Somewhere in the last three years, AI stopped being a tool I used and started leading the dance. These are the four warning signs of AI psychosis I wish I’d caught sooner, and the one that cost me something I can’t get back.

I’ve been a software engineer for about 20 years. In this video I walk through four patterns of AI dependency I slid into without noticing: hunting for problems the next AI tool could solve, watching anything slow start to feel like a waste of time, losing the sense that my own hours were worth anything, and slowly becoming the average of my outputs, like an old white shirt gone grey in the wash.

Along the way: why a model called Jev was named after a 19th-century economist, what happened to my Goodreads count, what AI art did to my Christmas paintings, a reading from Chapter 12 of the Tao Te Ching, and a Father’s Day gift I’ll never forget.

I’m not telling you to delete ChatGPT. I still use AI every day. But I’m sorting my loads again. If you’re anywhere near where I was with AI addiction or AI burnout, I hope this saves you some time and suffering.

(A note: \.