Iteration is how you think with AI
Not a workaround, the actual method
The back-and-forth feels wrong. Too many tries. People tell themselves they need the perfect prompt.
But iteration isn’t the problem. Iteration IS the method.
Words can mean different things. Examples less so.
When you stop explaining and start showing, it works. Not because AI suddenly understands you better. Because examples are data that can’t be misread.
This takes longer. It IS longer. That’s the work.
But getting something to work is not the same as understanding how it works.
Let AI handle what you’ve already mastered. When you’re learning something new, slow down. Ask to see the choices. Then change it yourself. Make mistakes. Fix them.
Otherwise, future you gets black boxes you can’t open.
Speed creates perfectly built things you don’t understand. Understanding requires the slow path. Iteration requires questions, not commands.
Commands try to get it perfect in one shot. Questions iterate toward understanding. One generates compliance. The other generates thinking.
Don’t trade away the right to be slow.
If anyone can refute me—show me I’m making a mistake or looking at things from the wrong perspective—I’ll gladly change. It’s the truth I’m after, and the truth never harmed anyone. What harms us is to persist in self-deceit and ignorance. — VI. 21
AI makes everything faster. Every conversation heads toward the quickest answer. Every solution seeks the shortest route.
But people don’t grow from speed. They grow from mistakes that teach what success can’t. From wrong paths that reveal what the right path hides. From struggle that builds understanding.
When building was slow, there were checkpoints. Time to think. Friction that forced you to question what you wanted, refine it, understand it.
Now everything is instant. We skip the struggle that builds us.
Curiosity needs mess. Toughness needs setbacks. Satisfaction needs effort.
These things don’t compress. They resist optimization. They require the long way.
The back-and-forth is the method.
The iteration is the thinking.
The slowness is the point.