A Lonely Brother In Need

[Hearth]

Hi all,

Don’t want to bore you with a long essay, so I’ll cut to the chase… I’m desperately lonely, and I need help to fix it.

About me

I’m in my mid-20s and I suffer with depression and anxiety, but thankfully I’m able to hold down a job and get on with my day without too much trouble.

I have no friends and no girlfriend. I get on really well with people, but they’re all just ‘acquaintances’. For whatever reason, I struggle to move from ‘acquaintances’ to friends with people.

I want to go out and meet new people, make friends, and meet girls also. At the moment, I spend pretty much all of my time in the house when I’m not working, which I know is really bad, as it means I’ll never get to meet anyone. I want to be one of those people that are completely comfortable going out by their self, and who can have a good time pretty much anywhere, as they can get along with just about anyone!

What stops me going out is apprehension about going out by myself (as I have no-one to do anything with), and a lack of confidence in general, I guess. For me the idea of going out to a mall or something and trying to strike up a conversation with random people seems a bit strange. There are times when I have gone out with the intention of doing this, but when I get there I feel anxious and/or depressed and bail from the idea. My other fear about going out by myself is bumping into groups of people that I know and them thinking I’m a loser or whatever for having no-one to go out with.

Advice I would appreciate

• How can I make myself feel comfortable about going out by myself in order to be social and meet people?
• Is it even socially ‘OK’ to go out to bars/wherever by myself and mingle?
• What kind of places are good hangouts to achieve what I want?

Please, please, please help a brother in desperate need!

 

[hudpes]

I think I know how you feel. Sometimes I too feel out of place though only in very specific circumstances. What you should really do first is establish the cause of your depression and work on that first. If that derives from the social anxiety only, the fix is rather simple. You have to get it through your mind, that it is irrelevant what other people think of you, you have self worth even if you don't see it. I'm biased in that regard, but I would suggest you start taking salsa classes and then progress to kizomba - I don't think there is a faster or more powerful way of overcoming the fear of being in contact with other people. I promise you, when the social environment okays proximity to a total stranger, and it would be weird not to be in close contact with them, the anxiety will melt away when you will repeat it many times. This way you will not only get rid of the anxiety, you will also gain some friends and when you'll become more easy-going, you'll be able to get friends outside of that circle too. Also, you will learn that other people, well, are people too, just like you, and they have a set of their problems and quirks. Some are alpha showoffs, some really hot girls can be insecure and they can mask insecurity with aggressiveness... if you pay enough attention, you will learn alot about people in general and consequently, yourself.

 

[Tictac]

When you get that your 'need' means nothing to anyone but you, you will be at the starting blocks.

Of course it's okay to go out on your own. So do that. Join a club or two, hang in places where you'd like to be anyway - museums, art galleries, music venues, bars, coffee shops.....

 

[sph21]

I know it took a long time to overcome this kind of anxiety of meeting a crowd of people. It took me years until I was totally comfortable of going out alone. It took a lot of guts. I've read your history here and you haven't solve these problems since 2008.

Here's what I did to solve a similar problems as yours. First, I realized that I need to to overcome my weaknesses by saying to myself that I'll do whatever it takes to fix my problems. After that, I split my problems to smaller ones and solved them one by one.

Here's what I did to solve my problems:
I was depressed for many years and I had only one friend and some acquaintances. It took me a long time to make him a friend. Whenever I needed to do something, I asked him to accompany me. My goal was just to duplicate how he handled things that I couldn't do. It was kind of funny now if I remember that again but it worked well. I was absorbing anyone I found interesting. Until someday I could be comfortable doing those things in my own style.

As for how I fixed my depression, I learnt that I can't fix what I did wrong in my past. All I can do is just to focus on my present. I improved anything that I could find of including how to be a fun person.

To be comfortable at meeting new girls, you must fix your anxiety of meeting new people first. You fix this by talking to some random strangers you can find.

Focus on the solutions and not the problems and you'll find some great ideas yourself.

Stop caring too much of what others think of you. By caring too much, you're wasting a lot of energy just to think of it.

 

[SeymourCake]

"When you are depressed, you are living in the past.
When you are anxious, you are living in the future.
When you are at peace, you are living in the present". - Lao Tzu

Look into mindfulness meditation. See if there's any zen centers around in your local area and practice meditation on a daily basis. If not, look into prana yoga in your area.

If there's not any or if they're asking for money, I can provide you with links with videos and PDF e-books you can read that can get you started at no cost.