When Ro announced its Super Bowl spot featuring Serena Williams talking about her use of GLP-1 medications, one line jumped out at me: “There is no one with more willpower and self-discipline than Serena Williams, which is why she’s the perfect person to help people see that GLP-1s are not a shortcut.”

It got me thinking about the arguments I’ve been having with friends—and with myself—about whether AI is a shortcut and will make us lazy. Will most of us use AI to take the easy way out? And is the easy way always inferior?

The Serena framing is clever. If Serena Williams—who, according to the advertising firm creating the spot, embodies grit, discipline, and relentless training—uses a GLP-1, then maybe these medications aren’t cheating. Maybe removing the friction and struggle of weight loss is better than clinging to “no pain, no gain,” especially if the result is better health.

What struck me while watching the Super Bowl (in addition to my Patriots losing) was how many ads leaned into themes of effort, perseverance, and creativity. The Olympic spots, the NFL ad with a child giving himself a pep talk, and OpenAI’s Codex ad. included messages about working hard, learning, not giving up. It felt like reassurance: Even in an era of AI doing more human work, grit still matters.

And yet the anxiety remains.

Parents, teachers, and employers worry that AI will deskill us—especially our kids. Why learn to write if a chatbot can produce an essay in seconds? Why do the math if an app can show the work? The fear is that AIs, like GLP-1s, are becoming shortcuts that let us dodge the hard part.

So the question becomes: If we use a tool like GLP-1s or AI, does that automatically make us lazy?

I don’t think it does. But it can. And that “can” is where the real nuance lives.

The Pros and Cons of Shortcuts

With GLP-1s, it’s easy to picture the worst-case scenario: Someone takes the medication, keeps all their old habits, never moves their body, eats whatever they want, and hopes the drug will do the rest. No behavioral change. No attention to health. Just an outsourced solution.

There are similar concerns with AI. The student pastes their assignment into a chatbot, copies the output, and turns it in without reading it. The worker asks AI to write a report and never understands what it says. In both cases, the technology becomes a way to avoid effort. The Brookings Institution recently suggested that many students use AI routinely and thoughtlessly, equating learning with accessing AI rather than stretching their own cognitive abilities. Students who use it this way may not have years of experience connecting effort to mastery—or role models demonstrating Serena-level discipline.

That version absolutely exists. GLP-1s can be misused as cosmetic shortcuts. AI can be used to skip all the cognitive work. When that happens, it’s fair to talk about de-skilling and laziness. But the Serena Williams campaign, I feel, also hints at something more complicated.

Who Gets the Most From These Tools?

In the ad, Serena describes GLP-1s not as a miracle fix but as part of a health plan. She’s moving better, feeling better, more flexible. The message is not that effort disappears but that with GLP-1s, it becomes more effective.

Personally, I see AI the same way in my own work. I combine it with 40+ years of discipline to improve, learn, and experience the rewards that come with effort. AI lowers friction so I can do more of the meaningful work. When used thoughtfully, I've found that AI can function as:

An editor to improve clarity and structure

A research assistant to generate ideas within parameters

A structuring tool to help organize thoughts

A clarifier to explain a concept five different ways

To me, that's not laziness. However, due to the power of these tools, I run the risk of getting lazy.

Maybe the Problem Isn’t That AI Makes Tasks Too "Easy"

We tend to treat ease as morally suspicious. If something becomes easier, we assume character is lost.

But our desire to make things easier is not new. We accept cars instead of horses, dishwashers instead of hand-washing, and Google search instead of card catalogs. We don’t accuse people of laziness for using spellcheck. How many of us actually remember our children's cell phone numbers or still know how to use a map to navigate without GPS?

The question, I argue, shouldn't be, “Is this easier?” Instead, we should ask, “What are we skipping?” With GLP-1s, are users skipping exercise and healthy habits—or skipping years of yo-yo dieting and chronic pain so sustainable change can stick? With AI, are users skipping thinking and revision—or skipping mechanical drudgery so they can spend more time on insight and creativity?

When I sit down at 6:30 in the morning to write, I sometimes ask an AI tool to help organize my messy thoughts or suggest a structure. For me, that makes part of the process easier. But it doesn’t replace the work of deciding what I believe or refining my argument. At least the way I use it, AI is less a shortcut and more a power tool.

These reflections focus on the “normal” use of GLP-1s and AI. For most of us, this is about design and intention. Do we use these tools to avoid effort—or to make our effort more strategic? Will they make us lazy? Will they devalue grit and persistence? Or will they improve our quality of life? I am struggling with these questions, which I’d like to believe are a new challenge and, at the very least, an example of thoughtfulness.

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