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Aw, that is sad  I love the work that you do, please keep it up, you are awesome! =]
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You might have avoidant personality disorder:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avoidant_personality_disorder
I have a bit of it.
Everyone in their life has this one somewhat embarrassing moment that nobody remembers... a simple thing like that could tear someone apart. Just remember that it doesn't matter, and it doesn't matter to anyone else.
If you want to feel better, try going to the gym and getting really fit. Being healthy always helps increase self esteem and happiness.
Just remember... never GG. Never give up.
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I cant say I have huge experience with talking to hundreds of people but I've talked to small groups of people. Sometimes you get nervous saying stuff and assume other people are uninterested or have a negative response when they probably are just acting as they normally do. Unless they were shaking their heads while frowning I woudln't worry about it too much.
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On November 27 2011 18:41 NeverGG wrote:
I don't normally post personal blogs (well not negative ones like this.) but I figured since quite a lot of people on TL are in the same section of the community as myself (aka. people with special interests) some people might be able to offer advice.
Something which happened recently made me feel quite isolated. I stood up in front of a couple of hundred strangers (around the same age as me give or take a few years either way.) to speak about a personal experience of mine in SK. I mentioned how eSports has helped me to connect and communicate with others (even though I lack social skills and have no self-esteem at all.) Instead of people accepting this I noticed looks of disgust and/or confusion from the others in the audience (especially my fellow women.) Instead of sitting down feeling happy to have shared it only reminded me that since I backed away from my old group of friends a couple of years back I've felt like I am some kind of hermit.
It's not difficult to find people online who are interested in the same hobbies as I am, but when it comes to real life relationships there's a part of me which feels undeserving of these potentially great friends. I'm not pretty, and I always seem to be making bad decisions so I'm not sure what I have to offer people. However, recently I get the urge to talk to people upon the rare occasions english-speakers turn up at events like Comic World. I just don't have the confidence to risk them telling me to eff-off.
At this point in my life (aged 27) I already feel as if the chance to date/have friends has passed. That's kind of weird, right?
I'm not really sure what to do to work on feeling better about myself/to start making friends again.
P.S. I'll post photos again one day. I just need to find some inspiration/motivation to take them.
1) You have it backwards.
2) Definitely not.
+ Show Spoiler +Spoilered cause this is the first time I've mentioned my depression over the internet. Feels weird.
I haven't told my old group of high school friends about my depression, and they've kinda just drifted apart from me. But I finally found one person who I can open up entirely to, and things finally feel 1000x better. It's all about giving things time to settle into place.
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Although I am quite a bit younger than you and can't relate quite as well as I would like with this particular problem I will say that I've been a lurker on TL for a very long time and as such you are one of the prominent figures who stand out in my mind for what you have done for us and share with us. At 27 though that is extremely strange! Don't become so jaded =p
I've never been all that great at expressing myself but keep doing what you enjoy and try your best to find happiness in it  Sorry if that's really vague.
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On November 27 2011 18:41 NeverGG wrote:
I don't normally post personal blogs (well not negative ones like this.) but I figured since quite a lot of people on TL are in the same section of the community as myself (aka. people with special interests) some people might be able to offer advice.
Something which happened recently made me feel quite isolated. I stood up in front of a couple of hundred strangers (around the same age as me give or take a few years either way.) to speak about a personal experience of mine in SK. I mentioned how eSports has helped me to connect and communicate with others (even though I lack social skills and have no self-esteem at all.) Instead of people accepting this I noticed looks of disgust and/or confusion from the others in the audience (especially my fellow women.) Instead of sitting down feeling happy to have shared it only reminded me that since I backed away from my old group of friends a couple of years back I've felt like I am some kind of hermit.
It's not difficult to find people online who are interested in the same hobbies as I am, but when it comes to real life relationships there's a part of me which feels undeserving of these potentially great friends. I'm not pretty, and I always seem to be making bad decisions so I'm not sure what I have to offer people. However, recently I get the urge to talk to people upon the rare occasions english-speakers turn up at events like Comic World. I just don't have the confidence to risk them telling me to eff-off.
At this point in my life (aged 27) I already feel as if the chance to date/have friends has passed. That's kind of weird, right?
I'm not really sure what to do to work on feeling better about myself/to start making friends again.
P.S. I'll post photos again one day. I just need to find some inspiration/motivation to take them.
I don't think it's weird to feel that way at times in your life. I've felt lonely too after losing contact with old friends. You just have to realise that it's not true that you've missed your chance.
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27? You're still young, barely even half way there. You can still date and meet people up until the day you die. There is nothing stopping you from doing it except yourself. Barring major health problems.
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whenever one of my friends has a hobby or a strong like for something that is either looked down upon by society or outside of a certain circle and feel sad when they get less than positive reactions in something that they enjoy, i tell them that their perception of happiness is something that is intrinsic to them, that what makes them happy will do so regardless of what other people think. and that caring how much about what others think is what can erode their perception of happiness to varying degrees. of course, very few people can stand total isolation, and nobody likes to be put down by a group of people. but why do you have to be with people who cannot accept what make you happy? if being socially accepted is high on your agenda, you simply don't have to share that which is new to certain social spheres, and share it in private with those who appreciate it as you do.
this might have been a bit confusing, but i just recently talked with one of my friends who has slept around quite a bit since entering college. society views her as a slut, and she herself feels the stigma and is unhappy about it. however, she genuinely enjoys sex, and isn't crushing relationships in doing what she does; she has principle. rather than associate herself with people who would put her down for having sex and enjoying it, i asked her to keep her closest friends those who would not judge her negatively for being a human being and having human urges, and to not feel down for feeling bad about being cast into a role in the groups that she associated with.
i hope that you don't cast yourself negatively in your own mind. doing so will only hinder any efforts you might have to be more outgoing, if that's what you really want. it's never too late to do most of the things that life has to offer, and dating and having friends certainly is not an exception. you are a great human being with a sense of kindness and devotion to a community, and with good artistic sense to boot there are a crowd of people that would love to get to know you better and be your friend, and i'm sure many on TL feel the same.
화이팅!
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+ Show Spoiler +
I personally can identify with that feeling a lot (being some kind of hermit/feeling undeserving of others/like you won't find people irl who share you interests and appreciate you). I moved 14 times between 0-17 years old. I was a really smart kid and often did my own thing outside of the classwork. My family was poor and I wore funny clothes and never had the same kind of food in my box lunch as everyone else. Other kids ignored me. Even now at university I feel a large disconnect from many people here who come from a very different life than my own. I have difficulty identifying with them in any way. Don't feel like you are strange for having this problem-- there are many people in your position.
On to the more important issue though-- your perception of yourself. Judging yourself as valuable based on your appearance is doomed to failure; you will get old. Instead you need to judge yourself based on the things under your control, like your decision making. If part of the reason you have difficulty making good friends is because you make poor choices, then of course that is something you need to work on! However if the reason you are having difficulty finding friends is only because you are different then that is ok! Someone worth being friends with may not always share you interests, but they will always value them because of YOU. These people who reacted with disgust are not worth your time. Those that react with confusion though, consider trying to let them get to know you more. If you have a lot of niche interests it make take time for someone to understand you.
Finally consider that everything worthwhile requires risk to attain. Imo it is better to risk failure by trying than to not bother and accept an 100% chance of failing. Be courageous! Your 'chance' has not passed. Every time of our life is equally valuable and holds opportunities. Pursue the relationships you desire, and pursue qualities that you feel confident offering to others.
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I doubt you have an avoidant personality disorder. You have fear of rejection, like every single human in the world. The difference is how we deal with it, how much we let it affect us.
When you are contemplating whether or not to talk to someone, you have a subconscious voice telling you 'Well what if they tell me to fuck off, what if i'm beeing annoying, what if they think im an asshole'. This is fear of rejection, or rather, the subsconscious message it sends.
Every psychologial theory accepts that every human is built up of many selves. This is one of those, it's like a small personality, inside your personality.
How to supress it: Now, suppressing it takes practice, anyone can do it. Think of it like a muscle, if you are very afraid of others reactions, it's probaby quite weak, and you have to build it up, which may take time, but you will be able to have a big bicep if you stick with it.
You cannot make it go away, the only way you can counter-act it is by raising the volume of what is said in your subconscious. Recognize when the voice is talking to you, and instead tell it 'No, this will be fine'. Your subconscious does not look at evidence and make a logic decision, it simply fallows a message. If you give it the 'No, this will be fine' message instead of the 'Oh shit i might get told off' message, you will be able to make yourself talk to people.
Now, this takes practice, like i said with my muscle analogy. Try practicing it by doing simple things. Ask people for directions, where you would have normally tried to figure it out by yourself. Ask someone in the shop where something is, instead of trying desperately to find it yourself, all of these help you practice, and make you more comfortable and more able to deal with fear of rejection.
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I know the feeling very well GG, not to the extreme though that I think you have.
I moved a few years ago from my home state, where I was someone with a community, friends, events, and knowledge. I was a big fish in a small pond and when I moved I moved to an even smaller pond in the middle of nowhere. I had these dreams and aspirations of starting my own business here eventually, helping start a music scene, get to know the people around, but none of it has happened.
I moved to Northern Nevada and the thing I did not realize about this are was how isolated everyone is and how they do not want to know you at all. They are not bad people at all, just isolated and if you try to make friends, everyone is either very flaky or treat you like "Who the fuck is this guy talking to me?"
I used to be able to sit outside of cafes back home, play guitar or read or whatever and things would happen. I would either run into people I knew or meet someone new. When I would try that at the local StarBucks here, everyone is so come and go, no stopping to chat at all, no hanging out there unless they were trying to use their computers and you were always bothering them at that point.
When I would tell people about my musical background and playing shows and everything, they all were just like "Okay, cool...whatever." They, for the most part, are rather non-passionate people I think. They don't seem to understand deeply-held personal passions like music or ESPORTS or whatever. Hell, I live outside of Reno a way no one around here is even into ESPORTS. I invite the people I know over for every MLG Sunday offering to buy pizza or chicken or whatever, and everyone just looks at me funny or blows me off, no care of effort to learn about something new or just spend time with good company.
At first I thought it was me. I thought I must be doing something wrong, but in the end it made no sense to me how I was the same person I was back home, so why was it easy there an not here? It couldn't be me I thought. It has gotten to a point where my wife and I are considering just leaving, giving up our house and whatnot just to go someplace where we feel welcome. We are almost at a breaking point, ready to give up on this area.
The issue then is that it feels like giving up. I have always been adaptable and a great problem solver, so why is this eluding me? I still don't know.
I am sorry for writing about this on your blog, but your post just hit me hard because it is exactly how I feel. I am now 30 and feel as you do, that finding new friends is past me. I remember being told at various points growing up that a good number of your friends now will remain friends your whole life...I still have them but so very far away, all over the country, none of them to just sit and talk SC2 or bands or whatever with anymore while kicking back with a pizza and a 6-pack of Anchor Steam.
Overall though, I am just trying my hardest to not give up. My mother is kind of my inspiration in that she is always still meeting new people and making new friends, so I know I cannot be too old or past my time or whatever. It just seems to get harder and harder. As we get older our lives become more and more structured. We run into more and more people that do not want that structure messed with at all.
This is why I dove so into the TL community, my show and cast and all that. At least here there were people that were smart, fun, into all sorts of things, that we could learn from, and that would listen. The lack of trolls and amount of intelligence is the reason I am here and just so you know, we at TL will be here for you as well. I know full well it is not the same, but it is something and it is more than a lot of people have, so I will take it.
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On November 27 2011 18:41 NeverGG wrote:
I don't normally post personal blogs (well not negative ones like this.) but I figured since quite a lot of people on TL are in the same section of the community as myself (aka. people with special interests) some people might be able to offer advice.
Something which happened recently made me feel quite isolated. I stood up in front of a couple of hundred strangers (around the same age as me give or take a few years either way.) to speak about a personal experience of mine in SK. I mentioned how eSports has helped me to connect and communicate with others (even though I lack social skills and have no self-esteem at all.) Instead of people accepting this I noticed looks of disgust and/or confusion from the others in the audience (especially my fellow women.) Instead of sitting down feeling happy to have shared it only reminded me that since I backed away from my old group of friends a couple of years back I've felt like I am some kind of hermit.
It's not difficult to find people online who are interested in the same hobbies as I am, but when it comes to real life relationships there's a part of me which feels undeserving of these potentially great friends. I'm not pretty, and I always seem to be making bad decisions so I'm not sure what I have to offer people. However, recently I get the urge to talk to people upon the rare occasions english-speakers turn up at events like Comic World. I just don't have the confidence to risk them telling me to eff-off.
At this point in my life (aged 27) I already feel as if the chance to date/have friends has passed. That's kind of weird, right?
I'm not really sure what to do to work on feeling better about myself/to start making friends again.
P.S. I'll post photos again one day. I just need to find some inspiration/motivation to take them.
Hot damn you must feel terrible if you're thinking this way. I don't have any advice for you right now other than you really NEED to work on and stop feeling/thinking this way about yourself; it's just not healthy obviously. I hope there a few here that can offer you some advice!! Hang in there and don't give up! <3
I've been having some issues lately, but luckily now that I think of it they'd all listen their hearts out for me but I just choose not to talk with them since my friends are older. I don't want to burden them with my problems just yet but really makes you appreciate how good it is to have close friends. I hope you make some new friends and also.. I doubt English-speakers will tell you to back off if you approach them if anything they'd be even more welcoming since you're in a foreign country.
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It might be AvPD. Although this doesn't sound as severe. Maybe social phobia? It's not that much of a difference - if I get it right. And the results are often similar.
Either way I would love to tell you it gets better but it's not that easy. Personally (I have AvPD), my only hope is finding someone so close you feel like with your family when you're with one another. I did once (She found me and wouldn't let go). Then I confided to her and she ridiculed me, accused me of making things up and left me. Basically, she didn't even want to discuss it because she wanted to get rid of me as she felt my dependence on her and I understand and respect that.
Before, I kept telling myself - I just need to work out a bit, work on my muscles, study hard at school, get money, everything will be just fine then. With each step accomplished, nothing changed. The only thing that ever worked was someone loving me. And it wasn't real. Either way having someone you feel so close to makes it a lot easier to face potential other friends and groups. I rarely went out just by myself - without my brother or my former friend. You can force yourself into going but it doesn't work because you're not enjoying yourself there anyway, you're just paranoic and you can't even talk to anyone and enjoy yourself. Your brain is telling you to not go (or to not talk with anyone) and really, you should listen to it. It's a son a of a bitch and it will make you pay for your riot, you can count on that. Uhm. This was probably both grim and of no help. Sorry. There is hope though, don't forget that.
You might want to read a few of these to relate to someone: http://avoidantpersonality.com/stories/personalstories.htm
I always go there when I'm at the bottom and it makes me feel a little better.
I do have two useful advices: Keep in mind - reading through the AvPD or social phobia or whatever personality disorder symptomes and relating is perfectly normal. With a personality disorder you often experience "perfectly normal feelings" but multiplied to a point where it makes you alter your behaviour and life routine, isolate yourself from the society etc.
Also you might consider seeking out professional help. Know that not much AvPDs were ever treated since the patients won't even trust the shrink and since they believe the shrink wouldn't help them anyway. It's good to have that in mind and maybe try and overcome this fear. The shrink should be understanding and should earn your trust. He shouldn't make fun of you or test your limits. If he does, stop seeing him. Maybe try looking for a better one. The AvPDs will often try e.g. not showing up for a session to test whether the shrink will get angry or will forgive them. Again, he should be aware of this and understanding.
P.S. If you understood any of what I wrote above and would like to talk some more please do PM me (or anyone else), I would like to listen to you and share, since I don't even have any online friends to talk to about this and I don't want to search for them on the AvPD sites as we would probably have nothing else in common. Btw. You said you weren't pretty - obssesing over your looks is another symptom often associated with AvPD. Once knowing that, it might be easier to deal with. It's good to identify these fears and know where they're coming from. They will stay but they will get a little easier to manage. Otherwise good luck and keep fighting!
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I can relate to you i was like that still am a little but it's never too late to date/make friends! Hell i started at 30 years old and i'm fine!
Never give up on talking/opening up to other people eventually it'll pay off.
You're a great person believe it all these people probably never did half the things you did!
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intrigue
Washington, D.C9935 Posts
look at it this way - you're never gonna think to yourself: "boy am i glad i just kept to myself all day and felt lonely". because 1. if people don't like you, they can go fuck themselves and 2. it sounds like you don't have much going for you right now, so unless they scam you or kill you or something you can only benefit from talking to people.
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I relate to you 100%. My in-the-flesh friend count: 0. Would be cool to go to a barcraft but I'm never going there by myself.
I could have kept friends with people from school, but I feel awkward and uncomfortable in trying, even there's some good people I've known.
Another possibility, perhaps I like being alone. Maybe I just think lowly of myself as a likeable guy because of a social stigma against anti-social (as in, not social, not the asshole way) people. The stigma sounds plain and simple and logical the way I formulated it and it might not disappear ever. In this context, I could just be projecting that stigma on myself for no reason while I should have the mindset that I'm different but not a worse person than others.
Anyway, fellow 'struggler' here
I'm slightly older than you and I'll tell you that friendships only get more meaningful for people as they age as they get to know themselves better. Before you can like or love someone else, you must first like and love yourself (or it helps heaps at least).
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On November 27 2011 20:43 intrigue wrote:
look at it this way - you're never gonna think to yourself: "boy am i glad i just kept to myself all day and felt lonely"
lol you'd be surprised.
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What Garlicface said. It's not you who are missing out on a possible great friendship, its them missing out!
Fuck the crowd, I am probably insane in real life and I have a weird personality. Yet I've been in relationships and I have great friends! Never stop trying! FIGHT! If they can't accept you for who you really are, f*ck 'em. I'd rather live isolated in a cave than have false idiots like that around.
Yep, I am aggressive sometimes.
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EPT
