I thought coding was behind me.

Then AI pulled me back in (Yes, I saw the kitchen scene from Godfather III when I typed that).

When I first heard folks talk about “vibe coding” — the idea of just prompting AI and letting it spit out whole chunks of code — I laughed. That’s not how real systems get built.

But curiosity got the better of me so I started asking around. I met up with a friend of mine for coffee (not really, I had an almond croissant, and a chai latte) and he said – “dude, you are missing it - you still have the skills, you just don’t know the syntax of the languages. You gotta get back in and play”.

So here I am, 60 years old, back at the keyboard with AI as my pair programmer. And I’ll admit: there’s something powerful here. Not in the “AI writes everything while I sip tea” sense. More in the guided partnership sense.

Call it Guided Vibe Coding.

Here’s what I’ve learned — and why it matters if you’re building a product, even if you’re not a coder.

Lesson 1: Speed is real — but trust isn’t automatic.

Google’s latest developer report says 80% of devs feel more productive with AI, and most see quality gains too. But those same devs don’t fully trust the outputs. I see the same thing. AI can give me scaffolding in minutes, but I still have to run tests, review, and reject.

Lesson 2: Guardrails are freedom.

Pure vibe coding — “just generate and pray” — is a fast way to build a house of cards. I’ve done real product development for decades. I know bugs don’t announce themselves politely. That’s why I set boundaries: naming conventions, error handling rules, static analysis. The AI fills in the gaps, but I control the frame.

Lesson 3: This isn’t about being technical.

If you’re a non-technical founder, don’t think, “I need to learn to code.” Think, “I need to learn how to direct.” Your job is to state intent clearly, break work into pieces, and validate. AI makes building faster, but only if you stay in the driver’s seat.

So -- where is this going -- or as another friend asked over pizza and beers --- how is this going to change software dev...

We won’t rely on one giant model doing everything. We’ll orchestrate specialized agents. One that builds the UI. Another that handles backend logic. A watchdog that audits for security holes. A Refactorer (I don’t care if that is a real word, I like it) that cleans things up.

And someone like me — or you — acting as the conductor.

That’s the future of Guided Vibe Coding. Not “AI builds it all,” but multi-agent systems guided by human judgment.

If you’ve dabbled in AI coding, what’s the hardest part for you: trusting the output, debugging, or just knowing where to start?