Keep Some of the Thinking for Yourself

Reading a demanding book and watching a short explanation of it are different experiences. Both can be useful. Only one asks you to stay with every paragraph, notice the gap in your understanding and work out how the ideas fit together.

Ease is valuable when it removes pointless effort. It becomes worth questioning when it also removes the part of a task through which you were learning.

This is the distinction I mean by productive friction: effort chosen for a purpose, rather than difficulty accepted simply because it is difficult.

Separate learning effort from unnecessary burden

A confusing interface, an unclear brief or repeated administrative work can consume attention without teaching you much. Reducing that burden makes sense.

Explaining an unfamiliar idea, comparing interpretations or trying to solve a problem before seeing an answer involves a different kind of effort. It reveals where your understanding is incomplete.

The aim is not maximum cognitive load. An overwhelming task can leave you with less to work with. Choose a challenge you can engage with, and leave enough room for feedback and recovery.

A useful question is: what am I trying to practise here? If the answer is nothing, the friction may be a candidate for removal. If the answer is a capability you value, think carefully before delegating all of it.

A physical analogy, held lightly

Slow resistance training has helped me think about deliberate effort. Slowing a movement makes aspects of the work harder to rush past. I have practised and taught it, and the experience offers an image for how I approach learning.

The brain is not a muscle, and a training analogy does not establish what a cognitive exercise will do. The useful parallel is simply the choice to remain engaged with a process rather than relying on momentum.

You might read a difficult passage without immediately asking for a summary. You might explain a concept in your own words before checking an explanation. The effort gives you information about what you actually understand.

Use AI to challenge a first attempt

AI can help remove the blank page, organise material and generate possibilities. It can also make it easy to move from a fluent answer to a feeling of comprehension without testing the gap between them.

One practical adjustment is to do a first pass yourself. Sketch the argument, identify the variables or write what you think the answer is. Then invite the tool to challenge it.

You now have something of your own to compare with the response. Where do they differ? Which claim needs evidence? What would you need to know before accepting the better-sounding version?

This is a choice about how to practise, rather than a claim that using AI inevitably weakens judgment. Different tasks and purposes call for different kinds of assistance.

Give the practice a small budget

Choose one recurring task where understanding matters to you. Set aside a manageable period to work without the usual shortcut. You could outline a proposal, explain a reading or think through a decision on paper.

Then add output. Tell someone outside your field what you think you learned. Write a short explanation and mark the sentence you cannot yet defend. Ask a colleague to identify the assumption you missed.

The practice ends with checking, not merely effort. Struggling alone is no guarantee that you have understood correctly.

For one week, keep one small piece of thinking that you would normally delegate. Notice what it reveals. What kind of assistance helps you learn, and what kind lets you skip the very capability you wanted to develop?