Why every AI draft sounds like the same person

Ever pasted something into ChatGPT, read what came back, and thought: that's fine, but it isn't me?

Same. For about two years, on and off, that was my whole relationship with the thing.

Here's the deal, and I'm not a computer scientist, so take the plumbing with a grain of salt. An AI is built to hand you the next most likely word. Not the best word. Not your word. The one that shows up most often after the word before it, across everything it ever read.

Which is a lot. More than any person alive has read.

So when you ask it for an email, a listing, a post, a note to the boss, it reaches for the safe version. Competent. Clean. Nothing wrong with it. And nothing you'd be proud to put your name on either.

That's why every AI draft sounds like the same person. Because in a way, it is the same person. An average of everybody. And an average of everybody sounds like nobody.

The part that took me longest to accept

Prompting it harder makes it worse.

You know the routine. "Make it sound more like me." "Less formal." "No, warmer." "Okay, now shorter." Twenty minutes in you've got seven versions and none of them are you. The longer that thread runs, the harder the thing pulls back to the middle. Every correction you type is one more jar on the shelf, and the kid in the candy store keeps walking out with the same bar every other kid picked.

And that's not me selling something. That's how they're built.

So what's the fix?

Not a better prompt. A better question, asked before you type anything.

What would you actually say out loud?

Picture the person the email is for. Your landlord. A client. The guy who runs the Tuesday league. Now say the thing to them, across a table, coffee in your hand. Out loud, if nobody's around to judge you. Then type that. Word for word, ums included if you want.

Give the AI that, and give it one job. "Tighten this up. Don't change how I talk. Fix the spelling." In and out.

What you're doing there is handing it one jar instead of a whole store. Same brain, one direction. It stops choosing and starts working.

And read what comes back out loud too. The ear catches what the eye forgives. If a line clatters when you say it, it wasn't yours, and you'll hear it in a second. I've edited by ear for paying clients for 12-plus years, long before any of this. Turns out it works on the machine as well as it works on people.

Try it once on the next thing you have to write. I'd bet the draft comes back closer to you than anything you've had off it in a year. Not perfect. Closer. And closer is a lot, when the alternative is sounding like a press release.

A couple of caveats, because I hate saying never. For a two-line reply, the AI's fine as it is, leave it alone. And if you've got nothing to say, this won't give you something. It never will. You bring the idea. That part stays yours, and honestly, that's the good news. The idea was never the problem. The sanding was.

Does this even make sense for you? If your AI drafts already sound like you, great, skip the rest of this blog and go enjoy your afternoon.

If they don't, there's more here, and none of it costs anything.

Your voice was never missing. It was getting sanded off.

If you'd like the next one when it's up, the little form below is the only ask on this page.