Are you using AI as a tool or a crutch?
The difference between AI leverage and AI dependency could shape your career (and your brain).
AI dependency doesn’t announce itself.
You don’t wake up one day unable to write a brief without ChatGPT. You don’t suddenly lose the ability to think through problems on your own.
It happens gradually. One shortcut at a time.
You’re busy. A deadline is looming. ChatGPT can write that brief in 30 seconds. Why wouldn’t you?
Then you do it again. And again. Until one day you’re staring at a blank screen and you genuinely don’t know where to start without it.
A line exists between using AI to get faster and using AI because you’ve forgotten how to think for yourself. The trap is that you won’t notice when you cross it.
I’ll show you the difference between AI leverage and AI dependency. What happens to your brain when you outsource your thinking (the research is shocking). And how to use AI without losing the skills that actually matter.
You’ll know exactly where that line is. And how to stay on the right side of it.
How dependency develops
AI leverage: you understand the task, you know what good looks like, you use AI to speed things up.
AI dependency: you use AI because you don’t know how to do it yourself anymore.
The first makes you faster. The second makes you irrelevant.
Here’s what most people miss. Every time AI does your thinking for you, you’re choosing not to develop that skill yourself. Do it enough times, and those skills start to atrophy.
You stop learning how to structure a brief properly. How to spot a budget issue before it becomes a crisis. How to communicate clearly without a chatbot holding your hand.
Your brain takes the path of least resistance. And that path leads to dependency.
Think about the last project brief you wrote. Did you draft it yourself first, then refine it with AI? Or did you prompt ChatGPT and hope for the best?
If you chose the second option, ask yourself: could you still do it the first way if you needed to?
What the research shows
A 2025 study from MIT’s Media Lab tracked 54 students over four months as they wrote essays. One group used ChatGPT exclusively, another used Google Search, and a third relied purely on their brains.
83% of ChatGPT users couldn’t recall key points from their own essays. None could provide accurate quotes from their work. The cognitive decline continued after they stopped using AI. Their brains stayed sluggish.
Another 2025 study examined 666 people across different age groups and education levels. Researchers found a significant negative correlation between frequent AI tool usage and critical thinking abilities. The more people relied on AI, the weaker their independent reasoning became. Younger participants showed the highest dependence on AI tools and scored lowest in critical thinking assessments.
83% couldn’t remember what they’d written. Their own work.
The trap doesn’t feel like a trap when you’re saving hours every week. But those hours saved now could cost you years of career growth later.
Staying in control
You can use AI without becoming dependent on it. You need to be deliberate about how you use it before the habits set in.
Draft first, then refine
Outline your project brief yourself before asking ChatGPT to write it. Know what you want to say. Understand the client’s needs. Map out the key deliverables and timelines.
Then let AI help you say it better. Polish the language. Check for gaps. Speed up the formatting.
You’re still doing the thinking. AI makes you faster.
This feels slower at first. That’s the point. You’re building the skill while using AI to speed up execution. Six months from now, you’ll have both the expertise and the efficiency.
Speed versus substitution
Need help formatting a massive spreadsheet? Perfect use case.
Don’t know how to structure a basic project timeline? That’s a skill you need to build.
AI should accelerate work you already understand. Reaching for AI because you genuinely don’t know how to do something is where dependency starts. Learn the skill properly. Then use AI to do it faster.
The moment you think “I’ll just let ChatGPT figure this out” instead of “I’ll figure this out, then use ChatGPT to speed it up” is the moment you need to pause.
Test your understanding
When you paste that AI-generated response into an email, do you understand why it works? Could you have written something similar without help?
Try this: close ChatGPT for a day. Do your normal work without it!
If that thought makes you uncomfortable, you’re closer to dependency than you think. If it makes you panic, you might already be there.
Master the process before automating it
The best project managers I know use AI to speed up processes they’ve already mastered. They understand the workflow, the logic, the reasoning behind each step. AI makes them faster at executing what they already know works.
The trap catches people who try to skip the learning part entirely. They ask AI to build systems they don’t understand. Create processes they’ve never done manually.
That’s like hiring a junior PM who’s never managed a project but can prompt ChatGPT really well.
Would you hire that person? Then don’t become that person.
Quick wins to avoid the trap
Draft your own version first, then compare it with what AI produces. You’ll learn faster and retain more.
Use AI to refine your work, not create it from scratch. You stay in control of the thinking.
If you can’t do the task without AI, spend time learning how to do it properly. That investment compounds.
Never send AI-generated content without reading and understanding it fully. No exceptions.
Ask yourself monthly: what skills am I actually building versus outsourcing? Be honest.
Before it’s too late
AI isn’t going anywhere. Neither is your brain.
Five years from now, everyone will know how to use AI. It’ll be as basic as knowing how to use email.
Your ability to think will separate you from everyone else. To solve problems AI can’t see. To understand context AI misses. To make judgement calls that actually matter.
The trap is already set. AI is faster, easier, and always available. The temptation to lean on it completely is constant.
But once you cross that line from leverage to dependency, clawing your way back is hard. The skills you didn’t build won’t magically reappear. The thinking patterns you outsourced won’t return overnight.
Use AI to get faster at things you already know how to do well. That’s leverage.
Catch yourself before you start using it because you don’t know how to do something. That’s how dependency begins.
You still have a choice. Make it deliberately.
Sources:
MIT Media Lab, “Your Brain on ChatGPT: Accumulation of Cognitive Debt when Using an AI Assistant for Essay Writing Task” (2025)
Gerlich, M. “AI Tools in Society: Impacts on Cognitive Offloading and the Future of Critical Thinking” (2025)