In some ways, AI can still be considered in its early stages with new developments constantly surfacing. To Mike Mikula, the rapid growth and evolution of AI creates a “sandbox,” giving each of us an opportunity to play with and explore endless opportunities to be creative and innovate. 

Mike kicked off 2025 by launching Emberweave LLC where he provides AI advising and consulting, but his AI journey began in early 2023 during a company hackathon. With a background in software engineering, this hackathon was his first experience building an integration using an API key on ChatGPT 3.5. Driven by his natural curiosity, he then explored ways of using ChatGPT to write code, eventually leading to tackling larger scales of complexity. After leaving the company in 2024, Mike learned how to use Cursor AI, which has quickly become his favorite fully-integrated AI tool. It has single-handedly transformed his perception of AI capabilities, ultimately making ChatGPT feel like the “stone age” in comparison. Ever since then, Mike has embraced the challenges that spark opportunities for innovative and creative thinking

As long as people know what they’re passionate about and create time to experiment, that’s what’s going to help them make the most impact.” 

In the spirit of growth and development, Mike has shared his passion for experimentation by teaching his fiancée and nephew how to build the snake game using Cursor. This set a foundation for their future projects. His fiancée realized her long-held dream of building her own endless version of Atari’s classic Breakout game. This led her to create the game on an actual gaming engine with Cursor’s assistance to write the code and set up the project. His nephew, a recent high school graduate with no coding background, was able to learn how to implement integrations via API keys to build a cat weather app. The app not only shows the weather but provides the ability to mark cats you want to adopt in a specified city. 

“That ‘light bulb’ moment where people get to be creative – to me, that’s something I’ve been passionate about,” Mike said. “It’s about when people can find their creative outlet and the tools that can help them achieve their goals.” 

Mike has reached several milestone moments in his own work, notably with a recent advising project for GuideTime – a startup focused on guided trips. Using both Cursor and ChatGPT, he built an entire AI agent on Salesforce, which is currently in beta. He watched the agent respond in natural language and build different API payload queries to find trips. By allowing the tools to “talk” to each other, he was able to navigate solutions to resolve bugs and issues, resulting in a refined AI tool. For Mike, this project exemplifies how his accumulated knowledge put him in the right place at the right time and ultimately enabled him to create this tool. 

When imagining the future of AI, one thing that keeps Mike up at night is advanced hacking capabilities. He points out that viruses can be built with AI integrated into them, giving them the power to “heal” themselves. With our current infrastructure, he’s uncertain how we would manage such risks. 

While the future of AI is uncertain, one thing for Mike stands true: now is the time to be curious and play. He encourages everyone to set aside the fear of failure and embrace the power of experimentation, especially as we continue going through these fast developmental waves of AI evolution. 

“If you feel like you’re ‘failing,’ know that you’re failing fast to learn,” Mike said. 

Mike is open to growing his network and manages a Discord server called “AI Creatives” – a space which features posts from people using and sharing different AI tools to solve all types of problems. This server has an open invite for the next 30 days for anyone who would like to join. 

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