teachitonce.com

A book by Michael Zelbel

Teach It Once

Make AI your mission control for life and work

Build an AI assistant that knows your background, does the jobs you keep repeating and has work ready when you come back. In small steps, on a small rented server or your own computer, in plain files you can read and correct.

Get the book on LeanpubRead a free sample
Chapters
42
Parts
6
Companion kit
Free
Cover of Teach It Once by Michael Zelbel: a glowing brain connected to chat, notes, files and a personal vault

What it builds

Every chapter ends with something that works, so you can stop after any of them and keep what you have.

Your mission control is a folder of plain text files: notes about you, instructions for the assistant, finished work. The assistant reads them before it helps you. You can open every one of them, and you can change any of them.

The replies quoted in the book come from real runs. Where something does not work, the book says so. And it tells you to judge each job after a few real days of use, because how the morning brief works over your breakfast says more than anyone's enthusiasm for it.

The route

Five steps, and you can stop after any of them

  1. 01Chapter 1

    Find out what your AI already knows

    Nothing to install yet. You ask ChatGPT, or whichever AI you use, what it knows about you, correct its answer and save it as a one-page file. That file is how your mission control gets to know you.

  2. 02Part I

    Install Godspeed Mission Control

    A free program, set up in one evening on a small rented server or on your own computer. That first evening it reads your file, asks you for one goal and does a first piece of real work on it.

  3. 03Parts II to IV

    Tell it about your life

    Who matters to you, what comes first, how you write and what it must never do without asking. You meet your notebook, a private page where you read and correct everything it knows, and you teach it the jobs you keep repeating.

  4. 04Part V

    Let it work while you are away

    Your morning ready before you sit down. Reminders that come more often as a deadline gets close and stop when the work is done. Research that stays on a question for weeks.

  5. 05Part VI

    Add what you need

    Reading your Gmail, an email address of its own, a phone call for you, captions on your videos. Nothing else in the book depends on them, so take the ones you need.

Inside

Six parts. Take the ones you have a use for.

Part VI holds the extras: reading your mail, an email address of its own, a phone call for you, captions on your videos, a second computer, coaching in depth. Chapter 40 is only for people who write code.

IStart With Something That Matters5 chapters
  1. 01Make Your AI Briefing From What It Already Knows
  2. 02Set Up Godspeed Mission Control
  3. 03Get Useful Work Done on Your First Day
  4. 04Your Files Are the Originals
  5. 05Let It Check In With You
IIGive It Useful Background9 chapters
  1. 06The People Who Matter
  2. 07Priorities Across Your Life
  3. 08Give Mission Control a Goal, Then Let It Work
  4. 09Teach AI Your Writing Style
  5. 10Tell Mission Control Once, Let It Remember
  6. 11Let Mission Control Keep Up With Your Life
  7. 12Correct AI Without the Argument
  8. 13Your Notebook: Notes, People and What It Noticed
  9. 14Collections, the Timeline and the World
IIITeach AI Repeated Jobs5 chapters
  1. 15Save a Repeated Job as an AI Skill
  2. 16Make an AI Skill Work Your Way
  3. 17Skills for Email, Planning, Conversations and Decisions
  4. 18Create Skills for Your Own Work
  5. 19Check That Your AI Skills Work
IVSet Limits and Check the Work4 chapters
  1. 20Set Limits on What AI May Do
  2. 21Back Up Your Mission Control and Undo Mistakes
  3. 22Check Where Your Private Information Goes
  4. 23Check AI's Answers Before You Act
VHave Work Ready When You Return7 chapters
  1. 24See and Change What Runs on Its Own
  2. 25The Morning Brief
  3. 26Let AI Investigate a Question While You Are Away
  4. 27Set Up an Automatic Weekly Review
  5. 28Get Alerts When a Page or Product Changes
  6. 29Keep Researching a Question Over Time
  7. 30Track Deadlines Until the Work Is Done
VIAdd What You Need11 chapters
  1. 31Give Your Mission Control Its Own Email Address
  2. 32Let Your Mission Control Read Your Mail
  3. 33Use Your Mission Control on Several Devices
  4. 34Look After Your Server
  5. 35Let Your Mission Control Make a Phone Call for You
  6. 36Let Your Mission Control Finish Your Videos
  7. 37Try Your Mission Control With Another AI Assistant
  8. 38Reach and Share Your Saved Prompts Online
  9. 39Coaching in Depth: Areas, Styles and Habits
  10. 40Use Your Mission Control for Coding Projects
  11. 41Let Your Mission Control Be Your Wingman
Closing1 chapter
  1. 42Keep the Jobs That Move Your Life Forward

About money

ChatGPT's free plan is enough to begin.

Your mission control does its thinking with an AI service, and the book uses ChatGPT. If you use it every day, you may want a paid plan later. Godspeed Mission Control, the program the book sets up, is free, now and later, and so is the companion kit with every template, prompt and practice file. A server, if you rent one, costs a monthly fee to the hosting company.

Explain it once.
Keep it for good.

Get Teach It Once on Leanpub

PDF and EPUB. The book is still being finished on Leanpub, and every reader gets each new version free.