Unlearn

Let me start by defining what ‘unlearning’ is, and the importance of it.

First, you learn something.  Lets say it’s a particular way of doing things.  Two specific work cases are copywriting and Google Ads management.

Historically copywriting is done as follows: You have a subject.  You create an outline.  You get a framework like the hamburger paragraph where you tell them what you’re going to tell them, you tell them, then you tell them what you told them.  And you expand into an article, a book, a post, whatever.

Google ads what done as follows: You take a client brief for a campaign, and all it’s goals, it’s objectives, and all the creative you have.  Then you put together the campaign doing keyword research, select your targeting and budget, then set it up.  To do this well you have to really understand the system.  Tweak all the levers, and really refine what you’re doing to get the best results using optimization techniques.

Now, with technology impacting everything, AI impacting everything.  It’s like that meme with the kid who likes corn, when you add butter, everything changed.  AI is butter.

So now, for copywriters, you can use Chat GPT to create the outline, build the framework and even write the post.

For Ads Specialists, you can set up the campaign in the system, and AI will optimize and get better results than you ever could.

So, from one day to the next, your job completely changes.

You have to unlearn the way you previously worked to adapt and adjust to this new way of working.

First, you have to realize the change has happened, and accept it.  Once you’ve finished denying the world has shifted, and finally wrap your brain around the fact that things will never be the same, you have to unlearn the way you did things for years that worked so well.

Now, you have to work WITH the machine, rather than against it.  It is improving so much faster that it will soon, if it hasn’t already pass you and your capabilities.

Now, not everything is as great as it seems.  Computers do have the ability to overwrite their previous programming on the hardware they have installed.  But this can also cause some issues, like catastrophic forgetting.  Important fundamentals get over-written, and that causes major errors.

But in people, it’s the willingness to change.  It’s hard when something as fundamental as gravity doesn’t work anymore.  What you were taught and learned the hard way either doesn’t apply anymore, or what was true, just isn’t.

So we all have to be more fluid in our knowledge.  More accepting that the fundamental truths are few and far between, and you have to be flexible about just about everything else.

One of the best things you’ll ever do is learn how to be comfortable with rapid change.  It’s only going to get faster.  It’s only going to get crazier.  It’s only going to get better.