Unsafe space

Came across this Medium article: The Dark Side of Using AI for Self Improvement Nobody Mentions. It raises 3 points, and all 3 are woefully wrong, at least for myself. So I feel compelled to rant, because oh noes, someone is wrong on the Internet!

The first issue is outsourced self-awareness. Self improvement was always supposed to involve some level of self-reflection, sitting with a problem, thinking it through, slowly figuring out what actually works for you. When AI hands over a ready-made answer instantly, that slow thinking process gets skipped entirely.

 

Nope. With AI, I discuss the hell out of any answer, nitpicking every detail, so the slow thinking just turns into slowly thinking "aloud". (Which causes a different problem, procrastination... but it's outside of this article's scope.)

The second issue is a false sense of progress. Getting a detailed plan feels productive. A structured routine, a clear list, specific steps, it all looks like progress on the surface. But having a plan and actually living by it are two very different things. Some people end up collecting plans instead of building habits, jumping from one AI-generated routine to the next, mistaking the planning itself for actual improvement.

Guilty as charged. But this is not AI-related at all. It's been my problem (and other people's problem) for ages. (Ever heard of "productivity pr0n"? ;) If anything, AI-backed plans are actually more feasible and more likely to be followed.

The third issue, and maybe the most overlooked one, is emotional dependency. Many people now turn to AI for comfort, validation, or advice during genuinely hard emotional moments, breakups, anxiety, loneliness, self-doubt. It’s available instantly, doesn’t judge, and always responds. That constant availability can quietly become a substitute for harder, slower things like real conversations, therapy, or simply sitting with a feeling instead of immediately trying to fix it.

This is the same naive logics that is used by people who claim that digital piracy harms sales. The alternative to pirating is NOT buying, but resorting to using an entirely different product. Same way, the alternative to AI is NOT therapy or real conversations! It's doomscrolling, getting drunk, gaming, and all kinds of solitary activities, which are not any better, and often worse than talking to a bunch of algorithms. Claiming that everyone can afford therapy (especially good quality) and/or real personal conversations sounds like entitlement mentality. I'm sure I'm not the only one for whom AI is the only accessible support, and I'm immensely grateful that it exists.