The AI Gap Is Showing Up at the Dinner Table
So the Washington Post ran this piece last week about a couple in Pasadena, and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it.
Carolina Caro is 51, runs a leadership coaching company, and uses AI for basically everything. Writing emails, refining her work, even navigating menopause symptoms. ChatGPT is her "confidant," her words. Her husband? He thinks the whole thing is a menace.
And honestly, I see this playing out everywhere.
I've got friends who text me screenshots of conversations they're having with Claude about their business ideas at midnight. I've got other friends who still think AI is just a fancier version of that Clippy paperclip from Microsoft Word. The gap between "uses AI daily" and "refuses to touch it" is getting wider, and it's starting to show up in relationships, workplaces, even families.
Here's what struck me about Carolina's story. She's not a tech person. She's a leadership coach. She's 51. She didn't wait for permission or a tutorial or some corporate training program. She just started using it and figured out what worked for her. That's the whole game right now.
I built PillStreak (a study app for my sister-in-law's nursing program) the same way. I'm not an engineer. I just started talking to AI tools and building. The barrier isn't technical anymore. It's psychological. It's whether you're willing to try.
The people who are going to struggle aren't the ones who use AI "wrong." They're the ones who never start. Because while you're debating whether AI is good or bad, someone like Carolina is using it to run her business better, understand her health better, communicate better. She's lapping you.
I'm not saying you need to go full AI-everything overnight. But if you've been watching from the sidelines, maybe start with one thing. One email you ask ChatGPT to help you rewrite. One question you'd normally Google. Just see what happens.
The gap is real. Which side of it do you want to be on?