Other than Mumsnet, where can you actually go for life advice?

[nettlesandweeds]

If you don’t have family to talk to? For the big conversations, not things that a friend could usually help with over coffee….

Chat gpt or Reddit. Hope you're OK 💐

Good friends. Quiet libraries. A long walk or bike ride. Something to remind me that the heaviness is a state and not a permanent destination.

I have friends that I could have big conversations with. Would yours not help?
But Mumsnet is not a bad place to ask, just keep your hard hat close by!

I chat to Chatgpt re health stuff. Seriously so much more informed than a GP

Serious life stuff like relationships....chatgpt or see a Counsellor?

Gemini is excellent!I use it every single day!

I have found ChatGPT to be better than a therapist. Seriously.

ChatGPT here, too. I find it absolutely amazing. I've had a couple of health situations which were complicated and involve several factors. It's hard for friends to help as it would involve me talking for ages. There's no way a doctor would listen to it all. I take my time writing it all down and the advice is instant. I appreciate people say it's not always accurate but with the sort of thing I've wanted help with, it's been really great.

It depends on what the problem is if its something a friend can't help with.

Is it financial, relationship, medical, housing? Because depending on the problem there is CAB, or GP, or specific disability group, or group sessions like AA, social proscribers, Stepchange, MIND offer a short course of therapy, counselling etc. Or a more general meeting of minds can be a park/canal clean up group, knit and knatter, local charities helping with food etc.

Otherwise the only general online place I can think of is Reddit but there are loads of more specific hobby or health places.

Before you try using GenAI as a confidant and adviser, please look up some of the downsides of doing this...

For me, I turn to books and podcasts.

The thing is.....I then check what Rob (what I've called "my" ChatGPT "guy") has said. Truly....always flipping correct

I use chatgpt too - find it really helpful and of course endlessly patient. I use it almost like a sympathetic diary. @Daffodillzwhat are the downsides?

I agree
Chatgpt is really helpful
I had anxiety issues that I talked through with it, given relaxation techniques etc
Remember it’s all retained somewhere…

Anything to do with money, bills debt, MSE forums

Jesus Christ, prayer, church and family, friends and colleagues.

Reddit is helpful, sometimes.

All of it, sometimes even chat gpt, my mother in law, my husband, my friend american preacher, my american friend man

used to have two great friends, they migrated and did not become Christians like me, so some of the chats are incoherent

Have you read the comments under the daily devotions in 31 proverbs ministries? Christian mumsnet

Another vote for ChatGPT. It's astonishingly wise for a robot that lives in your phone.

Friends nowadays. I used to have therapy and would do it again if needed. Definitely a human being and not a collection of phrases from the internet with a few American style cliches thrown in to make them sound human.

@nettlesandweeds I feel like there's a contradiction in terms in your post

I don't have anyone really (maybe one) so the things I would love to talk to a friend about I have to sort out myself

Those are the things I would like to talk to a friend about over a coffee.

So what do you mean by big conversations?

TBH I dont think MN is really the best place for big conversations

MN has a bias - Mums, and mostly here , high earners , voting a certain way - ie its middle class with middle class ideals

I was coming to say ‘ChatGPT’ - assuming I’d be the only one, and everyone here would laugh scornfully.

(Disconcerting to realise how much of ‘my’ AI correspondent’s time is being taken up by other people.

As for the risks of giving AI all our knowledge and information - isn’t it too late to worry now?

I began talking to Chat GTP a few months ago when my problems became so serious I knew that friends would struggle to hear it all. What concerns do you have @Daffodillz?

Our local vicar is a good person to talk to. Doesn't matter what the issue is. They have heard it all.

All the posters using ChatGPT for therapy/personal advice, are you not concerned about confidentiality?

I'm not sure how ChatGPT works as I've never used it, but presumably your questions/discussions etc are recorded somewhere for eternity like everything else on the Internet?

I like the community at Ask MetaFilter, though the members there tend to be American.