Reflecting on receiving four-star reviews for an AI workshop and the journey from people-pleasing to creating authentic experiences on my own terms.

Yesterday I delivered a workshop on AI for senior leaders. Ten people showed up to learn from me, and I did something beautiful: I decided not to gatekeep anything. I shared everything I know about AI, holding nothing back.

I designed it as a hands-on learning experience, meeting people exactly where they are. You can't teach complex software to people who don't know the basics, so I gave them challenges that matched their level. Though looking back, maybe I made it too easy.

Afterward, I checked the ratings on the meetup page. Two people gave me four stars out of five. The rest didn't vote at all. Just two four-star reviews.

I felt disappointed. I genuinely want to create five-star experiences for people, and falling short of that mark stung. It made me wonder if I should have created something even crazier, even better.

But then another thought surfaced: maybe I should stop talking about AI altogether. Maybe I should stop trying to satisfy people with what they want me to talk about and instead focus on the things I actually care about. Because honestly? I don't really care about AI.

My AI YouTube coach keeps telling me that when I go philosophical, people don't care. They stop watching my videos. But philosophy is who I am. I want to help people in a philosophical way, not just a practical way. I believe the practical approach isn't really... well, that's another conversation.

Here's why I'm telling you all this: if this had happened to me two years ago, I would have felt awful. The idea that I created something and people perceived it as only worth four stars would have devastated me back then.

But today? I'm practicing not caring what other people think about me. I still want to create five-star experiences, but because I want to create them—not because I need external validation. I don't feel bad about what people might think of me. This is what I'm trying to practice, and I think I'm doing pretty well these last couple of months.

Two years ago, four-star reviews would have made me feel terrible. I might have quit or given up entirely. Today, when I see a four-star review, I think about how to improve. I want to ask the people who gave those ratings: What was off for you? What do you need more of? How could we have done better? What do you think about this topic in general?

That shift—from devastation to curiosity, from people-pleasing to self-directed improvement—that's the biggest takeaway here. The freedom of not caring what others think while still caring deeply about the quality of what you create.

That's where I am now.