AI in Action: The Monitor Mystery
And the Struggle to Remember AI
Thought I’d share a quick use-case from last week - yet another “aha” moment when using AI. Simple but effective.
Old Habits, New Tools
I use an AI tool every day, and still, it’s an ongoing challenge to remember to use it in new ways. Using AI for a host of familiar things is now second nature – cooking and cocktailing, brainstorming and riffing on ideas, learning about an idea or concept, making stories for my little 3yo – but it often takes a deliberate effort and some repetition before a new use case sticks.
Take work, for example. Even after months of access to Microsoft 365 Copilot, I still found myself searching for emails and chats in Outlook and Teams manually, out of habit. Then one day, it hit me: why not just have Copilot do it? I started experimenting, figuring out how to phrase requests. I'd forget now and then, but over time it became second nature. Now, it’s always the first place I go—it’s simply a better method, and it usually works.
Tech Trouble at Home
Last week, I had another of these moments. My home monitor had been acting up, so I splurged on a big new high-definition monitor for my home office. I unboxed it, plugged it in, and… the display looked terrible.
Annoying. So, I fell back on old habits: I returned to the Amazon listing, scanned product reviews, searched for troubleshooting tips online. I even checked the Dell homepage but couldn’t find the exact model.
After wasting time and getting nowhere, I remembered: why didn’t I just start with GPT?
So, I spun up a new chat and spent all of 30 seconds writing out about my issue, and boom, GPT quickly gave me a number of easy steps to start with.
Progress! But right off the bat, step one didn’t work—the resolution option wasn’t available in my display settings. I told GPT that, and it immediately shifted into troubleshooting that specific issue.
It gave me recommendations and direct links (which I hadn’t been able to locate on my own) and ultimately helped me identify the culprit: my HDMI cable. It was a hardware issue all along, and GPT got me there faster than any forum or product page.
I always wondered why my other monitor couldn’t play sound! It was one of those annoying things that I didn’t care enough about to fix, but it was there, in the background, always bugging me.
I found a cable on Amazon that I thought might help, asked GPT to confirm, and it did. Seven dollars later, the sound issue was fixed.
A Coach That Never Clocks Out
This isn’t a flashy story, but it’s a real one—another example of everyday AI. What makes AI so valuable isn’t just the information it provides, but how it adapts to your needs. It’s personalized, patient, and always ready to help.
So here’s a challenge - if you choose to accept it - ask AI to coach you on something new this week. Try out something new and see where it takes you.