11:03 PM. There I was, desperately typing "how to make $500 fast without selling feet pics."
Don't judge me, you know you've been there.
Or, well, somewhere equally tragic.
Honestly, it was bleak.
I was broke as hell. Burnt out.
Failing this whole "responsible adult" thing like it was an Olympic sport. Bank balance? Under $50. Rent is due in 9 days.
The fridge, if you can even call it that, was a condiment museum.
Hot sauce central, but not a scrap of actual food.
I'd already run through the usual "make money online" nonsense:
Fiverr? Tried peddling Instagram captions, nobody bit.
Wow, don't spend it all at once.
Then, just to sprinkle some extra doom on my day, the landlord hits me with: "Rent's going up $125 next month."
Epic. Love that for me.
Somewhere in the middle of this financial meltdown, I stumbled on ChatGPT.
At first, I just used it for dumb stuff like,
"Write a breakup text in pirate slang," or "What chicken nugget sauce makes me feel like a billionaire?"
You know, the important things.
But then, one late night, I typed, "How do I test a product idea fast?"
And ChatGPT spat out this super simple plan.
Like, step-by-step.
Nothing earth-shattering, but way more coherent than what my sleep-deprived brain was serving up.
The $200 Plot Twist
I threw together a Google Doc, just three pages:
- What the idea was
- Who it was for
- Questions for feedback
Ran it through ChatGPT to make it sound less like it was written by a raccoon on Red Bull.
Sent it to this dude I sorta knew from a Slack group.
He comes back with,
"This is awesome. Can I pay you to make one for my brand?"
I straight-up thought he was trolling me.
Nope. Dude sends $200 to my PayPal.
I just stared at my screen, thinking, 'Did I just get punked?'
Was Ashton Kutcher about to jump out of my closet?
What I'm Doing Now
So, nowadays, I help tiny online shops (think: beard oil brands for hipsters) write better emails. Not exactly sexy. Not passive income.
But my $1,250 rent gets paid. Plus, I can fund my iced coffee addiction. Win-win.
Here's how AI fits :
- Whip up cold emails for brands (ChatGPT cranks out five drafts in like, two minutes)
- Write welcome emails for new subscribers
- Summarize customer reviews into stuff I can use
AI's cool, but I still gotta use my brain and do the work.
Sorry, cyborgs.
Catch you later, — Me (and my Google Doc that low-key saved my life) .
✨ Nov 28th/25 on learnaitoprofit.com — Linkedin — Facebook 🤍