I had similar thoughts recently. I wouldn't consider myself "the thinker", but I simply missed learning by failure. You almost don't fail anymore using AI. If something fails, it feels like it's not your fault but the AI messed up. Sometimes I even get angry at the AI for failing, not at myself. I don't have a solution either, but I came up with a guideline on when and how to use AI that has helped me to still enjoy learning. I'm not trying to advertise my blog and you don't need to read it, the important part is the diagram at the end of "Learning & Failure": https://sattlerjoshua.com/writing/2026-02-01-thoughts-on-ai-.... In summary, when something is important and long-term, I heavily invest into understanding and use an approach that maximizes understanding over speed. Not sure if you can translate it 100% to your situation but maybe it helps to have some kind of guideline, when to spend more time thinking instead of directly using and AI to get to the solution.