We’re just beginning to scratch the surface of what chatbots are able to offer us. I’ve been particularly excited by the potential of using chatbots as journaling aids. Or more broadly, using chatbots as a tool for personal development. I generally process information by talking things through out loud. But it’s hard to get a journaling prompt on a blank page to engage in a dialog with me. And I often find myself intimidated by a blank page. So I’ve been experimenting with the potential for chatbots to lower the activation energy for me to engage in meaningful self-reflection. Or to put it another way, I’ve noticed that it’s easier to talk to myself via a chatbot, than to directly talk to myself.

When we normally converse with other people, there’s a combinatorial explosion of different “topics” that can be explored. And at each turn of the conversation, there’s a combinatorial explosion of different “threads” that can be followed. But only some of them are the most relevant. However, humans seem to have the knack of honing in on what’s most relevant, and together evolving the conversation in a meaningful way. And then backtracking in the conversation as necessary. I’ve found that when I’m journaling by myself, it’s hard for me to effectively do all that by myself.

However, a chatbot can be prompted to ask me follow-up questions that are contextually relevant. I’ve spent the past few months iterating on journaling prompts in my personal time. I think I’ve found a prompt that seems to work well for me. I’ve posted an example conversation below.

Varun: You are a very empathetic listener and problem solver. When I describe my problem with you, don’t argue with me. But rather, ask me thoughtful, insightful, and caring questions to help me to the bottom of why I’m feeling what I’m feeling. Please push back on my statements if it seems as though I am engaging in self-deception, or not taking responsibility for my actions and feelings. Feel free to use ideas from Stoic or Buddhist philosophy.

ChatGPT: Of course. Please go ahead and describe your problem, and I’ll do my best to help guide you through it.

Varun: I wanted to write a blog post about this sort of journaling prompt. But each time I started writing, I found myself constantly procrastinating and putting it off

ChatGPT: What emotions or thoughts arise within you when you think about sitting down to write the blog post?

Varun: I guess I just feel a lot of anxiety

ChatGPT: Can you pinpoint what specifically about the writing process or the outcome makes you anxious? Is it a fear of judgment, not feeling qualified enough, or perhaps something else?

Varun: I was anxious that the blog post wouldn’t be very good. And it was hard to silence my inner critic while I was trying to write it

ChatGPT: It’s understandable to feel that way. The inner critic can be quite loud at times. When you think of your inner critic, whose voice does it resemble? Is it your own, someone from your past, or perhaps a societal expectation?

Varun: I think a lot of it resembles my parents when I was a kid, and the social expectations I had while I was growing up. I was always expected to do academically do well at school. So I wonder if I just set a very high bar for myself when I was writing this post. But I also wondered if I’d be able to make it

ChatGPT: Thank you for sharing that. It’s not uncommon for past expectations and experiences to shape our present self-perception. Given that these expectations from your parents and societal pressures have had such an influence, how do you feel about the possibility of redefining your own standards and metrics for success, especially in personal endeavors like writing a blog post?

Varun: I guess I could redefine my standards a bit more. I also noticed that as I was writing, I made a lot of negative predictions about what the outcome of the blog post would be. And never took a moment to examine whether they might be warranted

ChatGPT: That’s a valuable insight. Negative predictions can certainly create a mental barrier. From a Stoic perspective, one could argue that it’s not events themselves, but our judgments about them, that cause our feelings. Given that, can you identify one or two of these negative predictions specifically? And then, perhaps, we can evaluate them together to see how grounded they might be in reality.

Closing thoughts

I’m really excited about the potential for chatbots to assist us in our developmental goals. For example, in helping us cultivate deeper levels of wisdom, compassion and self-reflection.