Dan Martell - How to Go From ChatGPT Beginner to Pro in 2026

00:00:00.000 I've been programming since I was 17 and even I feel the pressure to keep up with AI.

00:00:05.120 New tools drop daily. Everyone's an expert and the more you search for answers, the harder it

00:00:10.420 gets to move forward. But after diving deep, learning everything I could about AI, building

00:00:15.120 my own AI companies, I've realized something. The real problem isn't that AI is hard to learn,

00:00:20.460 it's that you're stuck in the noise. So today I'm going to break down a simple four-stage roadmap

00:00:26.380 to go from AI beginner to AI pro,

00:00:29.960 even if you have zero technical background.

00:00:32.260 Stage one, choose your AI toolkit. 0.89

00:00:35.020 I've got a friend, he's a freaking genius. 0.84

00:00:37.420 His name is Chris. 0.92

00:00:38.160 He literally goes chasing AI tool, knows them all,

00:00:41.360 tells you how they all work.

00:00:42.580 But when you look at his life,

00:00:44.340 he's the same Chris I met 10 years ago.

00:00:46.460 And the reason why is he keeps resetting.

00:00:48.320 See, most people get into this squirrel mentality

00:00:51.140 of collecting information about AI.

00:00:53.700 What's more important is that you apply it

00:00:56.280 and actually get a result from it.

00:00:58.500 Most people have too many options.

00:01:01.320 They think they don't have enough,

00:01:02.480 so they're worried that they're gonna fail

00:01:03.740 by not saying yes to everything.

00:01:05.100 I'm telling you, it's the saying no to all the options

00:01:08.140 and picking one and going hard in the paint.

00:01:10.560 Instead of going a mile wide and an inch deep,

00:01:13.520 go a mile deep and learn these tools.

00:01:15.960 See, most beginners die from indigestion, not starvation.

00:01:19.000 So here's how to pick your toolkit.

00:01:20.660 First off, we have to audit your task list.

00:01:23.360 We gotta look at all the things

00:01:24.820 that you're doing every day

00:01:25.880 that's just sucking up your time, 0.80

00:01:27.820 that's draining your energy

00:01:29.220 that AI was specifically designed to help you overcome.

00:01:32.820 Make that list and start looking for groups of activities

00:01:36.140 that you can use AI to do for you.

00:01:38.340 Next, you have to think about

00:01:39.500 what is a bucket of things that you're working on

00:01:42.060 that AI can help you with

00:01:43.640 and pick two tools for that specific task.

00:01:46.240 If it's copywriting, if it's answering phone calls,

00:01:48.440 if it's writing emails,

00:01:49.420 as if it's coming up with ideas.

00:01:51.080 And you think there's no way that AI can do it.

00:01:54.020 Trust me, it can.

00:01:55.080 The reason we want two tools is so that we can figure out

00:01:57.920 which one's gonna best accomplish it for the way we like.

00:02:00.800 See, a lot of people don't like AI

00:02:02.160 because it doesn't feel like the way I do it.

00:02:04.180 Okay, guess what?

00:02:05.220 Two tools, two different outcomes,

00:02:06.780 pick the one that feels most organic to you and run with it.

00:02:09.920 Next, we wanna commit to seven days in a row

00:02:13.440 of doing the work, picking that one tool

00:02:16.420 and applying it to that task until we figure it out.

00:02:19.300 I get it. You might overwhelm yourself. You might get frustrated. It may not initially do it exactly

00:02:24.320 the way you want, but just play with it. The cool thing about AI, it gets better and better

00:02:29.340 every freaking week. Finally, make it a habit. I call this habit stacking. See, most people have

00:02:35.000 a hard time adding something new to their life because they don't force themselves to wake up

00:02:39.720 and stack that against another habit. So the way I do it is I find something that today I do no

00:02:44.800 matter what and then i add to that new behavior so that i stack it against something else so i like

00:02:50.040 to read every day in the morning so when i really wanted to plug in this ai world of mine i added

00:02:54.940 prompting ai after i read in the same chair three prompts every day for months now my default is to

00:03:01.280 go to ai i've already used it 26 times today and it's the first thing in the morning now that

00:03:06.320 you've chosen which tool to use it's time to get really freaking good at how to use them i call

00:03:11.680 this prompt like a pro the other day i was hanging out my buddy and he's like i use ai look at this

00:03:16.800 hey ai tell me what the weather's gonna look like tomorrow isn't that cool i'm like bro do not think

00:03:24.340 asking it to tell you what the weather is tomorrow is using ai it can do way more for example i sit

00:03:30.200 on a board incredible company i was busy with a lot of other projects i got the board pack this

00:03:35.420 is all the information the financial analysis the update from the ceo any other notes from anybody

00:03:39.960 else on those executive teams and i didn't have a chance to look it over so what i do i took all

00:03:44.440 that information and i plugged it into my own private ai because it's private and it's secure

00:03:49.400 and it's safe and then i asked it hey act as an investor and tell me what are the five questions

00:03:55.320 i should be asking the ceo based on this information the call started everybody starts

00:03:59.320 asking questions and then finally i get my turn the first questions got the ceo looking at me like

00:04:05.560 How did you know that?

00:04:07.180 That information around gross margin

00:04:08.900 was on page 27 of the financial plan,

00:04:11.080 and I didn't even know it, and you asked me about it.

00:04:13.520 The truth is, I don't like to work hard.

00:04:15.640 I like to work smart, and AI makes me wildly smart.

00:04:18.440 You essentially need to become a prompt engineer,

00:04:21.560 but I'll show you how to get the same results

00:04:23.280 without spending years trying to become one.

00:04:25.200 So this is my four-step prompting process

00:04:27.380 to go from AI beginner to AI pro.

00:04:29.820 The first one is the role.

00:04:31.540 You have to tell it, act like it.

00:04:33.300 I literally get really fun with these.

00:04:34.940 I tell it to act like the most eccentric version

00:04:38.180 of the person, because what that does

00:04:40.280 is it allows the AI to look at all the information it has

00:04:43.400 and discount or add things that it knows

00:04:46.300 only that kind of person would be interested in.

00:04:48.880 Next, we wanna give it the context.

00:04:50.800 I like using AI to help me with financial planning.

00:04:53.500 So what did I give it?

00:04:54.680 I gave it everything.

00:04:55.800 I gave it my bank statements.

00:04:57.220 I gave it all of my past investments.

00:04:59.400 I gave it all the legal documents.

00:05:01.340 Then I ask it questions like,

00:05:02.960 based on my age and my goals,

00:05:05.300 what do you think I should consider adjusting?

00:05:07.840 These are things that people pay some other person

00:05:10.640 to do for them that AI can not only do it better,

00:05:13.420 faster without the fricking attitude.

00:05:15.740 Next, we wanna give it the command.

00:05:17.520 Essentially, we wanna tell it what we want.

00:05:19.500 So if you want it, for example, to draft a legal document,

00:05:22.180 if you have to give it the command

00:05:23.540 for what it's trying to accomplish

00:05:25.020 based on what you gave it.

00:05:26.320 Next, we wanna give it the format.

00:05:27.960 And this, for me, I think a lot of people

00:05:29.840 misunderstand how powerful this is.

00:05:31.520 format yes is a list but formats also a spreadsheet a pdf a json output for the nerds in the audience

00:05:39.680 you can literally ask it to write the code for your next idea and watch it spit back code now

00:05:46.400 this is a cheat code of cheat codes at the end once you've talked to ai and you've given all

00:05:51.280 the prompt engineering you've gotten to an answer you like here's a really great way to get there

00:05:55.200 faster ask it to write the prompt that would have got you to that result faster and it will give it

00:06:00.800 to you. And then all of a sudden now you're learning how to talk to AI in a more productive

00:06:05.380 manner, which by the way, if you're a business owner and you want my step-by-step prompting

00:06:09.960 format for all areas of your business, just go find me on Instagram. It's Dan Martell,

00:06:14.440 12s and Martell and follow me. Then message me the word YouTube prompt, and I will send it

00:06:19.860 directly to you. So now you know which tools and how to use them, but with how fast everything's

00:06:24.960 changing, you have to create your own learning rhythm. Schools don't teach kids AI. If anything,

00:06:30.400 they get in massive trouble if they even consider using it.

00:06:33.940 Now, I get it.

00:06:34.560 Some teachers are like, yeah, but you don't understand.

00:06:36.780 If you let them use it, they're never gonna learn anything.

00:06:39.160 I completely disagree.

00:06:40.820 I have been teaching my kids AI

00:06:42.860 from the moment it was released.

00:06:44.680 They use it every day for their creative projects.

00:06:47.240 And what, I'm supposed to pretend

00:06:48.600 like the future doesn't have AI in it?

00:06:50.720 That's like when, before we had the internet,

00:06:52.720 if people wanted to learn something,

00:06:53.940 they had to like walk to the library to get a book

00:06:57.000 and find the right book.

00:06:57.800 They had the answer to their question.

00:06:58.980 and then the internet came along

00:07:00.440 and all of a sudden it got brought to us.

00:07:02.440 AI is the exact same thing.

00:07:04.200 And you're telling me we shouldn't let people

00:07:06.420 use the internet and instead force them

00:07:08.020 to walk to the library to learn?

00:07:09.660 Not something I can support

00:07:10.980 because once you stop learning, you start dying.

00:07:13.940 This is the AI learning rhythm

00:07:15.300 that's gonna turn you into a pro.

00:07:16.940 First, it comes down to daily consumption.

00:07:19.520 I'm a big fan of using my feed to feed my mind.

00:07:22.480 So I want to make sure that wherever I put my time

00:07:25.100 and attention, it's feeding me the things

00:07:26.980 that I wanna get better.

00:07:27.860 So here's how I do it.

00:07:28.740 I open up my phone and I go to TikTok

00:07:31.160 and I search for AI construction or whatever your field is.

00:07:35.180 And then I give it a FYP in the comments of the videos

00:07:39.000 that it shows me.

00:07:39.820 So it tells the algorithm to change my algorithm

00:07:42.500 to only show me things that is relevant to what I'm doing.

00:07:45.520 Whatever your role is, you literally do that.

00:07:48.260 And now when you go on TikTok,

00:07:49.960 you will have a feed that's gonna teach you

00:07:52.240 how to become an AI pro.

00:07:53.740 Next, you wanna create your weekly mastermind.

00:07:56.040 I'm a big fan of learning through osmosis.

00:07:58.920 So what I did months ago

00:08:00.260 is I decided to do a weekly mastermind

00:08:02.960 with people I saw online creating content.

00:08:05.520 And it's very simple.

00:08:06.560 They don't even know me.

00:08:07.620 I reach out to them.

00:08:08.520 I ask them if they wanna come have lunch on Zoom.

00:08:10.880 And we just talk.

00:08:12.040 One of my favorite questions I ask them right now

00:08:13.660 is what do you think they're gonna release

00:08:15.320 in the next Frontier model?

00:08:16.880 Talking to people that are doing it at the Frontier

00:08:20.240 that you find on social media using the first step

00:08:23.260 is how you stay competitive.

00:08:25.300 Next, we wanna do a monthly tool audit.

00:08:27.880 Go back to step one and go back to all the tasks

00:08:31.140 that you're working on and specifically the things

00:08:33.020 that suck your energy that you really don't wanna do 0.90

00:08:35.140 and ask yourself, can AI today replace that work?

00:08:39.020 See, what you can do today changes every three months

00:08:41.840 in a massive way.

00:08:43.220 Finally, a quarterly event or going to a workshop.

00:08:46.620 At the end of the day, there's no way that you on your own

00:08:49.740 with your assistant can recruit

00:08:51.040 and have these meetings every week

00:08:52.400 and it's gonna give you coverage.

00:08:53.520 what i want to encourage you to do is find the ai focused event in your industry or at least the

00:08:59.400 industry event and hopefully they have a whole section on ai i'd be a little bit concerned if

00:09:03.720 they didn't and go sit in that room be around those people that's where you find potential

00:09:08.600 peers advisors or vendors that can help you solve the biggest problems you've got using ai so you

00:09:14.500 can get leverage because you don't want to default to labor you want to look for leverage but there's

00:09:18.800 one last shift. And honestly, it's the one that will make sure you stay ahead because it's not

00:09:24.020 just about using AI to get stuff done. You need to become a director, not a doer. People ask me

00:09:29.360 all the time, will AI replace me? How do I stay competitive? Here's what I've learned. There's

00:09:34.460 only three things AI won't replace. One, vision. Can you predict and see a future that doesn't

00:09:41.380 exist yet that should? Hey, see AI, just like great music, it doesn't know when to stop taking

00:09:48.160 things away to consider something complete your taste by reviewing 1500 different facebook ads

00:09:54.560 but understanding what the market's going to resonate with that is invaluable and lastly it's

00:09:59.760 care a lot of people call this eq emotional intelligence your ability to care for people

00:10:05.760 to interact with people in a caring way that ai will not disrupt so you need to become a visionary

00:10:11.520 you need to become somebody that can predict and see around the corner because ai will take care

00:10:16.480 the last mile so this is how you become a director not a doer first we have to stop being busy a lot

00:10:23.040 of people confuse busyness with motion if most of your day is just busy task work back to back

00:10:30.000 you have to step back and look for ways automating all of that stuff because in 10 years ai will be

00:10:35.280 doing 99 of your to-do list next we have to upgrade our taste this is about understanding what great

00:10:42.240 output looks like it doesn't matter if it's art or business or leadership you want to study the

00:10:47.760 best in the world you want to look at what they're doing and ask yourself what's the pattern that

00:10:52.400 they're all following that's contributing to that success honestly that's why i love social media a

00:10:57.440 lot of people say it can be used for harm i think it's the most helpful thing in the world if you

00:11:01.280 use it properly so go find those examples follow those people study those videos on youtube and

00:11:07.040 and just go and bathe in world-class mastery.

00:11:09.960 Next, we have to simplify our thinking.

00:11:11.980 See, to be a great director,

00:11:13.780 you need to be able to explain complex problems

00:11:16.160 in a simple way.

00:11:17.240 Let other people go, oh, that makes sense.

00:11:19.720 So being able to understand what's available out there,

00:11:22.440 but then create a plan that's simple but powerful,

00:11:25.840 that's gonna make you an AI pro.

00:11:27.540 And lastly, we have to practice self-reflection.

00:11:30.260 A life unexamined is a life not lived.

00:11:33.320 We have to look at ways

00:11:34.780 that we can get feedback from other people.

00:11:36.680 could be our team it could be our family members you have to be willing to seek the feedback the

00:11:41.480 self-reflection to understand is my calendar getting better am i becoming more effective

00:11:46.760 is ai giving me more time back i know ai is overwhelming but honestly if you follow this

00:11:52.040 simple road map you'll stay ahead of 99 of the people you're watching this because you're like

00:11:57.320 hey i don't want to be one of those people that wake up and go hey what happened to the horse and

00:12:02.120 buggy and why is everybody driving around these cars but here's what i've seen because i'm a

00:12:06.120 technology guy when uber launched are all the people that drive ubers previous taxi drivers

00:12:12.600 or are they just normal people that shifted into new roles most of them never drove a taxi before

00:12:17.320 they drove uber the truth is is as innovation creates new opportunity we're just going to have

00:12:22.280 people migrate from one skilled area to another that's what happened in the industrial revolution

00:12:27.960 and many other transitions along the way but the difference is the people that were here ahead of

00:12:33.160 the curve and wanted to take advantage they sold the picks and shovels to all the people looking

00:12:37.800 for gold that's the opportunity in front of you now if you want to learn how to get rich

00:12:42.120 in the new ai era click the video and i'll see you on the other side

Dan Martell - July 22, 2025

How to Go From ChatGPT Beginner to Pro in 2026

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