TL;DR: My writing streak wasn’t just about discipline; it was a psychological defense against AI FOMO and burnout. By regaining clarity through daily reflection, I didn’t just keep up with the pace of change, I got ahead, seizing a new professional opportunity to lead AI adoption.

You have to wear your own oxygen mask first.

Yesterday, I shared how my 100-day writing streak began with a simple, joyful decision to just show up and write again. But the motivation to sustain that streak, to keep digging for topics and insights was fueled by a very modern kind of anxiety: AI FOMO (Fear of Missing Out).

The Crossroads: Burnout Meets Exponential Change

Before my career pivot, I was operating on fumes. Bored and mentally drained, I was stuck at a crossroads. My day-to-day was reduced to just showing up and doing the bare minimum to thrive. Simultaneously, the AI era was advancing at an exponential pace. Every single day felt like a massive gap was widening between what I knew and what I needed to know. Keeping up felt nearly impossible.

I tried running AI experiments, but they lacked depth and purpose. The problem wasn’t a lack of tools; it was a lack of mental clarity.

To me, writing is clarity. I write when I can truly think. Writing allows me to visualize and understand exactly how I’m feeling and what I believe to be true. It was out of this urgent need for internal structure that the writing journey truly took hold.

Writing as My Personal Oxygen Mask

When you focus on the internal work on understanding your own thoughts, biases, and goals, the external noise starts to fade. As I wrote daily:

1. The AI FOMO Faded: The fear that I was missing something external disappeared because I was actively capturing, organizing, and articulating my own internal framework for navigating change.
2. Clarity Emerged: My reflection led me to build a concrete, repeatable system for rapidly processing and adopting new AI changes. This became my intellectual shield.
3. Joy Returned: The simple act of writing, the pure joy I mentioned yesterday, became the reward, not the promotion or the title.

Because I chose to focus on wearing the oxygen mask on myself first, prioritizing my mental health and clarity, I built a system that made me highly prepared for the professional change I was seeking.

Opportunity Meets Preparation

The real win wasn’t just feeling better; it was the ability to translate that internal work into external impact.

I landed a new role, and in this fresh environment with a new team, a massive opportunity presented itself: the chance to drive AI adoption.

This is a great example of how success is often defined by opportunity meeting hard work and preparation. I kept doing my consistent work (my daily writing and internal learning system), and when the opportunity arose in my new role, I was prepared to seize it.

Today, I’m not just excelling in the AI landscape; I’m able to guide others. I’m still learning daily, but the overwhelm and the FOMO are gone. I feel confident, empowered, and equipped to help my teams navigate this new world.

The ultimate lesson of this 100-day streak is that to lead others through change, you must first secure your own foundation. The simple, small habit of daily writing became that foundation for me that gave me clarity to quickly embrace the AI era.