Most of what appears on this site is written by hand on my laptop keyboard.
However, because of a damaged tendon junction in my right hand and managing arthritis in my fingers and thumbs, typing everything isn't always manageable.
On days when my hands are painful, I voice dictate posts instead. I speak into a mic and let it output a long stream of consciousness. It’s often the best way to capture an idea quickly while it’s fresh in my head.
Whenever I can, I go back and edit those spoken drafts by hand to make sure they communicate as intended. But for longer posts, doing all that manual editing an still feel like a challenge. Sometimes I’ll use AI to fix up the basic spelling and grammar from the voice-to-text transcript.
I'm open about this because I've tried using AI to actually generate writing for me in the past, and it completely ruined the experience. It was the exact reason I stopped writing for two or three years, and it killed my love for writing entirely.
The whole point of writing for me is to learn how to articulate my thoughts, refine my perspectives, and communicate them clearly.
Artificial intelligence is a practical tool that can be used to tidy up dictated drafts, meaning I can keep publishing without worsening my hand injuries in the process.