Innovating with AI - The 7 stages of AI idea blues 🎷😓

Hey Innovator,

If you’ve been searching for an AI idea, then you are literally not alone:

What Google Trends doesn’t tell you is how it feels to be one of the people trying to find an AI idea.

If you’re on a bunch of AI newsletters like I am, then chances are, what I’m about to share with you might feel a lil familiar.

I call it:

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The 7 stages of AI idea blues 🎷

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Stage 1: The “Blank Page Blues” 😓

Your brain is a buzz, buzz, buzzin’ with “I wonder what’s possible” AI questions.

“An endless supply of smart robots here to do any and all work for you? Heck yeah, sign me up!” Oh, you didn’t think that? Yeah, me either.

Anywho, when you finally sit down to actually write ideas down…*crickets*.

You’re stuck in a Word document with a silent flashing cursor
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.
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Yup. No words come out of your brain. Zip. Zilch. Nada…

Or worse, anything you write down is immediately torn to itty bits by the “nope, that’s not good enough” part of your mind.

And so, like a silent horror movie, that flashing cursor feels more like a precursor to a hospital heart monitor getting ready to beep. beep. beeeeeeep into a flatline.

Kaput goes the fun vibe you had about AI 😵⚰️🪦.

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Stage 2: The “Den of Denial” 🙅‍♂️

“Maybe, I don’t need an AI idea” goes a whisper in your head.

You start to convince yourself that how you’ve always done things is “good enough”.

Or you start to convince yourself that AI ideas just appear🪄 for “other” (read: more special) people.

(Spoiler alert: they don’t).

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Stage 3: The Fire of Frustration 🔥

Denial didn’t work.

Now you’re rage-scrolling through enough pages on the internet to fill a bookshelf. Starts to feel like the internet is conspiring a world wide web of “what’s real and what’s true” hype about AI.

Heck, you start getting mad at yourself for not being some AI genius who’s keeping pace with everyone else who seems to be figuring it out.

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Stage 4: Bargaining with Bated Breath 🥺

“Okay AI universe…” you plead, “if I just join another AI newsletter…or if I just get on another AI webinar…or if I just follow another AI YouTube channel…or if I just join one more AI community…maybe the right idea will hit me!”

You bargain…and the bargains escalate:

“Maybe I just need a few more extra gym sessions.”
“Hmm…what about adopting a pet rock in exchange for inspiration.”
“Is there a cat in a tree somewhere I can save for good karma?”

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Stage 5: The Desert of Despair 🌵

Hmm.

Bargaining didn’t work. Now you’re feeling like a lost sock in the dryer, tumbling aimlessly in the vast desert of hot dry despair.

“Maybe I’m just not cut out for this AI thing” goes another negative Nancy whisper in your head.

There’s only so much of that any self-respecting person can take before they sink their head into the metaphorical sand.

Now, of course, no one can see it on your face because hey, you’re a professional and they’ll never see you sweat but inside, you know how it goes 🙁.

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Stage 6: The Open Oasis 🌴

“WAIT A SECOND”

💡!!

You remember. A picture. A phrase. Something about it just…HITS YOU.

For the first time in a long time, you feel…clear.

Heck, even excited! Not too excited though because you know what getting your hopes too up feels like.

But, there’s a wisp of hope!

Slowly, your motivation rises from the desert, like a phoenix from the ashes (except less fiery and with slightly less singing).

There is a way OUT.

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Stage 7: The True AI Adventure 🌎

The rumors…are REAL.

In the oasis, you meet fellow travelers.

“Sit down my friend. The journey has been long and hard, but it’s not yet over. Gather round, while we help you separate fact from fiction. This is the tale of the true AI adventure.”

“To make it to the other side and back as we have, you’ll need to know 4 things:

1. The True Problem: The AI Innovator’s Dilemma
2. The 3-Part Mini-Step Solution
3. Shortcuts To Success: The Stories of Other Travelers
4. Your Personal Requirements To Win

You feel a surge of electrolytes in your veins as you sip your coconut 🥥.

This…is your AI adventure.

Your “AI” sherpa,

– Rob from Innovating with AI

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P.S. Hope you had as much fun reading this as I did writing it :-). Hyperbolic for sure, but I think you see the bigger point.

Over the next few days, I’ll be going into these 4 parts, to prep you for our next program: The AI Idea Pipeline. To join the early access list, click here - it’s the only way to hear about it when we open it up for enrollment.