TUESDAY TUTORIAL
One useful thing you can do with AI today.

Good morning.
This issue covers the six settings that quietly changed how I use AI every day, memory, preferences, files, projects, reusable instructions, and recurring workflows. Most people have every one of them available and have never touched a single setting. I hadn't either, not long ago. Now I can't imagine starting from scratch again.

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My son gave me a piece of advice years before I ever started this newsletter. I brushed it off the first time. The second time, it stuck, and it changed how I use AI more than anything else I've tried since.

It wasn't a tool or a subscription. It was three settings sitting inside apps I already had, that I'd never bothered to turn on. Most people are still paying a mental tax they don't notice: explaining who they are and what they're working on, every single time they open a new chat.

This week, you're building the setup that ended that for me. Six pieces, memory, preferences, files, projects, reusable instructions, and recurring workflows, working together so your AI already knows you the next time you show up.

1. Turn on memory.

In ChatGPT: Settings, then Personalization, then Memory. In Claude: Settings, then Memory. Turn it on in whichever tool you use most.

Memory is the foundation everything else sits on. It's what lets your AI recall your situation between conversations instead of forgetting the moment you close the tab.

2. Set your preferences once.

Memory and preferences aren't the same thing. Memory picks up details as you go. Preferences, called Custom Instructions in ChatGPT, are the rules you write once and expect to hold every time: your tone, your format, what you never want repeated back to you.

Think of preferences as your standing order. Memory is what gets added to it.

3. Upload the files that matter.

Any AI tool with Projects, a separate space the AI treats like its own folder, or persistent chats lets you attach files it will actually use: a resume, a family calendar, a budget spreadsheet, a medication list.

Upload once. Reference forever, instead of re-explaining your situation in every new chat.

4. Create one project for each part of your life.

A project keeps a topic in its own lane so it doesn't bleed into everything else. One for a home renovation. One for a job search. One for planning your daughter's wedding.

I keep a project called Health with my supplement list and the questions I want to ask my doctor on my next visit. It has never once seen my resume, and it never will. Keep them separate. An AI that mixes your retirement numbers into your grandkid's birthday plans isn't saving you time.

5. Save reusable instructions as templates.

If you write the same kind of prompt more than twice, it deserves a permanent home. Save it inside a project, or in a note you paste in when needed.

6. Build one recurring workflow.

Pick a task you already do every week. A Friday budget check. A Sunday meal plan. Run it through AI the same way each time, using the same project, the same preferences, the same saved prompt.

That repetition is what turns a helpful tool into an actual system. Once a workflow runs the same way twice without you re-explaining anything, it has earned its place in the setup.

One honest catch. Memory means the AI is holding onto real details about you between sessions. That's the whole point, but it also means you should treat it the way you'd treat any other place that remembers things about you. Skip the account numbers. Skip anything you wouldn't want written down somewhere.

You don't need all six running by tonight. Turn on memory and build one project. Everything else layers on top of that.

I wish someone had told me this the first time, not the second. Now I'm telling you.

This week: open your AI settings, turn on memory, and type three sentences about who you are and what you're working on. Five minutes, and you never start from zero again.

Try This With AI

What it does: Turns a plain description of your situation and preferences into a ready-to-save Custom Instructions block.

Before you begin: Have two or three sentences ready about who you are, what's on your plate right now, and how you like things written.

Customize it: Swap [who you are, like retired teacher or weekend home cook, what's on your plate right now, and how you like things communicated] for your own details.

Try it now: ChatGPT · Claude

Then ask this: "Now give me three reusable prompt templates for tasks I do every week."

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