There is a scripture that says the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.
I have never felt that verse more personally than I did last Tuesday at 7pm.
I had gotten home late, already tired in that bone deep way that teaching gives you sometimes. Not just physically tired. The kind of tired that sits in your chest. And waiting for me was a custom Bunco order that needed to be done. A customer had requested four columns instead of six across five separate documents, which meant moving lines, recentering text, adjusting font sizes, and doing it five times in a row with the precision a paying customer deserves.
My spirit was fully committed. I owed this person quality work and I knew it.
Twenty minutes in, I had finished exactly one document. Four to go. I did the math on how late I was going to be up and I didn't love the answer.
Then I had a thought. I wonder what Ideogram would do with this.
I uploaded the first document, typed out what I needed in plain everyday language, and watched it work.
Ninety seconds.
It did in ninety seconds what I had been wrestling with for twenty minutes. I sat there for a moment just staring at the screen. I won't pretend I wasn't emotional about it. When you are that tired and something just works, the relief is real. I almost cried. No drama, just truth.
I finished all five documents in seven minutes. Drafts were sent to my customer. I was in bed by nine o'clock, which was exactly what I needed.
That tiny monthly subscription fee for Ideogram has never felt more worth it than it did in that moment.
The second AI win this week was less dramatic but honestly just as satisfying.
I finally listed the Final Wishes Estate Planner that I had been putting off. You might remember me mentioning it a few weeks ago, the digital fillable HTML planner that Claude helped me build from an old printable product. The one I was so proud of and then let sit on my laptop for two weeks.
The part I had been dreading was the listing photos. Creating professional mockup images for Etsy used to take me forever. Buying mockup templates, placing products inside them in Canva, adjusting everything until it looked halfway decent. It was tedious and the results always felt a little generic.
This time I gave Claude my product description and some screenshots of the actual digital screens and asked for Ideogram prompts specifically designed for Etsy listing photos. What came back were seven detailed prompts covering everything from a clean desk hero image to a cozy lifestyle shot to a multi-device mockup.
I ran them through Ideogram, picked the best variations, added a few simple text overlays in Canva, and had a complete professional looking listing photo set in a fraction of the time. They looked like catalogue images, not homemade mockups. The difference was noticeable.
The product is listed. Finally.
Here is the thing both of these experiences have in common. In each case the AI didn't replace my judgment, my commitment to quality, or my care for my customer. It just removed the friction that was standing between my intention and the result.
I believe customer service is everything. I have spent two hours customizing a $4.99 product for a customer because I wanted them to come back and tell their friends. That decision had nothing to do with AI and everything to do with values. But when I am bone tired at 7pm and a tool can handle the mechanical parts of the job in ninety seconds, it means I still show up for my customer even when my flesh is weak.
That is what these tools are actually for.
Your turn. What is the task you keep putting off because it feels too tedious, too technical, or too time consuming for what it pays? Open Ideogram or Claude, describe what you need in plain language, and see what comes back. You might be in bed by nine.
The AI assist this week: Ideogram for Bunco document customization and Etsy listing photo generation. Claude for Ideogram prompt creation.
The honest take: Two different problems, two different tools, both solved faster than I expected. The subscription fees are worth it. Not because AI is magic, but because time and energy are finite and anything that protects both is an investment worth making.
See you next Wednesday. — Kelly
P.S. Haven't grabbed the free NotebookLM Quick Start guide yet? Five prompts that show you exactly what this tool can do for your content. Grab it free right here.