It’s therapeutic to talk to someone about your problems, but that means you either need a heart-to-heart conversation with a friend or you’ve got to pay a professional to sit down and listen to your rants. In the modern world, it seems like the latter is more plausible.
Social media has made people oddly antisocial and single-faceted, as we compulsively post our surface-level updates, positive moments, and greatest achievements online. Purposefully leaving out at least half of the story of our lives—the parts where we have mental breakdowns, cry during the sad parts of the movies, and road rage against the old lady driving 40mph on the freeway—our social media accounts are an inaccurate portrayal of actuality. On social media, everyone is a model citizen, but in reality, we’re all just closeted dirtbags unwilling to show our authentic selves to each other, and how are you supposed to make real friends in that kind of environment?
Besides, it’s rare to have a close friend—a genuinely impartial ride-or-die who would never judge your true self—that you can fully trust with intimate details of your soul. So in a world full of strangely public loneliness, self-isolation, and social media flexing, it’s becoming nearly impossible to find someone legitimate enough to spill your deepest secrets.
However, it’s also an era of artificial intelligence and computer learning, so there’s a new bestie out there that stands in as a pseudo-therapist, a shoulder to cry on, and the ultimate nonjudgmental diary: ChatGPT.
