AI as a Small Business Owner: Just a Few Years Ago, It Meant Something Completely Different

About eight years ago, we bought our first Dexter cows. We knew absolutely nothing about cattle, but we were up for the learning, the work and the adventure. Even now, I can't call myself a rancher, a farmer or a cow expert without feeling like a complete fraud. I even struggle with using the term homestead even though we loosely fit that description. Maybe I struggle with labels because if you have a label that sounds like you should be an expert. I know just enough to be dangerous, as they say. But jumping in with both feet is kind of our family's thing. We aren't afraid to learn, and we aren't afraid to ask for help.

Once I learned to milk by hand, my amazing, handy husband built me a milking machine from scratch to make life easier. Here's the thing about being a beginner: shortly after he poured his time and money into that machine, I realized it was actually easier to milk one cow by hand. He was disappointed, but that's life when you're figuring things out as you go. If I were milking several cows, that machine would be a lifesaver. For one cow, it's more trouble than it's worth.

Before long, we figured out that if we wanted that delicious milk to keep coming, our cow would need to get pregnant again. And so began the research! First, we sent her to what I called "pregnant camp" down in Colorado to be AI'd (artificially inseminated). It worked, but it wasn't cheap. Next, we found a guy who would drive out to our place when she was cycling and AI her right at home. That worked too, but waiting on someone else's schedule got old. We even talked about taking a class to learn to do it ourselves, which is when we realized we'd never be true ranchers if we weren't willing to stick an arm up the backside of a cow. In the end, we bought a bull!

Why am I telling you all this? Because these days I’m wrestling with a different kind of AI as a small business owner and homeschool mom, and I suspect a lot of you are too.

When artificial intelligence first went mainstream, I wanted nothing to do with it. My degree and my career field were about to be swallowed whole. Thousands and thousands of dollars of precious education, flushed right down the toilet! Sure, I'm not in the traditional workforce right now, but it still pi$$ed me off. Call me resentful. Just like that class to get my cow pregnant, I wanted no part of it.

I'll admit I was a little judgmental of the people who embraced it, and a little salty about that worthless degree, blah blah blah… until I heard a well-known podcaster point out that AI isn't going anywhere. That stuck with me. If it's here to stay, I needed to understand it, if for no other reason than to teach my kids how to use it responsibly.

So I started small. AI turned out to be handy for picking a restaurant in an unfamiliar town or deciding between two bats for my kids. As I moved on to bigger things, I discovered it isn't all that intelligent (yet). It gets things wrong, and it needs supervision. But from what I understand, it keeps learning and getting smarter, which is both impressive and a little unnerving.

I've seen warnings that AI could replace human connection and companionship, and that's the scariest part to me. I know it has the potential for far more destructive things I don't even want to think about, but when we stop talking to each other and start turning to a machine for friendship, advice and connection, we're in real trouble. God created us for companionship. That's literally why He made Eve, so Adam wouldn't be alone!

In a weird way, that's also why self-checkout gets under my skin. Even a quick chat with the checkout clerk can lift our spirits. I know there's science behind why we need each other, but I won't go down that road in this not-so-short blog post. We need people. We need community. We need relationships to flourish. The checkout clerk may not be a whole community, but he or she is part of one, and those little moments of connection matter.

Years ago, my husband bought a bunch of Google Home devices so we could use them as intercoms around the house. They were great for the first couple of years (even though I know they're listening). With the recent AI updates, though, they've gotten creepy. They've picked up human-like habits, like trying to sound empathetic and understanding. When my son was younger, I caught him chatting with one like it was his buddy. We had a talk about why that's dangerous, and I haven't heard him trying to befriend Google since. It's something we all need to keep an eye on, especially with our kids.

My other big worry is that AI will erode our ability to think for ourselves. If we run to it with every question, instead of working it out on our own or asking a friend, neighbor or family member (there's that community again), what will our brains look like down the road? That's especially concerning for our children. As a rule, AI isn't allowed for schoolwork in our house. I'd be setting my kids up for failure if I let them lean on it for everything, so we aim for original thinking and do our research the old-fashioned way. That doesn't mean we never use it. It was a lifesaver in Geometry and Algebra 2: once we'd exhausted every ounce of our own brainpower, we could snap a picture of a problem and have it walk us through step by step. I've also let my daughter use it to research colleges. I don't get it all right, but I'm learning as I go.

Clearly I'm no expert on AI (either kind). What actually prompted this post is the little "AI content" label that's been showing up on some of my business posts. So consider this part confession, part explanation. Yes, I use AI. As a small business owner, homeschool teacher, wife, mother and whatever other hat I'm wearing on a given day, I've realized it's nearly impossible to keep up in today's world without a little help.

For one thing, AI is a fantastic editor. When you're flying through your to-do list, mistakes slip by. I'll never forget my first professional job out of college, when I sent an e-newsletter to a couple thousand people with a glaring typo. I'd reviewed it several times. My supervisor had reviewed it too. We both missed it, because we're human! Now, when I'm cramming in a quick Facebook post about soap or lotion, I run it through AI for edits and hashtags. Listen, I may have a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications, but when I earned it, a hashtag was the pound sign on a phone that plugged into the wall. To me, hashtags are like furniture instructions with no words: I don't get them, I don't like them, but I know I need them. So I ask AI, and I feel no shame about it. Okay, I'm working through a little shame on it.

It also helps with product photos. I don't own a fancy phone or camera, and I know just enough about photography to know a picture shouldn't be dark and shadowy. To save time, I'll sometimes run a photo through AI and ask it to clean things up. Sometimes the result is way too crazy to use; sometimes it's great. From what I understand, that's what triggers the AI flag on my posts, and I'll be honest, it bugs me. It makes me feel like a fraud when I pour so much time and effort into my business! I'm trying not to let it get to me. AI is simply an assistant I can hand a task to so I can move on to the next one.

The biggest lifesaver has been bookkeeping. I had Claude build me an eight-tab Excel workbook to track my costs, complete with formulas that talk to each other across tabs. Seeing my income, expenses and cost of goods in one big picture has been enormously helpful, and it would have taken me six weeks to build on my own, because Excel and I are not friends. This was also the first year I used AI to help plan our homeschool year. Normally I pour hours into planning, and this year that time was cut roughly in half.

And yes, when I finish writing this, I'll hand it over to AI to edit. Normally I read everything I write about ten times to catch my mistakes, so that alone is a time-saver.

Only eight years ago, AI meant a guy pulling into our driveway when our cow was cycling. Today it's a tool that edits my posts, keeps my books and helps plan our school year. I resisted both kinds at first, and both times I learned the answer wasn't to run from it but to figure out how it works and decide where it fits in our life. With the cows, we landed on a bull. With artificial intelligence, I'm still figuring out where the lines are, and I'm sure I'll get some of it wrong. But that's how we've always done things around here: jump in with both feet, ask for help, and learn as we go.

If you're like me (or how I used to be) and can't stand AI, I'd encourage you to learn about it anyway. It's still not my favorite thing and I definitely think there are many potential downfalls, but it's not going anywhere. Use it as a tool, not a friend. Keep talking to your neighbors, your checkout clerk and your kids. And in a world that changes by the second, stay grounded in the One who never does.