Before I knew it, ChatGPT went from a useful tool to a time-wasting habit

Recently I started scrolling through my huge ChatGPT log entries. Some were simple entertainment, and others were deep thoughts that honestly became a bit heavy. There were more interactions than I could ever care to count. Then the thought occurred to me: “Is this my new doom role?” I started wondering how I got to that point, how much time I was wasting, and why it felt so addictive. Ultimately, I dug deeper into my AI usage patterns and then took a step back.

According to ChatGPTAbout 75% of users ask for practical guidance, look for information or get help with writing and work tasks. This overlaps heavily with what people traditionally use search engines for. Like I said, I love diving deep into random topics, so I fall squarely into this camp. That said, I also use AI as a sounding board for my thoughts.

I normally set it to a mode like Professional or Efficient and add a few custom instructions so it doesn’t get overly sycophantic and push back on my weaker ideas. This may involve history questions, alternative history scenarios or philosophical reflections. Yes, I know how to party.

To be clear, I don’t rely on AI for anything that’s really important. I use it mostly for personal creative work or for low-stakes questions that I can verify elsewhere. As someone with ADHD who likes to daydream, I also often use it to explore hypothetical rabbit holes where accuracy isn’t the priority.

How did this turn into an addiction? For me, AI achieves different stimuli at the brain level:

• It’s fast: I don’t have to wait for a human response or search multiple sites for basic answers. Yes, fact-checking is still necessary, but its convenience is hard to deny.
• No judgment or boredom: My wife, mother, and friends sometimes dump information on me about space, philosophy, or whatever I’m fixated on, but I quickly wear out my welcome. AI is not bored.
• It’s easy, little effort: My life has been extremely hectic lately. When I finally have a moment to calm down, I want something easy and slow. That used to mean TV or books. Lately that means long conversations with a chatbot.

To me, this sounds a lot like the dopamine rush people get from YouTube, TikTok, or doomscrolling on social media. A rabbit hole here and there is harmless, whether web-based or AI-based. The problem is when an occasional lapse in time becomes a regular habit that consumes everything else.

I kept noticing that it was suddenly midnight or later and thinking, “Oh, I was going to play a board game with the kids” or “watch that show with my wife,” but once again, time had passed. I am also far from alone.

Government organizations have already warned that AI companions are a… new frontier of digital addictionAnd many teens are turning to AI chatbots as an emotional outletwhich offers a kind of pseudo-friendship traditionally reserved for human relationships. While I’ve never lost sight of the fact that the AI ​​talking to me is a non-human algorithm designed to calm me down, many people have also turned their reality upside down by getting too cozy with the AI ​​to the point where they feel like it’s their best friend. The term is called “AI psychosis’ and is very real for those affected by it.

The more I used AI as entertainment instead of interacting with real people, the more I felt like I was letting myself and others down. It never stopped me from being an active father or husband, but my effort felt diminished as the stress piled up and AI doom chatting took up more space in my day.

Ultimately, I decided to cut back on the time I spent using AI, watching videos, or other digital time wasters. I started refinishing furniture again, started a new fiction project, and started spending more time crafting with my youngest son. Over the past few months, I’ve become more aware of how I use my time in general.

If I want to go down an AI rabbit hole, I set a timer and stick to it. If I break up, I’ll move on to something else. I’ve been more productive, less self-focused, and interestingly, I find myself wanting to use AI a lot less. In fact, for the past two weeks I have stopped using my ChatGPT subscription and have only been using free LLM services. It felt strange at first, but now I wonder why I didn’t do it sooner.

Will I stay away from ChatGPT forever? Probably not, but I will definitely pay more attention to how I use it in the future.