The New Rules of Vibe Coding: Why “Easy” Is Making You Worse

In 2019, coding education had one enemy: tutorial hell.

You’d watch 6-hour videos, code along flawlessly… and then freeze the moment you had to build something from scratch.

So we fixed that.

We built interactive courses, hands-on projects, fewer videos. Tutorial hell faded away.

But something new took its place.

Welcome to Vibe Coding Hell.

This time, we can build things—sometimes shockingly cool things.

But they’re built with AI, for AI, and under AI supervision.

“I can’t build without Cursor.”

“Claude wrote 6,379 lines to lazy-load my images—must be right?”

“Here’s my project: localhost:3000.”

The problem isn’t output.

The problem is mental models.

Projects are shipping, but understanding is not.

And here’s the uncomfortable truth:

Learning only happens when you feel discomfort.

Tutorial hell let you avoid discomfort by watching someone else code.

Vibe coding hell lets you avoid discomfort by letting AI code for you.

Both lead to the same outcome:

You don’t wrestle with the problem. Your brain never rewires.

“But AI makes me more productive!”

Maybe. Maybe not.

A 2025 study found developers believed AI made them 20–25% faster…

…but in reality, AI slowed them down by 19%.

Speed without understanding is an illusion.

It’s motion, not progress.

And the psychological risk is even bigger:

“Why learn this? AI already knows it.”

If AI doesn’t take our jobs, demotivation will.

The New Rules of Vibe Coding (If you actually want to learn):

❌ Don’t use AI to write the code for you.

No autocomplete. No agent mode. No “build the whole feature.”

✅ Do use AI to think with you.

Explain this. Challenge me. Ask me questions. Show me another approach.

❌ Don’t ask for step-by-step instructions.

That’s just a tutorial with extra steps.

✅ Do ask: “What am I missing?” or “Where could this break?”

Force your brain into active problem-solving.

❌ Don’t accept AI’s first confident answer.

LLMs are sycophants. They’ll tell you what you want to hear.

✅ Do demand sources, real-world examples, and opposing opinions.

That’s where real learning lives.

The Hard Truth

Learning must feel uncomfortable.

Not because struggle is noble.

Because struggle triggers growth.

When you’re stuck, frustrated, and pushing through uncertainty—that’s your neural network literally rewiring.

AI shouldn’t remove that pain.

AI should sharpen it into clarity.

If AI makes coding effortless, it’s making you weaker.

If AI makes thinking deeper, it’s making you unstoppable.

Vibe Coding isn’t the problem.

Vibe Coding without discomfort is.

The future belongs to the developers who learn how to use AI as a thinking partner—

not a crutch.

Real work. Real struggle. Real skill.

That’s the new vibe.