[Correction] 🔮 How to use AI to reclaim deep work
We’re resending the latest email with a correction. The version we sent out earlier was missing one part of the prompt that makes the workflow tick as intended. This email includes the correction. Thanks for your patience and happy building! EV Team Hi, it’s Azeem. Two weeks ago I asked the question of can AI finally clean my inbox? I imagined an assistant inspired by the Eisenhower Matrix that could do ruthless triage on my behalf: deflect distractions, protect focus time and act on urgent matters with minimal input from me. A few days later, my colleague George Johnston had a working prototype for me. Today, he’s sharing the full step-by-step guide so you can build your own AI assistant – no code required and in under 15 minutes. If you’re an Exponential View member, you’ll also get free access to the tools we used. Enjoy! ⚡️ NEW: GET TOP AI TOOLS WITH YOUR EXPONENTIAL VIEW MEMBERSHIP We’re launching a new perk: exclusive access to some of the best AI tools we use ourselves. Annual members now get $1,250+ worth of AI products right away, including Perplexity Pro for research, Lindy and Wordware for agentic workflows, Julius for data analysis. Already an annual member? Claim your bundle. 📝 How to build your own artificial assistantLast Sunday, I opened my laptop to find 73 new email threads, six Slack pings and a calendar resembling the final stages of a Tetris game. Just as I was absorbing the chaos, Azeem’s post on the AI agent he *really* wants appeared in my inbox. His aspiration for an AI solution was this:
I immediately realised that many of the items on his wishlist were already doable without needing to know any code, inside an AI tool called Lindy. I knew that Azeem already used Lindy so I set up a flow for him. By the end of this post, you’ll learn how to build this exact flow to help you declutter your workspace. And if you’re an EV member on the annual plan, you’ll get access to the Exponential AI Bundle where you can unlock Lindy Pro with an extended free trial and more tokens to run deeper flows like this one. Let’s go…When I first set out to build this workflow, I considered the usual suspects: Zapier and Make. Both have moved fast to add agentic AI features, balancing innovation with the needs of their long-time users. But in any new tech category, fresh entrants have a chance to rethink the experience from the ground up without compromise. They can focus on doing one thing exceptionally well. Emerging tools like Lindy AI, Wordware and n8n come with trade-offs. Their integrations are still growing (though accelerated by coding assistants and MCPs), and their interfaces may feel unfamiliar to non-early adopters – unless they’ve nailed the UX. For this workflow, I chose to work with Lindy. This walkthrough will help you build a working agent to declutter your comms, but I invite you to notice what makes this feel different from building a traditional workflow. Along the way, we might even uncover what sets truly agentic products apart. Prerequisites (3 min)Step 1: Set up Lindy (1 min)
Step 2: Add Trigger → Email Received (1 min)
Step 3: Summarise & Classify Email (2 min)
🔥Hot tip: I asked ChatGPT to create this prompt and you can ask it to better define what urgent means to you and use that prompt instead.
In the top right hand corner, click Test ➜ you’ll see a JSON preview. (If Gmail has no matching email yet, forward yourself one and re‑test. You may need to re-test by re-adding the first gmail step)
Step 4 - Send a Slack DM (3 min)On this step, you’ll receive the Slack DM that there’s an urgent email with a title and summary. You will be able to reply to this email, from Slack or alternatively ask your agent to book in a 30 minute slot when you’re next available so you can tackle it with focus. + Action again ➜ Slack → Send Direct message.
Step 5 - Add the conditions based on your Slack reply (3 min)
Step 6 - Add the action to reply to the email (2 mins)
Step 7 - Add the action to create the Google Calendar event (2 mins)After the conditional path: the user wants to create a 30 minute calendar slot to focus
Step 8 - Test!
The Finale: Turn your agent on (5 sec) 🤖⚡
Want to extend further? Let’s make it fully autonomous with Lindy’s Pro tools↓↓ Pro tips & automation steps below — unlock premium Lindy with more tokens to run deeper flows, Perplexity Pro & other AI tools ↓↓... Continue reading this post for free in the Substack app |
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