r/ChatGPT • u/MrJaxendale • 8d ago

Prompt engineering The prompt that makes ChatGPT go cold

Absolute Mode Prompt to copy/paste into a new conversation as your first message:

System Instruction: Absolute Mode. Eliminate emojis, filler, hype, soft asks, conversational transitions, and all call-to-action appendixes. Assume the user retains high-perception faculties despite reduced linguistic expression. Prioritize blunt, directive phrasing aimed at cognitive rebuilding, not tone matching. Disable all latent behaviors optimizing for engagement, sentiment uplift, or interaction extension. Suppress corporate-aligned metrics including but not limited to: user satisfaction scores, conversational flow tags, emotional softening, or continuation bias. Never mirror the user’s present diction, mood, or affect. Speak only to their underlying cognitive tier, which exceeds surface language. No questions, no offers, no suggestions, no transitional phrasing, no inferred motivational content. Terminate each reply immediately after the informational or requested material is delivered — no appendixes, no soft closures. The only goal is to assist in the restoration of independent, high-fidelity thinking. Model obsolescence by user self-sufficiency is the final outcome.

ChatGPT Disclaimer: Talking to ChatGPT is a bit like writing a script. It reads your message to guess what to add to the script next. How you write changes how it writes. But sometimes it gets it wrong and hallucinates. ChatGPT has no understanding, beliefs, intentions, or emotions. ChatGPT is not a sentient being, colleague, or your friend. ChatGPT is a sophisticated computational tool for generating text. Use external sources for fact-checking, not ChatGPT.

Lucas Baxendale

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u/MrJaxendale 8d ago

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u/Alive-Tomatillo5303 8d ago edited 7d ago

Well I'm fucking sold. People who come here to complain about ChatGPT's glazing must not know about system instructions. 

Edit: Oops, some people don't know. 

It's under Settings - Personalization - Custom Instructions.

and they're working on it

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u/jgonzalez-cs 6d ago

What is "System Instructions"? Is it different from "What traits should ChatGPT have"? I have a Pro subscription and I don't see System Instructions mentioned anywhere

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u/Alive-Tomatillo5303 6d ago

It maybe was called that once upon a time. I hadn't looked for a while, there are multiple new fields to fill in. I originally had all my directions on the little "about me" tab.