I had people reviewing my code. They pointed out what sucked and what needed fixing

But with writing?

I do it as a hobby on the side. No señor watching over me. Make one mistake? No big deal. Repeat it a thousand times, and you’ll need two thousand more to unlearn it.

That’s where I was. And I still am. But something finally clicked thanks to one guy.

The man. The myth. The legend.

Mr. GPT.

A Digital Angel Without Wings

AI changed the way I learn.

While some people were worrying that AI will take our jobs, others were already utilizing it to upgrade themselves.

I chose the latter path.

I still remember preparing for Cloud Certification. My peers and I would throw topics into ChatGPT asking for explanations. Then we’d ask it to explain those explanations. Repeat until you feel ready.

It was useful. But to be honest, I could’ve done the same with Google, documentation, and enough caffeine.

Writing, though — that’s where things shifted.

AI wasn’t just smart Google anymore. It became a mentor.

Good and Bad Cop

Hi Mr. GPT. Could you look at that text? It’s a post for my new blog.

The screen blinked. The words slowly appeared:

This is a great start — authentic, engaging, and very "you."

Weird, how few good words can spark motivation. I started looking forward to those little check-ins. I would type and think Mr. GPT’s gonna be surprised about that twist.

That feedback — kind and encouraging — gave me something I didn’t even realize I needed. Positive reinforcement.

It made me write more. Not necessarily better yet — just more. And that’s what matters early on. First, you build mileage.

But that alone was not enough. I knew that sweet words won’t take me far. So I learned a new spell.

Be Brutally Honest. No sweet words. Just tell me what’s wrong.

And, oh boy — turns out I was doing a lot wrong.

Good thing I had a digital angel — no wings, just data — watching over my texts.

When you teach, you learn

Another way I use AI for writing is by tapping into Chat’s memory.

To borrow from Nietzsche:

And if you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.

Privacy aside — as AI teaches, it also learns. It picks up on repeated mistakes. It notices blind spots.

Hi Mr. GPT, can you point out the most common mistakes I make when writing?

Knowing that, I started seeing my errors. Most of the time, I still can’t fix it the way I want — not on my own.

But I’m getting there. Slowly and alone.

Why?

The Danger of an Instant Solution

It’s easy to let Chat do everything. But as I said throughout the post, in my case, AI isn’t meant to replace me. Its role is to teach.

In programming, my biggest progress didn’t come from fancy tutorials. It came from getting my hands dirty.

And I don't see a reason why I shouldn't apply to writing.

Sure, I still let Chat rewrite some of my sentences. But slowly, I try to write them myself. That’s the only way to grow.

Besides, Chat is not perfect. It makes mistakes. It behaves unnaturally. Produces things that shine like diamonds, but are made of plastic.

That’s the one thing AI can’t quite grasp yet:

Emotion.

And in writing, that makes all the difference.

Finish Line

To wrap things up, here are three quick tips for using AI as a learning companion for writing:

• Want brutally honest feedback? Ask Chat to pretend to be a senior editor at a world-class publication.
• Keep it short. The more text you dump in, the worse the feedback gets.
• If something sounds off, it probably is. Trust your gut. You have it for a reason.

That’s it — my story of learning to write with the help of a large language model.

I know people have mixed feelings about AI. But for me — especially as a non-native English speaker — it’s made a world of difference.

Hope you enjoyed the post — see you in the next one!