Has AI Changed the Joy of Building?

Lately I've been thinking a lot about how AI is changing the way I learn to code.

It helps me solve problems faster, but sometimes I wonder if I'm giving away the part that actually makes me grow—the struggle of figuring things out myself.

I've also realized that, at times, it's taken away the satisfaction of building something that truly feels like mine. Not because AI is bad, but because I leaned on it before giving myself a chance to think, experiment, and fail.

The projects I'm most proud of aren't the ones I finished the fastest. They're the ones where I got stuck, read the documentation, made mistakes, and eventually figured things out on my own.

I don't think AI is the problem. The real challenge is finding the balance between using it as a teacher and letting it become a substitute for our own thinking.

This is something I'm trying to improve, and I'm curious—have you ever felt the same way? How do you balance AI with genuine learning?