Hey everyone, welcome back to the notebook.
If you are a creative, a solo operator, or a misfit entrepreneur trying to build something real online, you’ve probably felt the ultimate crossfire lately. On one side, your purist friends look at generative AI like it’s a threat to humanity’s soul. On the other side, tech enthusiasts are screaming at you to automate everything.. NOW!
Enter Rachel Lee, co-founder of Neo Genesis - a lean, mean, visual branding agency built for creatives who refuse to water themselves down.
Rachel didn’t want anything to do with AI. When her business partner practically dragged her to use ChatGPT, her immediate reaction was pure resistance: “I don’t have time for this.”
But then she opened the prompt box, treated the AI like a human, and uncovered a massive truth: Ignoring the tech isn’t saving your craft. It’s just creating a quiet energy leak in your day-to-day operations.
In our latest episode, Rachel joins us for an incredibly honest, informal, and peppy look at what it actually feels like to build a business in an AI world without losing your mind, or your creative edge.
The Art vs. The Design bucket
One of the most brilliant framing devices Rachel shared is how she keeps her sanity intact by separating her creative work into two strictly policed buckets:
* The ART Bucket: This is self-expression. It’s private therapy. It’s Rachel sitting in a corner drawing to recharge her battery at the end of a hard day. AI is banned here because art is about the process, not a masterpiece for likes.
* The DESIGN Bucket: This is problem-solving for clients. It’s a business service. Because she isn’t precious about the grunt work, she uses AI as a high-powered personal assistant to fast-track research and clear the administrative clutter.
Leaving your first AI Partner
We also dive into the hilarious reality of tool fatigue. Rachel talks about getting comfortable with ChatGPT, only to have her partner suggest migrating the entire business to Claude.
“It’s like that feeling of only having dated one person. That’s your only context for a relationship. When he told me there were other tools, I went into overwhelm all over again!”
She breaks down why ChatGPT felt like “the friend who just says - yes go girlfriend! to every bad idea,” while Claude offered the actual depth needed to revamp brand copy.
Why AI visuals are still absolute sh*t
For anyone worried that AI is coming for premium design jobs anytime soon, Rachel has some comforting words. Despite using professional design terminology, she notes that AI still completely fails at high-level visual execution. It can’t navigate human nuance, and it definitely doesn’t understand the happy little accidents that happen when a human designer puzzles pieces together on a canvas.
The 30sec workflow flip
Before AI, Rachel would have spent 15 - 30 minutes after every single client call frantically typing up notes based on her faulty human memory. Today, she uses an audio tool called Granola (she swears by this!) paired with custom Notion templates.
The result? The call ends, she spends 30 seconds doing a copy-paste, and she’s done. More importantly, she can finally stop staring at a notepad and actually be present in her virtual coffee chats.
Listen to the full episode to hear:
* How to step through the vulnerability of being a beginner again.
* Why having a “bot participant” in a casual meeting completely ruins the vibe.
* Rachel’s dead giveaways for spotting non-human AI slop on your timeline.
Connect with Rachel:
* Website: https://www.neogenesis.me/
* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/racheltylee/
* YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@neogenesis_me
* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/neogenesis.me/
👉 Listen on
* YouTube:
* Spotify:
Keep it weird,
Pavitra
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pavitrast/
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