I'm a loser. (long read, but please help)

[Mintyfresh]

Okay maybe I'm not as hopeless as some, but I have it pretty bad right now. I really need some advice, and some encouragement here.

I'm 26 and I just finished college. I moved back home to my parents house and its been really rough and depressing.

I have no friends in the area. I have no job. I'm broke. I spend each day watching tv, playing video games, and reading books. I've had a pretty bad case of social anxiety the majority of my adult life and it really prevents me from doing things I want. I used to be very depressed and contemplate suicide everyday (even tried a few times). I feel the depression creeping back in due to my bad situation and i cope with it in a very unhealthy way. I do drugs. Specifically dxm or dmt around 4-5 times a week. Neither chemical is addictive and I'm positive that it would be no problem quitting if I actually had stuff going on to fill up my life.

I'm not totally hopeless though... I've had sex with girls. I had a girlfriend for 2 years. I'm very good looking, and have a wide body frame (which ive always hated but girls seem to love it). I've held down jobs for a few months at a time. I'm very intelligent, which i born with, but the massive amount of time ive spent alone reading books has kept my mind developing. The psychedelic drugs have led me down a very spiritual path, and I would consider myself very spiritually developed. I know one day I will achieve enlightenment. I know I am pure awareness and the me writing this post is nothing but imaginary, yet I still long for my ego to be happy.

In college, there were plenty of girls interested in me, but i always found the ones interested in me were either shallow, or not attractive, or crazy. My social anxiety flared up like crazy making it impossible for me to chase the ones that I was genuinely interested in. I could never bring myself to use girls for sex, so normally I would break things off very fast and despite good intentions... it would still deeply hurt them, and that in turn hurt me.

Here's where i need advice i guess:

1.) A part of me is very afraid to work a job that I am not proud of. I always imagined that I would be doing something very great and respectable with my life. I have an interview tomorrow doing overnight stock for a northface clothing outlet, and I'll take the job just not be broke, but working a menial job eats away at my confidence. My degree is in graphic design, but I don't think I'd feel good working for an advertising firm.. helping trick people into buying stuff. I'm completely against consumerist culture.

2.) I don't care about being a don juan and having sex with a ton of girls... thats never been me. I just want to be confident enough to pickup the quality girl of my dreams. I'm afraid of kino.... which is from self confidence issues i guess. I really want a spiritual hippie kind of chick. I guess I should take yoga classes and hit on girls there?

3.) I need a life. I need to get out of my house. I need to make friends. I have not a clue about how adults make friends. In college it was easy...

4) I've always had dreams of traveling the world. I don't know how to make this possible. Work, save money, blow it on a trip for a year, come back to the states and I'm back in the same position I was in before... it seems like a catch 22. Yet, I know in 50 years I will be dead and that excitement and adventure is much more important than job stability.

5.) I want to find a way to help people. I know true pain. I know how much it hurts to feel alone in the world. I know how much it sucks to not have any hope. Although nobody has ever shown me a shred of kindness, I know that everybody deserves to be shown love and compassion. I don't know how to do this... I applied to the peace corp, but they never got back to me.

I need your help. I need your advice. Please steer me in the right direction.

Namaste.

 

[Voice]

Hey man, I am a lot like you. I'm also introverted and also had a bad case of social anxiety in the past. I'm not exactly Mr. Outgoing now but I've improved dramatically. The thing is about us introverts is that we think TOO much, we are in our head ALL the time. It sounds like you are just stuck in a rut. You are doing the same things over and over day by day and you really have nothing that brings any type of spark into your life. You probably feel like your life really has no meaning at the present moment. I've been there. So you have to ask yourself how are you going to change your present situation? How are you going to mix things up? I don't want to condemn you for doing psychedelics but I feel like perhaps you are living too much in the fantasy world they bring you into. I've done my share of shrooms and although I love them (a lot) I do them very infrequently because I'm too interested in living my real life. I need an escape every once in a while, but I also realize that I can't live in that world forever.

Although I'm younger than you and still in school I can say that I've made most of my friends through clubs, fraternity stuff and then networked out. I'd imagine it's really no different in the real world. Joining the peace corps is a great idea. I know some guys that went ROTC and the military does a lot of that stuff. Other than that, exercise is always a great hobby and great antidepressant.

As far as your career goes, I don't think you are being ambitious enough. You have to do what you love and if graphic design is it then you gotta do it for yourself. If not, than find out what you want to do and do it.

 

[Warrior74]

4 & 5. Ever thought about teaching English in a foreign country. Two birds, one stone yah?

 

[HighResurrection]

People Mentioned it already but repetition is the mother of learning. Exercise, join a gym or a sport you enjoy and release those endorphins also a chance to make friends. Take whatever job you can find right now keep the money coming in and part time work for yourself man your graphic designer. Read books on wealth, invest your money and slowly save up for a trip that you can afford while maintaining your wealth. Join one of those meditation groups, i'm sure their are lots of hippie girls their, or just go to our local organic grocery store.

Wake up visualize where you want to be and before you go to bed.

Always keep it moving.

 

[DonGorgon]

more and more men are in this situation these days.. 90% of females are only choosing to F 10% of males around them so sad times ahead..

 

[EvilAgenda]

Read your 1,2,3,4,5.

Then look at what you wrote:

I spend each day watching tv, playing video games, and reading books.

I spend each day watching tv, playing video games, and reading books.

I spend each day watching tv, playing video games, and reading books.

Now what is wrong with this picture?

 

[Mintyfresh]

EvilAgenda - what would you do with your time if you were broke, depressed, and had no social life? I also paint, longboard, play guitar, workout, meditate... I've applied to jobs, I've been on interviews. It takes a massive amount of effort just to not give up on life. Some days I just can't deal with it and force myself to sleep 24 hours straight.

However, I digress ... I appreciate all the kind words. It's nice to know that there is the capacity for compassion towards a complete stranger, especially in this community which has a tendency to be a bit harsh.

I guess the first step of digging myself out of this hell is taking a job, any job.

 

[pdx1138]

hard exercise will definitely help

 

[Rikudo]

Look First its good that you admit that you have a problem its a huge problem look you need to change your whole life my friend first do a job to trick ppl second sleep with as many girls as you can third no one wants to help you why should you help them third without a good pa ying job you cant travel the world and the job goes with one you need to trick ppl 4 forget one girl get 100 girls !! This is from me!1 If you like to live this out just pm me i will give you some tips somethings you should do and so on !!

 

[snowdog]

Okay maybe I'm not as hopeless as some, but I have it pretty bad right now. I really need some advice, and some encouragement here.

Advice 1: Cheer up

I'm 26 and I just finished college.

You're doing better than 80%-90% of the population already.

I moved back home to my parents house and its been really rough and depressing.

I have no friends in the area. I have no job. I'm broke. I spend each day watching tv, playing video games, and reading books. I've had a pretty bad case of social anxiety the majority of my adult life and it really prevents me from doing things I want. I used to be very depressed and contemplate suicide everyday (even tried a few times). I feel the depression creeping back in due to my bad situation and i cope with it in a very unhealthy way. I do drugs. Specifically dxm or dmt around 4-5 times a week. Neither chemical is addictive and I'm positive that it would be no problem quitting if I actually had stuff going on to fill up my life.

Advice 2: Stop doing drugs. No excuses. Replace that **** with running or something. Become active!

I'm not totally hopeless though... I've had sex with girls. I had a girlfriend for 2 years. I'm very good looking, and have a wide body frame (which ive always hated but girls seem to love it). I've held down jobs for a few months at a time. I'm very intelligent, which i born with, but the massive amount of time ive spent alone reading books has kept my mind developing.

In one sentence: you're a handsome, smart guy in good shape. That doesn't sound too bad, right?

The psychedelic drugs have led me down a very spiritual path, and I would consider myself very spiritually developed. I know one day I will achieve enlightenment. I know I am pure awareness and the me writing this post is nothing but imaginary, yet I still long for my ego to be happy.

I can see what you mean here. I advice you to read "The power of now", which would be perfect for you if I read all this. Really good stuff.

In college, there were plenty of girls interested in me, but i always found the ones interested in me were either shallow, or not attractive, or crazy. My social anxiety flared up like crazy making it impossible for me to chase the ones that I was genuinely interested in. I could never bring myself to use girls for sex, so normally I would break things off very fast and despite good intentions... it would still deeply hurt them, and that in turn hurt me.

You don't even give these girls a chance to like you because you don't even seem to like yourself. To me it looks like you have some deep self-loathing issues. Just the way you write this whole thing, man. I could be completely wrong, because I just base this off this one post and never talked to you in real life.

1.) A part of me is very afraid to work a job that I am not proud of. I always imagined that I would be doing something very great and respectable with my life.

Forget that sh*t. That's your ego messing with you. ****, man. A lot of rock stars and movie stars flipped burgers or had stupid-ass jobs. It doesn't matter. Through the years I worked in a fast-food place, in a warehouse, drove a cab and my last 3-year job was selling computers in a store (while I was in college). I was never ashamed of any of that because it was a honest way to make money. I had a chance to go on welfare for a while when I was ****ed up & depressed and dropped out of high-school. I refused that **** and took a job flipping burgers instead, and it made me feel good about myself because I didn't take the easy way out.

Only self-absorbed ****heads feel themselves too good to do any work.

Doing something very great and respectable doesn't happen overnight. Pretty much every brilliant person got there by working their ass off. A lot of brilliant guys worked sh*tty jobs before they got their breakthrough.

I have an interview tomorrow doing overnight stock for a northface clothing outlet, and I'll take the job just not be broke, but working a menial job eats away at my confidence.

You need money to live, and you'll need to work for it even if you don't like it. Welcome to the real world.

My degree is in graphic design, but I don't think I'd feel good working for an advertising firm.. helping trick people into buying stuff. I'm completely against consumerist culture.

You're in a negative spiral, dude. You ***** about everything.

• "I want to make money but I don't want to take just any job"
• "I have a degree in graphic design but it goes against my principles"

Making graphics for a product/website/magazine/whatever doesn't mean you're attributing to this "consumerist culture". Hell, the monitor you're looking at right now was once designed by a graphic designer, and so was the logo on it and the Windows start button you see in the lower left corner. Pick a company that suits you and that doesn't employ aggressive marketing tactics. There's nothing wrong with healthy consumerism by the way, it keeps the economy going. You wrote that post at a desk, while sitting on a chair, typing on a keyboard and using a mouse etc. You bought all that stuff because you're a consumer, like all of us.

2.) I don't care about being a don juan and having sex with a ton of girls... thats never been me. I just want to be confident enough to pickup the quality girl of my dreams. I'm afraid of kino.... which is from self confidence issues i guess. I really want a spiritual hippie kind of chick. I guess I should take yoga classes and hit on girls there?

You should first take care of yourself, because that's where clearly the problem lies right now.

3.) I need a life. I need to get out of my house. I need to make friends. I have not a clue about how adults make friends. In college it was easy...

It still is, especially if you're good looking and have a positive vibe about you.

• Get a job and meet people there
• Get a gym subscription or start doing sports
• Find a place where you can find people that have the same interests as you. You like to read, so join a book club
• Go to a bar and hang out with people there. Just sit down next to someone and start talking
• Talk to people everywhere

4) I've always had dreams of traveling the world. I don't know how to make this possible. Work, save money, blow it on a trip for a year, come back to the states and I'm back in the same position I was in before... it seems like a catch 22. Yet, I know in 50 years I will be dead and that excitement and adventure is much more important than job stability.

Worry about getting a job first. Don't think ahead so much, it does absolutely NOTHING for you. There's plenty of time to do all kinds of ****, but you gotta take the first step. You need to break through the cycle you are in now.

5.) I want to find a way to help people. I know true pain. I know how much it hurts to feel alone in the world. I know how much it sucks to not have any hope. Although nobody has ever shown me a shred of kindness, I know that everybody deserves to be shown love and compassion. I don't know how to do this... I applied to the peace corp, but they never got back to me.

I need your help. I need your advice. Please steer me in the right direction.

Namaste.

Don't worry about others now, help yourself first. You're filled with self-pity and negativity.

My suggestion is you go talk to a psychologist, you seem pretty depressed.

Read the two articles on my blog too. I just started it and I'm sure you'll relate to it. I came from a similar position, only I was younger when I really had enough of it all.

 

[evansblue]

more and more men are in this situation these days.. 90% of females are only choosing to F 10% of males around them so sad times ahead..

In every single one of your posts you are crying and whining about how men are not worthy of women. Do you ever get tired of it? I've never seen anybody on this forum put women on a pedestal as high as you do.

 

[Alex DeLarge]

Definitely go to a few counseling sessions. It's nothing to be ashamed of normal people do this, I've done it.. It helps relieve a lot of stress.

Any job is a good job these days in this economy.

Like most people said so far, you have to help yourself before you can help other people. How can you expect to help other people when you cannot help yourself first?

I wish you well man. I hope you overcome!

 

[Mintyfresh]

Definitely go to a few counseling sessions. It's nothing to be ashamed of normal people do this, I've done it.. It helps relieve a lot of stress.

Any job is a good job these days in this economy.

Like most people said so far, you have to help yourself before you can help other people. How can you expect to help other people when you cannot help yourself first?

I wish you well man. I hope you overcome!

I tried seeing a shrink a few years ago when I was SEVERELY depressed. I mostly wanted some meds to help me deal with social situations. The guy was very aggressive and put me into a defensive state whenever we talked. He even denied that anxiety issues in a social situation were a real problem and told me to suck it up. Needless to say I've never tried it again. Also he refused to give me a prescription for xanax or anything that would've helped me back then.

Also .. I don't have health insurance now so counseling is pretty much out of the question unfortunately.

I've been trying pretty hard to get a job, but I've had a string of bad luck really. I had a design internship lined up a spiritual organization and I was so happy that it seemed like I was going to get it and I haven't heard back from the lady in days, despite following up with phonecalls and emails. I had an interview at a banana republic store and when i got there the manager had apparently completely forgotten she scheduled anything with me and took the day off ... I got a gig selling energy braclets in a kiosk and the jerk only gave me two days work before completely blowing me off and refusing to schedule me anymore ... I was even doing a good job and sold a ton of the stupid scam braclets. I just had an interview with north face today and it seems promising and i really clicked with the lady interviewing me so I'm just keeping my fingers crosser at this point.

 

[PrettyBoyAJ]

Get a Masters, A Bachelor's really ain't sh*t no more unless its Accounting or Computer Science.

 

[AlexDP]

Interesting situation here, kind of proves my theory that college not only does not prepare people for life, but it actually hurts them in the ling run.

That's just bull****. The main goal of college is to get a degree. This degree helps you get a job. Furthermore you make friends in college and those can come in handy at later times as well.

However, college does not prepare people for "real" life. But no one ever claimed it did. You still have to learn to be your own man and you have to find a job yourself.

In the long run though, it most definitely does not hurt people.

 

[Mintyfresh]

So, I got a job. It took two interviews, and they called EVERY single one of my references. It's a retail job, so I guess the economy really is pretty poor when they're taking these jobs so seriously. I remember getting hired at one store without even an interview a few years ago. Honestly I was kind of worried because I have a lip ring, but it worked out so yay.

I also hooked up with an old friend by inviting him to a metal concert. He's in a similar situation, has a lot of trouble making friends, still lives at home, girl dumped him a year ago and hes having trouble recovering.

Anyway I realize that this isn't huge progress, at least it doesn't feel like it, but at least I'm putting myself out there and doing SOMETHING.

I'm not sure where to find clubs and meetups and stuff. I really want to make new friends. Meetup.com is pretty much a bust for my area. Has anybody joined anything to meet people? I really don't even know where to begin.