No gf, no friends, it’s hard to meet new people. Tinder and other apps don’t work. Idk even if I travel somewhere I’m alone
This is going to seem trite but it’s not meant to, it’s a real attempt to help.
Have you considered going to church?
Around 100 members (including kids) is a pretty good size; enough for variety and interaction, but not so many you get lost in the crowd.
They are there trying to be friends with each other, to be a family. It can be good.
I have no spouse, I have one friend who lives in another state, and I live alone and work from home. I personally enjoy my solitude because I can live without pressure/expectations. Before getting into a relationship, maybe fuck around a little? Not in regards to cookie, but was there something you wanted to try, but were afraid of making a mess? A hobby you wanted to try, but we’re shy about, like a instrument or singing, etc.? This is the time to do all that. Make cookies at 3 am, walk around in your undies, do that 5 minute craft, listen to that guilty pleasure song and sing all the words. Watch that kid’s movie you’ve been curious about. A lot of people go from one family to another, or to a roommate. You have been given a season of you, don’t skip it.
If that season never ends, and you have put effort out to end it for some time, I would start looking into social clubs. And not, like, meet ups (those are fine if that’s your bag), but ones centered around getting better at socializing in general. I am extremely bad at socializing offline. I cannot make friends with my current skill set, I would need to work on it. Of course, just the opinon of a random on the internet.
I can’t completely relate as im that type of person who never gets enough alone time for my liking. My idea of a good time is a two hour hot bath or taking a nice walk through a natural setting or just being left with my thoughts. That being said while I may have a smaller social tank and my mileage on it is super efficient. Everyone needs companionship every so often. Alls I can say is I met my wife at a sci fi convention so basically while being part of an interest I enjoyed. I have nice neighbors but you know I will bring the mail to their door (its a condo) when its on the way and most christmasses I got something and left it for xmass at their doors. I do not put signage but after a few years they figure it out (did not this year but they know im between jobs so Im betting they will understand). I have a dog I walk and meet folks while walking her. We have a regular mail man (actually did not for awhile as the lady retired and then we got like temps till a new regular got the route), super, and more often than not when the elevator breaks we get the same guy who I am just getting to the point of recognizing and hes pretty social and affable so will take a view minutes to chat as he goes between gigs. I liked the arc mmos (champions and star trek online) although I don’t do them anymore. Those are tough because you have to do some major blocking before the chats are civil. I mean its not hard as the low hanging fruit of folks just blasting explicatives or derogatory stuff or whatever improves it massively and then over the long term you figure out the sneakier troll types. Worked much better in champions which had a smaller more intimate community. Tons a furries though so you have to be an open minded type but they kept most of the furry rp to dedicated channels so its not like the local one was filled with it. I recently did some pathfiner 2E doing play by discourd and met some very nice folks. Someone posted in the pathfinder community that a guy was doing begginers box sessions folks could sign up for till the new year. Most of my talk has been about now but you know I was living at a place where on one side of me was the family that was the core of the local gang and the other was a slumlord. two properties down though had some really nice folks. so you can pick and choose the neighbors you associate with. I don’t know if any of this will help but I hope it does.
Find people with common interests and try to make friends. Maybe with an app like Meetup or some other friends making apps.
ITT: Bunch of assholes telling you “have you tried to NOT having a cold” when your nose is clearly leaking.
If you don’t understand how it feels to be lonely, any advice you give is awful and full of entitlement.
In the ADHD community, a lot of sound advice for building good habits and coping mechanisms overlaps a lot with “just don’t have ADHD” advice because the advice still works, even if it’s significantly harder to pull off with ADHD.
There’s less overlap for depression, but there still is some between sound advice and “just don’t be sad lol”.
I’m sure there’s some overlap in this case for lonliness.
One of the tough things about this stuff is that it is very easy to convince yourself that nobody understands what you’re going through, so when you don’t see immediate results from advice that means they’re just wrong and there’s nothing you can do. The most important piece of advice is to never give up.
All that said, if everyone in this thread is giving bad advice that shows they don’t understand, you’re implying that you do understand. So where’s your advice?
Or did you just comment to discourage people from trying to help and leave OP to suffer?
Or did you just comment to discourage people from trying to help and leave OP to suffer?
Sure dude, both discouraging people from “helping” (lol) and leaving OP to suffer are obviously the same thing. /s
First of all: OP didn’t ask for advice. Second: I’m discouraging people from giving bad advice.
I can relate to OPs suffering. I know is though, and I undestand on my own experience how OP feels. I know that the only solution for it’s like another commenter said: “get used to it”. OP probably knows this too.
With some projection from me, I can assume he’s only trying to rant over this, thats why OP asked said it on this sub. That’s why he hasn’t answered other comments beside hobbies. OP is trying to relate to people this way.
So when people show up full of self-indulgence thinking “OP NEEDS MY ADVICE”, then it’s clear those comments are more for themselves than for OP. So congrats, you’ve given yourselves a pat on the back. If that’s your attitude, you can fuck off.
It’s true that I know most most of advices from this thread. I’m also know that I should to use them, and I try but it’s hard IRL. Sometimes I just break up like today and every answer to me is like getting in contact with some human. Satisfy some social need idk
I understand, sometimes you just need to scream and rant. It is a good thing.
When I get anxiety this hard, I usually take a very long walk until I get exhausted, so I could think for myself instead of hearing my subconscious how awful things are.
After taking a break, you’ll notice that this voice is always emotional, with 0 logic, full of exaggerated negativity, and will try to convince you that “this is how you die today”, which is pretty much bullshit and incredibly unrealistic. For me at least, that voice will always try focus on the worst in people. When I feel alone is pretty much this.
Sometimes I get a crazy though like telling me “you’re done, dead, there is no going back” for something so trivial as remembering I have to take the dog out tomorrow (not now or yesterday, tomorrow). There is no win unless you ignore it and push through. And even if you commit, it’s still fucking hard.
Maybe it’s just my own bias, but I assumed the advice comes from people who have been or are lonely, and are talking about what helped them.
The worst depths of loneliness I’ve had were when I lived in a country where I didn’t speak the language well, and was in a tiny, tiny town. The way I got out of it was threefold. One was being kinder to myself. I indulged myself in just being alone. Watching movies on my laptop and trying my hand at creative writing, which I had always wanted to do, but hadn’t done. The second was getting into better physical shape. Even half assing it made me feel better: I’m a biologist so I can attest to the fact that one’s mental health improves with a little healthier physical body, if it’s possible. Finally…I just had to be comfortable being awkward. I was the bizarre foreigner who didn’t understand customs or the language, and even when I had assholes being kind of a jerk… Whatever! I just did my thing, went to social events as regularly as I could stomach (once a week ish), and was surprised at how after a month or so, things really did turn around. I found asking questions to be a way to get to know people and places. Other people love to talk and answer questions, even when you didn’t ask a question: as we’ve all seen in this thread.
None of that is to say it will work for everyone, or even anyone else… But I understand the pain of loneliness. So if sharing my experience can help anyone, please grant me some leniency if I’m being a tone deaf jerk, because that’s not my intent!
