There’s this whole ecosystem of free webinars these days. A young guy on Zoom, all excited, promising to show you the latest and greatest AI tools. They usually happen after office hours or on weekends, cost next to nothing, and are packed with mind-blowing tips. I’ve joined a few, and honestly, I’ve learned a lot. But what I’ve also learned is that these webinars aren’t really about the tools at all.
They’re selling a fantasy.
It’s the same sales pitch every time: “Let AI do the heavy lifting.” This line, this phrase, is everywhere. It’s the battle cry of the new-age guru. It’s not about using AI to free up your time for more interesting, creative work. No, no. It’s about using AI to free you from work, period. It’s about how you can write emails, create content, and build presentations without ever having to think.
And it’s not just for content. Even in stock trading webinars, the message is the same: use our tools to make money without working hard. You might get lucky. You might even get rich. But what kind of message is that? What happened to the thrill of the struggle?
I know I’m going to sound like some grumpy uncle from D-Mart, but hear me out. Your brain is like a ChatGPT of life experiences. How can you expect it to come up with a solution to a problem if you haven’t done the heavy lifting yourself? If you haven’t lived it, breathed it, and failed at it a hundred times? You can’t learn to build a business just by trading stocks. There’s a world of experience in dealing with people, in touching and selling actual things, that no algorithm can teach you. The roadside vendor has more stories to share than a guy who’s just been trading stocks for years.
The real danger here is that we are teaching an entire generation to run on fake aspirations. We’re telling them that success is all about the destination, not the journey. That you can skip the hard part and still get the glory. People want to earn money without working hard, not because they are lazy, but because they have extended their legs far beyond their earning potential. They are in a constant revenue deficit and are looking for shortcuts to fill it.
AI is a wonderful tool. It’s a Ferrari for your mind. But you still have to learn how to drive it. These webinars sell the car and promise you don’t need a license. They’ll give you a few cool tricks for free, then bait you into buying an expensive course on a low-cost EMI. They’ll tell you the original course was worth lakhs, playing into that scarcity effect, all to make money from people who want to make money without working. It’s a pyramid scheme of aspirations.
I just wonder what will happen when this bubble finally bursts. When people realize that without doing the heavy lifting, without the struggle, you haven’t built anything solid. No one ever said life was a no-cost EMI. Some things, my friends, you just have to pay for with effort.
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