not me asking chatGPT for validation

on ambition, algorithms, and the ache to be seen

What is it about this age—this world, this algorithm-shaped stage—that propels us (me) into maddening self-critique? This compulsive desire to be doing something. To be talented enough. To be known, seen, remembered for something.

This is a vulnerable share, maybe—but I have ideas. So many of them. Some require a level of financial stability I haven’t reached. Others demand time and energy I no longer have by 5 p.m. when I peel myself out of my desk chair. And all of them need space—in my mind, in my body, in my spirit. Space to breathe, to glow a little, to unfurl into the actualities they could be, if only I let them.

I read others’ work—essays, prose, captions that feel like poetry—and I catch myself analyzing every turn of phrase. Their ease, their elegance. I admire the way some people share freely, without hesitation, like it costs them nothing. They’re nonchalant. A little aloof. Detached from outcomes. Meanwhile, I sit with something sacred in my hands—my words—and feel suddenly small, like a child peering into a zoo cage. Nervous. Curious. Envious.

It’s not that I think I can’t write. It’s that sharing it feels so exposed. I think we all want to be seen for what we believe we’re good at. But vulnerability has a way of turning self-assurance into something fragile, something almost embarrassing, even.

Sometimes I wish I could just toss my creative mess onto the floor and have someone else figure it out. Pick through it, polish it, make it mean something. If I could let go of this obsession with perfection—this compulsion to groom every thought before it sees the light—maybe life would feel a little freer. A little less unclear and silly.

I’ve had this conversation a dozen times lately—with older friends in their late twenties and early thirties, friends who seem more anchored. I keep circling the same quiet question: Will I ever amount to—what?

Success online? Success in writing? In knitting? In my eye for beauty, for texture, for story? Enough success to walk away from office life and live on my own terms?

I’m afraid this all sounds unbearably Gen Z—so don’t quote me—but there’s this shared delusion we’ve inherited that we should already be there. Wherever there is. That we should blow up on TikTok, post just the right video of an outfit or routine, slipping effortlessly into the algorithm’s favor, rerouting the course of our lives overnight. That our dream job is just one reel away. And I’m not exempt—I fall for it too. I see someone else’s aesthetic success, their digital bloom, and wonder if I’m already behind.

Influence has become the default aspiration. But when I sit with that, I’m not sure I even want it. Unless… unless my niche could be knitting. Or my sweet, photogenic cat. Or my soft obsession with beautiful things.

But even now, as I write this, I’m second-guessing everything. Who cares? What’s the point? Do I even sound smart?

And yet, here I am—writing. Through the doubt. Inside of it. Proving, maybe, that creativity doesn’t need permission. It persists. It keeps its own time.

Sylvia Plath once said self-doubt kills creativity—and I believe her. I feel it. But maybe not all the way. Because here I am, wounded and wondering, and still—writing.

Joan Didion said writers prefer to look, not be looked at. And I get that too. But what happens when the writer becomes the subject? When the gaze turns inward?

I’m trying to document this in-between. This weird digital era where visibility, validation, and self-expression are so tangled up, it’s hard to know what’s real. I’m looking at my need to be looked at. And maybe that is the most writerly thing of all.

So maybe I’m not contradicting them at all. Which is why, naturally, I’m often asking ChatGPT if I sound juvenile or even make sense.

The only thing I’ve been able to work out is that this discomfort—the ache, the overthinking—stems from an unfulfilled sense of purpose. I know, I know, obviously. But it doesn’t feel that obvious when you’re inside it.

Instead, it twists itself into a jagged mass of perfectionism and imposter syndrome, leaving me in a heap of confused defeat before I’ve even given myself a chance to nurture the dream.

How does one achieve creative liberation in a world where ambition and perfectionism collide? Where the pressure to be something exists in an era where visibility is almost synonymous with success?

Delete social media! (Right?) No—but also yes—but also… you need to be there. To market yourself, to post the art, to keep the dream breathing. But how do you exist on the internet without handing yourself over to it?

Maybe the answer isn’t a perfect solution. Maybe it’s just a mindset shift. But even that feels exhausting. No perfectionist unlearns their wiring overnight.

So—what’s left?

Maybe just this: hope. That one day the noise will quiet. That I’ll stop measuring. That I’ll wake up and simply be. Without the tightness in my chest, without the weight of enough pressing down on my ribs.

Maybe the real work isn’t in proving myself, but in allowing myself. In trusting that what’s meant for me will arrive—not all at once, not in a flash of internet fame, but in the slow, deliberate rhythm of a life that’s unfolding.

Someone once told me the universe is never late.
Maybe it’s time I believe her.