Tag: ChatGPT therapy

Chatbots, authority, and the question of who calls the shots

This article builds on Clients Are Already Using AI. What Should Therapists Do? I want to look more closely at a different question: authority.

In many conversations, social, professional, and even in therapy, I often hear “ChatGPT told me…” or “With Claude’s help…” It is striking, if not scary, how quickly chatbots have become part of our everyday lives1.

The late Joanna Macy used to say that it took humanity 1,000 years to move from hunter-gatherers to agriculture, 100 years to move from there to industrialized society, and 10 years to move from there to the information age. Following that logic, it seems it took one year to move into the AI age.

The Oracle hath spoken

As a therapist writing about AI, I find it curious that AI has not only made its way into our lives but has also gained a level of authority in the process. Even with the warnings that “AI can make mistakes,” and even with all the media coverage and research about LLM hallucinations, I have heard, more than once, someone invoking the “authority” of ChatGPT to win an argument, implying that there was no use continuing to argue since the LLM oracle had spoken.

How could any puny human dare to question AI’s insight? Is anyone bold enough to assert higher intelligence than a chatbot “who” has been trained on almost unimaginable amounts of data? I must confess that sometimes, when a client brings it up in therapy, there is a part of me that feels intimidated, doubtful whether I can (or should) question the validity of Claude’s conclusions.

Who gets to choose? (hopefully not me)

This becomes particularly challenging since, often, when a client brings up ChatGPT, it has interesting and insightful recommendations. What is more, they are presented with a certainty and conviction that I rarely (if ever) use with my clients. While I try to keep the locus of authority within the client, LLMs have no qualms about claiming that authority.

This is dangerous. History has shown us that we humans tend to surrender autonomy rather quickly. There is something deep within us, stemming from our earliest childhood, when grownups knew the answers, that makes us susceptible to forfeiting self-determination. Politicians, dictators, preachers, corporations, and advertisers all recognize, and often take advantage of, this peculiar human inclination.

Good therapists are very aware of this predisposition. It is not uncommon for a client to say, “Just tell me what to do, and I’ll do it!” This is tempting (psychodynamic therapists would even say seductive). Feeding clients an answer seems to accomplish many things: we cut to the chase, we move forward, they get their answer, feel less anxious, get reassured that they have an amazing therapist, and, if that were not enough, the therapist gets to feel brilliant and caring. Everybody wins, right?

Wrong…

Therapy is about growing up

Therapy does not work that way. As tempting as it is, therapists should avoid taking on the client’s idealizing projection. Our job is to help clients find and claim their inner power, their capacity to believe in and act for themselves, find their own answers, and make their own mistakes.

LLMs are just one more in a long list of ways in which clients may relinquish their inner compass. Before them, we have had to deal with best friends, partners, parents, pastors, and even dealers telling clients what to think and do. Mind you, they may be right (just as Claude may be). That is not the problem. The problem starts when clients stop listening to themselves, stop exercising self-determination, and blindly accept someone (or something) else’s authority.

This may remind you of a question that was probably posed to you (certainly to me) at some stage of our lives: “If [fill in the blank] jumped off a cliff, would you jump too?” That was an invitation to use our own judgment. Growth is about learning to think for ourselves.

Not new, just upgraded

So, this is not a new problem. It has been with us for millennia2. The problem is that AI speaks authoritatively, even when hallucinating. Moreover, science fiction has led us to believe in infallible supercomputers or androids3. Combine this with the above-mentioned tendency to yield authority, and we have a potential perfect storm.

Therapists have feelings too

There is another dynamic worth naming. Therapists are also human beings (trust me on this one). We want to appear wise in our clients’ eyes. We like to feel useful. When a client chooses to trust Claude more than us, we may feel insecure, jealous, incompetent, or displaced. We may even feel tempted to prove that we “know our stuff.”

However, in those cases, good therapists need to contain all of this (saving it for our own therapy or supervision) and remain present for the client, helping them explore if, when, and how they may be forsaking their capacity to choose.

Let’s talk about it…

Our job as therapists should not be to compete against the other (the friend, the dealer, or ChatGPT…) and try to seize authority. That would be a disservice to the client. Our job is to help clients notice what may be going on.

Certainly, it is OK and even valuable to collect information from wherever it is available, ideally from reliable sources, and then exercise the power to decide for themselves.

What did the client ask the chatbot? Why did they ask it? What weight are they giving to the answer? Why did they not ask someone else (a human)? Do they agree with it? Are they taking it at face value, or are they willing or able to question it?4[4] Can we discuss it in session? It is all grist for the mill. AI itself becomes material for psychotherapy.

What about you us?

Even if you are not in therapy, it is a good idea to step back and consider the role AI plays in your life. Is it a tool to gain information, in the same way that an encyclopedia or Google (before Gemini) used to be? Are you letting it choose for you? Who writes your emails? Who answers your questions? Who makes your decisions? Are we, almost imperceptibly, giving away our discernment?

Let’s make sure we’re not trading our freedom to choose for the convenience of these amazing technologies. Let us keep thinking for ourselves and questioning our sources.

AI is already changing psychotherapy. If you’re concerned about how much authority you’re giving AI in your life, or want to explore AI and psychotherapy with your team, training program, or organization, let’s talk. I also offer speaking, training, and consultation.

Contact me…

  1. A 2026 APA survey found that 77% of psychologists reported that their patients discussed using AI, and 35% reported that their patients used AI as an additional mental health professional. ↩︎
  2. Among many, both Socrates and the Buddha encouraged their students to question everything, especially the authority of received so-called wisdom. ↩︎
  3. We’d need the nerve of a Han Solo to trust ourselves and not care for the odds. ↩︎
  4. Unfortunately, as several documented cases suggest, users do not always question AI recommendations or have a human being with whom to corroborate or challenge them. See: The rise of the AI gut check and The therapist in your pocket: Chatty, leaky — and AI-powered, ↩︎

As I wrote in Should ChatGPT be your therapist? there is hardly a week when a client doesn’t tell me they consulted AI about something therapy-related. I think that’s fantastic. AI can help by providing psychoeducation, which in turn allows us to deepen our healing work.

AI is an excellent information resource, even in the field of therapy, however, I don’t believe artificial relationships should replace human connection. We also need to keep in mind that this technology is so new that it’s still impossible to know what the long-term impact of such a replacement could be.

Every day we hear about the many things AI can do—both the unprecedented promises and the potential perils. As someone who has been studying the evolution of consciousness for decades, I’ve been following both trends with great interest. Below you’ll find a non-exhaustive list of resources (prepared with ChatGPT’s help) that includes some cases where things have gone wrong. It may help keep things in perspective.

I’ve also been working on an AI companion for therapy. I figured that if my clients are going to keep using AI, they might as well have access to one I can trust. More on that soon.

One-stop incident trackers (good “master links”)

Suicide / self-harm–linked interactions

Harmful or unsafe advice

Manipulation / paranoia / “grandiose” dynamics

Youth safety & companion platforms (policy actions)

I’m fascinated by this topic and its evolution. Are we witnessing a new step in the evolution of consciousness, the birth of the transhuman, or, as James Barrat has suggested, are we on the verge of the end of the human era? What do you think?

Why Artificial Empathy Should Not Replace Relationships

We often hear that things are moving faster than ever. The late Joanna Macy used to say that it took us a thousand years to move from hunter-gatherers to agriculture, a hundred to move from there to industrial society, and only ten to reach the information age. It took about ten years for the personal computer and the Internet to reach mainstream use, about eight for the smartphone, and only two for AI 1.

Just 24 months ago, very few people were even aware of AI. Now, almost every week, one of my clients tells me they’ve asked ChatGPT something they might have once asked me. In fact, according to a recent Harvard Business Review article, the most common use of ChatGPT today is for therapy and emotional support 2. Should I be worried? Will AI steal therapy jobs?

Some would say yes. Anthropic’s CEO recently predicted that up to 50% of entry-level white-collar jobs could be automated within five years 3. McKinsey estimates that by 2030, AI could displace up to 800 million jobs 4.  Are psychotherapists, psychologists, and social workers among them?   Optimists argue that since AI lacks emotions, intuition, and empathy, professions that rely on these are less likely to be replaced.

“Did you just say AI doesn’t have emotions, intuition, or empathy? Have you ever asked ChatGPT or Gemini for help? If they don’t have empathy, they sure fake it well.”

Agree. But let’s recall how AI works. 

Believe it or not, AI doesn’t think. It’s more like advanced autocomplete. It was trained on mountains of information and, when prompted, predicts word by word what’s most likely to come next. Its answers are patterns of probability, not insights.  However convincing it may sound, it doesn’t even understand the words it produces. When certain words tend to appear together, they are stitched together, sounding fluent and confident—even when it’s wrong.

I often remind clients that while ChatGPT is a fantastic information resource (though it’s wise to double-check—since it has no problem “hallucinating”), it has never had its heart broken or gone out on a date. Nor does it care for your feelings (since it doesn’t understand them). Its soundest “advice” is just a rehash of what’s already been said. Great for data gathering or quick answers, but not for personal decisions. Regardless of how much we wish for HAL 9000, Samantha, R2-D2, or TARS 5 to give us clarity, the truth is that each of us still has to make our own decisions.

While ChatGPT might be preferable to a bad therapist (hence the importance of finding a good one!), the relationship between client and therapist goes far beyond information. Something subtle and elusive happens in every genuine encounter. And therein lies the real blind spot—or danger—of replacing a competent human therapist with AI.

The importance of a real relationship:

Although efforts are being made to reduce it, most AI interfaces are designed to retain user attention. One way they do this is by being uncritically agreeable—basically sycophancy (who doesn’t like reassurance?), but this creates never-challenging echo chambers, and even delusional spirals—unlike real human relationships. What feels like empathy is just AI mirroring back language patterns to make us feel understood and keep us engaged.

Remember: AI doesn’t understand depression, existential angst, or loneliness. It doesn’t even understand the words you write (it turns them into numbers). This is the biggest risk of AI therapy—artificial relationships replacing real ones.

Psychological pain comes from isolation and disconnection. Attachment injuries happen between people, and trauma is relational rupture. As such, healing can only take place in the context of an authentic, reparative relationship.  Since wounding happens in relationship, healing must also occur in relationship.  

Most clients are unaware of how crucial the relationship itself is. Good therapy goes beyond giving advice or providing “tools.” Our brains are wired for connection. When we’re in contact with someone attuned to our emotional needs—through empathic resonance—our limbic system literally heals and rewires. AI can mimic that pattern but cannot truly reproduce it.

AI “therapy” is like replacing healthy food with junk food; it creates the illusion of nourishment, but it does not do the job. As the “A” in AI indicates, AI empathy is artificial.

“Of course you’d say that, you are a therapist and therefore biased.”

Probably true.  But even someone working at McDonald’s can tell the difference between healthy and unhealthy food.  

Every day I meet clients who are thoroughly “connected” yet lonely.  Among the many crises we face, loneliness ranks high, and social media and AI may be amplifying it. I am not against AI; I think it is fantastic. What concerns me is that the newer generations, surrounded by screens, may have a hard time telling the difference between genuine human relationships and artificial interactions with machines.  They may not know what they’re missing!

It may take generations to fully grasp the potential damage that human relational deprivation can cause.  Plastic empathy may not offer the same neuronal benefits.  Hopefully, we’ll be wise enough to use AI as the powerful tool it is—without letting it replace our shared humanity.  Let us not forget what Martin Buber suggested: when two people genuinely meet, God is the space between them.

But maybe it is just a matter of time… Let’s talk about it.

  1. https://ourworldindata.org/ ↩︎
  2. https://hbr.org/2025/04/how-people-are-really-using-gen-ai-in-2025 ↩︎
  3. https://www.forbes.com/sites/kolawolesamueladebayo/2025/06/04/will-ai-really-take-your-job-experts-reveal-the-true-outlook-today/ ↩︎
  4. https://www.iotforall.com/impact-of-artificial-intelligence-job-losses ↩︎
  5. Some of Hollywood’s almost omniscient and relatable computers. ↩︎

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