Nothing beats an in-person meet-up with your besties. Nothing.

This past week was a whirlwind of balancing the needs of a new contract I started, presenting myself and my work to Nobody Studios, wrapping up the B2B contract work for a current client, continuing to build the structures and connections I need for my business, trying to stay current with the latest AI advances, and preparing for my first time meeting my online besties, Nicole and Linda.

I started the week a little freaked-out about the Nobody Studios thing. This is an organization of big start-up folx who have the goal of establishing 100 AI-native companies over the next 5 years. To aid in that, they went out and found folx (like me) who are actively building and working with clients to solve the business issues that show up as patterns across every industry and vertical. Couple of weeks ago when they onboarded me and 40 other people, they'd invited folx to sign up for a 15 minute presentation on their weekly internal meeting. You know me. My current method of building my business is commit and figure the rest out later. So I did. And then all of the sudden it was my turn in a day.

Here's the 'pitch' I presented if you want to see what it looked like. It actually turned out better than I'd expected and I've had two of the leadership group reach out and congratulate me on a great presentation.

And then I fell - oh-so-easily - back into my former M.O. of being a yes-person, people pleaser with my contract work. It happened so quickly and while my new internal 'business owner' voice was saying, "Hold up, Deb. You're committing to something that will impact your trip to Denver with your besties" I completely ignored it and committed to something I hadn't fully figured out, counting on my usual mix of dopamine, adrenaline, and deadlines to have me muscle through it.

In my mind I'm seeing that Family Feud 'X' for when someone gives an answer and the voice goes, "Survey says!" Because this was the single decision that, had I chosen differently, would have made a huge difference.

Thursday saw me scurrying to complete some major things (preparing for my first solo B2B training with a non-profit, packing for a flight to Denver, responding to requests for meetings and further information) before heading to the airport for a desperately needed and highly anticipated first physical meeting with Nicole Eisdorfer and Linda Sung, my fellow Witches of LinkyLand. What I hadn't considered was how storms would delay the flight and how being a mile higher than the flats of Minnesota would affect my body.

Friday morning saw me getting up at 6:30AM (because of course - my contract client is east coast, and instead of being my usual central time, I was now in mountain time) to attempt to puzzle out a highly manual reporting process so I could cover for a lead who was heading out on vacation on Monday.

Y'all - I tried. I really did. But my brain was not gonna be braining. At least, not in the way it usually does. Cue confusion, dizziness, and memory loss (fun fact, I hadn't done a VLookup in a couple years and stupidly thought it would come back once I was in a workbook.)

For a while I told myself the lesson was simple: my gut said no, I said yes anyway, lesson learned, trust the gut. But that's not it. Because I'd said the exact same kind of yes earlier that week to Nobody Studios - commit now, figure it out later - and that one worked. Two leaders reached out to say it was a great presentation.

Same instinct. Same "say yes and muscle through." Opposite outcomes.

So it wasn't the yes. The Nobody Studios yes was a full-tank yes, building my own thing, the kind that fills me up. The contract yes was an empty-tank yes, for someone else's report, given on a body that was already a mile in the air and running on fumes. The variable was never my gut. It was my energy, and whose tank the yes was actually filling.

Nicole named the other half of it for me this weekend (she and Linda are my forever guinea pigs - they test every freebie before you ever see it). She pointed out there's a second kind of bad yes: the one you say when your tank is full and you say yes to a thing just because it's there. The sale-rack yes. Cheap, and you regret it the second you get it home. I'd never had a word for that one until she handed it to me.

So if there's a yes sitting in your inbox right now - the one you're already drafting the guilt reply to in your head - this issue is for that. Not to teach you to say no. To find the smaller, truer yes hiding inside it. 'Cause I figure I'm not the only midlife woman who does this.

The rest of this weekend? Priceless. Truly. I'm writing this from the spare bedroom in Nicole's home after two lovely evenings packed with delicious food, crafting, soul nurturing conversation, and fully cementing the relationship the three of us have built online over the last couple of years.

I've been remote since 2006. I met my husband while performing as Taunter Goodnight in the virtual platform Second Life. I'm a huge advocate for people connecting virtually across time zones, languages, and cultures. And still, there is nothing that replaces human beings sharing space and a meal together. AI will never be able to replicate that and frankly, we wouldn't want it to.

I head home on Tuesday morning and I'm already missing these ladies and this wonderfully chaotic household. My spirit and my soul feel filled up. And there is a clearness in my purpose that was not there even a couple days ago. For anyone right now struggling, stop running and make time for your besties, whoever and wherever they might be.

Here's what I keep forgetting: the yes I give on empty isn't generous. It's a loan I take out against next Friday, at interest.

I tell myself I'm being kind. Reliable. The woman who shows up. I tell myself adrenaline will cover the gap, that resting first would make me precious, or lazy, or worse - the woman who said no when she technically could have said yes.

So I say yes. And adrenaline does show up. It always shows up. And then it hands me the bill at 6:30AM, in a workbook I can't read.

You're allowed to check the gauge before you answer. Not when it's polite. Not after you've earned it by running all the way dry first. Before you open your mouth.

The guilt doesn't get to fill in the number for you.

The stuff that touched, moved, and inspired me this week. Or in the case of the last one, made me laugh entirely too hard.

Projection screen
When you become a public person, people start projecting things onto you. Not necessarily who you are. Who they need you to be. A fascinating conversation about identity, expectations, and being human.

Walkies
I really wish I had this level of enthusiasm for going for a walk. These doggies obviously find exercise even better than eating (seriously, incomprehensible).

Panda feng shui
These pandas are #goals for me. Dunno about the rest of y'all, but sleep has become something where all conditions must be juuuuust right for me to achieve maximum unconsciousness. I look at these furry lumps and I aspire to have this level of unconcern.

A quick word from this week's partner (yes, another real live ad - still gotta keep the lights on around here 💜)

Raise your hand if "staying current with AI" has ever looked like 14 open tabs, two half-watched demos, and a newsletter pile you swear you'll get to someday... 🙋🏻‍♀️ (reader, it's me.)

There is more AI news every single day than any woman with a job, a life, and a finite supply of patience can actually read. The Rundown AI does the scrolling for you - the news that matters, the tools worth a look, the occasional tutorial, all in one free five-minute email every morning. No firehose. No guilt pile.

Which feels about right for the week we're having around here: you don't have to consume all of it. Five minutes, free, and somebody else already did the doomscroll. Give it a peek.

You don't have to scroll every AI thread, track every new tool, or watch every demo. 

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Someone you actually like wants an hour on the phone. You want to say yes. You also have nothing left today, and you know how this ends. You say yes, shove three things aside to make room, and show up to the call already gone.

The Yes Check reads your energy first, then the ask. Two minutes, no signup. And it doesn't teach you to say no. It finds the smaller yes hiding inside the big one - a voice note instead of the hour, twenty minutes instead of the whole afternoon. You keep the friend. You keep the time.

You walk away with your pattern named, one rule for the week, and a Yes Card you can email yourself and paste back next time, so it remembers what trips you up.

Then, when you're ready, there's a kit that teaches you to rebuild the whole thing inside the AI you already use - ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini - so it learns your traps and writes the response in your voice. The AI lesson, minus the lecture.

Here's the part that keeps you stuck in the too-big yes: you already said it. Going back now feels like flaking. Like you're the unreliable one. So you white-knuckle the whole commitment and show up wrecked, because backing out feels worse than burning out.

But quietly renegotiating, early and honestly, is not flaking. Flaking is going silent and bailing at the last minute. This is the opposite of that. This is the grown-up version - you keep the relationship and you keep yourself.

So here's a prompt for the yes you've already given and can't actually afford.

The ROCO Prompt
Copy this whole thing and paste it into ChatGPT, Claude, or Perplexity. Then answer the questions it asks you, one at a time.

What happens next
The AI asks you three questions. Answer them honestly. Then it shows you the difference between what you promised and what you piled on yourself, and it hands you a message you can actually send. Edit it to sound like you, then send it. You're not bailing. You're right-sizing.

The Matriarchy Minute is where I spotlight women doing work in AI that you should know about but probably don't.

This week: Whitney Menarcheck

I met Whitney when I got into SheBuilds by Lovable, Season 01 - a 48-hour buildathon where women from all over the world sat down to vibe code, many of them for the very first time. Whitney was the one holding the whole thing together. She had us all piling into Discord (a tool most of us had never touched) and somehow kept the nerve and the connection high for two solid days while a roomful of women did something that genuinely scared them.

Here's the part I love. Whitney didn't come from tech. Her background is counseling psychology, and it shows. The way she runs a room full of nervous first-timers feels less like a product launch and more like someone making sure nobody gets left alone with the hard part. Tech with a heartbeat, as she puts it.

If you've ever wanted to build something but assumed you'd be the only one in the room who didn't get it, Whitney is the one quietly making sure that's not true. Find her on LinkedIn and keep an eye on SheBuilds.

Find Whitney on LinkedIn.

Friday, June 12 | 10 AM CDT (It’s happening this week from Denver!)
Friday Jam Session with Joy Prompt Club. 30 minutes. No agenda. Just prompts, play, and people who get it. Open to anyone who wants to join in and has questions or a problem they’re trying to solve. You do not need to be in Joy Prompt Club to benefit from these fantastic humans.

The Executive AI Edge - Digital course (90 minutes) with me and Kate Sargent. $449. For the executive in your life who's nodding along in AI meetings and understanding none of it.

AI Confidential for Teams - The corporate AI training that doesn't sound like corporate AI training. Send the link to whoever's making training decisions at your company.

Joy Prompt Club - My favorite little virtual place in all the interwebz.

AI Confidential Prompt Kits - 10 copy-paste-ready prompt kits for the stuff you actually need help with - resumes, LinkedIn profiles, interview prep, content, career direction, caregiver sanity, all of it.

Fifty-two issues in, written from the spare bedroom in Nicole's house by a woman whose soul is full and whose brain only really came back online somewhere around Saturday afternoon. I head home Tuesday. I'm already missing the noise of this house.

Go check your tank before you say the next yes. Not the big heroic version. Just the smaller, truer one. You don't have to earn the right to do that first.

💜

Take care of yourself, take care of each other,

Deb

P.S. Go run something through The Yes Check - ideally the actual yes you're dreading right now, the one sitting in your inbox. Then hit reply and tell me: did it find you a smaller version you could live with, or did you guilt-yes it anyway? Tell me what worked, what flopped. That's how it gets better.

P.P.S. I love hearing from you. If AI's got you feeling stuck, behind, or dumb, or you just need a human to talk it through with, hit reply. That inbox is me. It's always been me.