The chemical that hooks you on A.I., and how to use it to your advantage.

"Nothing is so good as it seems beforehand." — George Eliot, Silas Marner

🔑 This issue at a glance (2-second summary)

Dopamine rewards the chase, not the win. That's why AI feels so addictive. Use this science to your advantage.

Why you're addicted to AI

I set up a client with a few AI employees last week. We wired them into his existing tools and routines. He can message them whenever he wants and give them new skills and recurring tasks. But these aren't chatbots. They are actually doing real things in his business.

Three days later, my client texted me, "Why didn't you tell me this was so addictive?"

He couldn't stop. Up at night messaging his agents, handing them new jobs, watching them work, finding one more thing they could do. These AI team members are making him real money and saving him real time. It's like he found new friends who are paving the way to a life of freedom for him.

Reading his text message, I chuckled to myself because I can relate. I'm still dealing with this addiction too. But now I'm beginning to understand the science behind it.

I just finished reading The Molecule of More, by Dr. Daniel Lieberman. It's a book about dopamine, the chemical everyone calls the "pleasure" chemical. Turns out that's wrong.

Dopamine isn't about pleasure. It's about anticipation.

It doesn't fire when you get the thing. It fires when you might get the thing. It's the chemical of the future, the "what's next," the maybe. Lieberman calls it the molecule of more. And more is never satisfied, because the second you have something, dopamine wants the next thing.

That's why gambling hooks people. The addiction isn't the win. It's the pull of the lever. The anticipation of it.

Today's ambitious leaders know that agentic AI is one of the most powerful dopamine engines we've experienced (at least among the legal ones).

Every prompt is a pull of the lever. Every idea could work. Every tool could change everything. You vibe-code an app at 2am. You spin up an AI employee that runs while you sleep. The possibilities are endless, and endless possibility is exactly what dopamine feeds on.

So of course my client couldn't put it down. Of course I stay up building. We're not chasing the result. We're chasing the future the result makes possible.

That's a gift and a trap because the "more" molecule will keep you starting. Forever. One more tool. One more agent. One more idea you never ship. The chase feels like progress. It isn't. Real progress is what you finish.

So I flipped it. I don't let myself feel the hit for starting a project, only for shipping one. Done. Sent. Live. That's the high I'm training my brain to want.

The word I keep coming back to is "done."

This works whether you're a solopreneur playing with your first AI tool or a CEO wiring agents into a 50-person team. The dopamine is going to fire either way. The only question is what you point it at.

My client? I texted him back. "It's addictive because you have new superpowers now."

Then I told him what I have to tell myself every day: Point the dopamine at done.

Winners take action

I'm not going to tell you to use AI less. I'd be lying. I'm up late building too, and I'm not stopping.

We're in a rare window. The tools are this good, this cheap, and this new, all at once. That won't last. So lean in. Build as much as you can, as fast as you can. This is your shot to get ahead and create a new life for yourself. Sleep later.

HOWEVER, take what you just learned about dopamine and use it on your own business. If anticipation is what hooks people, build anticipation into the products and services you sell. Give customers something to look forward to. Surprise them, then do it again, until they're waiting to see what you do next. Get them hooked on your product the same way AI has you hooked ( but do it ethically, of course).

The tools you need

Here's the real fix: Decide what done looks like, then tell your AI not to stop until it gets there.

In most agentic AI platforms (Codex, Claude Code, Hermes, OpenClaw, etc), there is a slash command made for exactly this.

/goal sets your definition of done. Then AI keeps working on its own, turn after turn, checking its own output until that condition is met. You're not prompting every step. You write the finish line once, and it keeps going until it gets there.

So instead of typing "help me write my sales page," you type:

/goal The sales page is written, proofread, and live on my site. It has one clear headline, a subhead that names my reader's biggest problem, three proof points backed by real numbers or testimonials, a short section answering the top three objections, and one call to action repeated at the top and bottom.

Now the machine is chasing done. Not you.

This week on the pod

This week on King Moves (Why You're Addicted | Ep. 140), Justin and I get into the science of why you can't put things down. Why it's the anticipation, not the win, that actually hooks you. Why founders who sell their companies often end up depressed. And we explain Justin's "customer expectation pyramid," four levels for turning that same wiring into something your customers can't stop coming back to.

Customer Expectation Pyramid

If you've ever wondered why you keep reaching for your phone, or your next AI tool, this one explains it.

Listen on Apple Podcasts

Listen on Spotify

Listen on YouTube

Stop playing life on hard mode. Automate your success.

Until next week,

Ethan King signature

Ethan King
A.I. Automation for Business Growth
Keynote Speaker | Author | CEO | Strategist

Ethan King

P.S. On Saturday, July 25th, I'm hosting my last Hermes/OpenClaw guided setup for a while. Why? Because my speaking schedule is filling up and I'm doing a lot of these installations in-person for private companies. So if you don't have the budget to bring me in 1:1 but you want AI employees that actually take work off your plate, this is your last shot for a while. Fair warning: it's addictive.

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P.P.S. This month started off with three private AI employee team installations back-to-back for different companies in different sectors in different cities. Here are some other upcoming events:

How can I help your business, association, or organization? Let's talk.

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