Do I Have the Energy To Learn AI?

Why "I'm not strong enough" is the excuse that hides exhaustion, and why strength might look different than you think.

Nora's alarm goes off at 6:15 AM.

By 7:00, she's made lunches, signed permission slips, and reminded her teenager twice about after-school plans. By 9:00, she's at her desk, reviewing the same project plan she was too tired to finish last night. By noon, she's answered forty-three emails and attended two meetings.

By 3:00 PM, she sees an email about a new AI training. Optional, but recommended. Something about efficiency tools that could save time.

She stares at the subject line. She knows she should sign up. She knows it might help. But her brain simply says: I cannot add one more thing. I am not strong enough for this.

She closes the email. She tells herself she'll get to it later. She doesn't.

If this sounds familiar, you're not alone. Nora is one of you. She's strong, she's been strong for years, for her kids, for her team, for everyone who relies on her. And she's tired. Not the tired that a good night's sleep fixes. The tired that comes from carrying a hundred small weights every day.

And now, someone wants to add another one.

Where This Excuse Hides

For Nora, it's "I'm already stretched so thin. I can't add one more thing to my plate."

For Clara, it's "Between the kids and the house and everything else, I have nothing left for myself."

For Elena, it's "I'm just starting out. I don't have the reserves to take on something this big."

For Patricia, it's "At my age, I've earned the right to rest. Why should I push myself now?"

The excuse sounds different for each woman, but underneath it's the same truth: you're exhausted. And the idea of learning something new - something that feels big and unfamiliar as learning AI does - feels like asking a runner to sprint a marathon after they've already run ten miles.

Who Was Wayne Dyer?

Dr. Wayne W. Dyer (1940–2015) was an American psychologist, author, and motivational speaker who became one of the most influential voices in the self-help movement.

After earning his doctorate in counselling from Wayne State University, Dyer worked as a high school guidance counsellor and later as a professor at St. John's University in New York. His first book, Your Erroneous Zones (1976), became one of the best-selling books of all time, with over 35 million copies sold worldwide.

Over his career, Dyer wrote more than 40 books. His work evolved from psychological themes like motivation and self-actualization to deeper spiritual teachings influenced by thinkers such as Abraham Maslow, Lao Tzu, and Swami Muktananda.

This blog post is a part of a series based on Dyer’s book “Excuses Begone! How to Change Lifelong, Self-Defeating Thinking Habits”, which was published in 2009 by Hay House.

Dyer's gentle, compassionate approach reminds us that we're capable of far more than our excuses would have us believe: a perfect starting point for our conversation about AI and staying human. 

What Dyer Knew About Strength

Wayne Dyer often said that strength is not about pushing harder. It's about aligning with something larger than yourself.

For the excuse "I'm not strong enough," Dyer offered this affirmation:

"I have access to unlimited assistance. My strength comes from my connection to my source."

Notice he didn't say "try harder." He said "you have access to unlimited assistance." Strength, in Dyer's view, is not something you manufacture alone. It's something you receive when you stop believing you have to carry everything by yourself.

The Lies We Believe About Strength

Let's look at some of the stories you might be telling yourself about what strength looks like:

The Lie: Strength means doing it all myself.

The Truth: Strength is knowing when to ask for help, when to delegate, when to let something go.

You've been strong alone. Imagine what you could do with support.

The Lie: If I rest, I'm being weak.

The Truth: Rest is not the opposite of strength. Rest is how strength is restored.

 A tree that bends in the wind doesn't break. A tree that refuses to move does.

The Lie: I have to keep up with everyone else.

The Truth: Your pace is your own. You don't need to match anyone else's timeline.

Learning one thing this month is more than you knew last month. That's progress.

The Lie: I should have more energy than this.

The Truth: You have exactly the energy you have. Judging it doesn't create more.

The question isn't "why am I so tired?" The question is "what can I do with the energy I have?"

The Lie: Strength means never feeling tired.

The Truth: Strength is continuing to show up even when you're tired.

Nora shows up for her kids, her work, her life -

every day. That's not weakness. That's the definition of strength.

Learning AI: One Small Thing You Can Do Today

Here's a practice I borrowed from my own life. I call it the "One Thing, Not Everything" rule.

When you feel the "I can't add one more thing" voice rising, ask yourself one question: What's the smallest possible step I could take toward understanding AI? Not the whole journey. Not the training course. Not the expert certification. Just one tiny step.

Maybe it's:

• Opening the email and reading just the subject line.

• Asking a colleague, "What's one AI tool you actually like?"

• Watching a three-minute video while you drink your morning coffee.

• Writing down one question you have, just to get it out of your head.

That's it. One small step. You don't need to sprint the marathon. You just need to put one foot in front of the other.

What happens when you do: you prove to yourself that you can show up, even when you're tired. And showing up, even in the smallest way, is where strength lives.

A Gentle Invitation

I keep a small notebook where I track my "one things." Not the big goals I'm not reaching. Just the small steps I actually took. Looking back at them reminds me that I'm doing more than I give myself credit for.

If you're someone who finds proof on paper, I make journals for exactly these moments. A place to capture the small steps, the quiet efforts, the evidence that you're stronger than the tired voice in your head wants you to believe.

But even the back of a receipt works. The important thing is to see what you're already doing—and give yourself credit for it.

Back to Strenght

The day she finally opened that email, Nora didn't sign up for the training. She didn't have the energy for that. But she read the first paragraph. It mentioned a tool that could summarize long email threads. She bookmarked it. That was it.

A week later, on a day when the inbox felt especially endless, she remembered the bookmark. She opened it. She tried it. It saved her twenty minutes.

Twenty minutes she used to sit quietly with her tea before the next meeting.

She didn't feel stronger, exactly. She felt something else. Something like: I did something for myself today. A small thing. But it was mine.

Strength is not the absence of exhaustion. Strength is doing one small thing anyway, because it matters to you.

You don't need to have endless energy to learn. You don't need to be the strongest person in the room. You just need to take one small step, in your own time, at your own pace.

And let that be enough.

Come back soon. There's more to talk about.

Warm greetings

 Maria