Loneliness

I can't count the times I've typed up a reply to a post or even made a topic on this forum and ended up pressing the 'Back' button overwhelmed by the fear of foolishness and irrelevance I'd display. So if this ends up being posted, well then mission accomplished...

I wanted to ask if anyone has ever thought about (who am I kidding, I'm sure you all have) the reasons why loneliness comes about. Before going to university between the age of 15-17, I was socially inept, a person noone wanted to be around, and incapable of having close friends. As the the age of 18 came closer I was in a real rut. But I was about to go off to uni, finally being in a different environment from high school, where people are more mature and the subjects you study are specific to your degree and therefore meet people with similar interests or share your passion for them.
You can imagine the shock when I found out not much had changed since high school. Everyone seems extroverted, has the same basic interests (along with some of the vanity) as in high school and people doing my degree are very scarce (so scarce I haven't actually met one, because first and second year modules are mixed with other students).

I'm afraid that I won't ever meet someone my age with the same weird interests as me. Now I'm not just talking romantically, but that too I suppose.
But thinking about it, someone with my interests is probably also as introverted (or maybe not the same extent) as me. How in the world do introverted, timid, avoindants like maybe some of you, meet? I find that I always end up making the little contact that I do, with the outgoing, social maniacs, which doesn't really help much at all, because I may be socialising, but I feel absolutely awful listening to the experiences and stories all of them have had. It seems most people my age have lived so much, and I can barely make it out of the apartment...

I guess I'm really just looking for solace, but does anyone find that part of the reason why you isolate yourself is because you are unable to find people you can connect with?

Again, I'm not saying the people I've met are awful, but simply have few charactestics which do not match up with me. Like the apparent love for social drinking that somehow seems mandatory in college :/ it seems some of the best people I've met (and it's barely a handful) have always been slightly older, like 30-40s
I know it seems all gloom and doom but I'm starting to feel like there are very few people out there that I'd truly feel comfortable with. Let alone my age.

Somebody doesn't need to be as avoidant and introverted as you are to get along with them real well. I have a million things in common with my best friend, except that he is as extroverted as I am introverted. I was at work one day being bored and pissed like usual and this co-worker just walks up to me right before break time and he is like "yo... you wanna go smoke some pot?" And we did. Then after work we got drunk and played dungeons and dragons. What are the chances of meeting somebody who is as big a dork as I am and also into all the illegal $#%^ I am. It sucks he is in jail now but I would have never met him if he was as introverted as I was, there is no chance in hell I'm going to ask a random co-worker if they wanna go light up.

But um... there is hope I guess. Being really shy there isn't much chance of you going out and meeting somebody like you, but somebody like you could always come along and meet you.

I was also severly dissapointed with the social aspects of college, it really is just like highschool. And I was as big a loser in college as I was in highschool.

I know plenty of people with my interests - writing, photography, art, philosophy, politics, intelligent conversation, stupid conversation, illegal $#%^, being cynical assholes to the rest of the world, whatever. I just hate myself so much I have it ingrained in my mind that I can never measure up or be friends with the amazing, intelligent, beautiful, hilarious, awesome people in the world. That's why I was actually a little bit happy for the year I went to Miami University, because it was easy to reject and be rejected by people I considered idiots (I was even in the dorm full of the preppiest, most boring and generic sorority girls on campus, the "health and fitness" community, because it was the only place a single room was avalable).

I understand the hating your self thing, but it doesn't really interfere with my friendships(plenty of other things do though). I don't really have much to live up to with my friends, for the most part the people I hang out with are other dirt bags just like me so there isn't really much for me to measure up to as far as being worth being their friend.

I thought I would reply to your thread here because I'm feeling particularly lonely tonight.

"I guess I'm really just looking for solace, but does anyone find that part of the reason why you isolate yourself is because you are unable to find people you can connect with? "

YES. That is the story of my life... I have always had trouble finding people I connected with... people are either too shallow, too snobby, too stupid, too cruel, talk too much... the list goes on.

Criminallyvulgar, there is something you wrote that I can relate to. Because I have not accomplished much in the past several years (in a bout of extreme avoidant behaviour), I find myself less likely to feel comfortable around people unless they are at least as unsuccessful as or as unmotivated as I am.

I am so damn lonely I could cry. Yet I am doing anything possible to distract me from crying.

I am so angry over the past few days, because it's not fair that I am so lonely and without friends. I don't know why this has come up for me so acutely. I am angry at people who have treated me badly in the past. I usually just try to shrug off the rejections, believe I deserved them or believe it didn't really hurt, but it did hurt, and it does hurt. I deserve better than that, so I am pissed.

I've been placing ads on the Internet looking for friends. And of course a romantic lover. I am just at my wits end, being shy and anxious makes having a social life so difficult. I don't want to keep doing this alone.

/end rant.

trence wrote:I am so angry over the past few days, because it's not fair that I am so lonely and without friends. I don't know why this has come up for me so acutely. I am angry at people who have treated me badly in the past. I usually just try to shrug off the rejections, believe I deserved them or believe it didn't really hurt, but it did hurt, and it does hurt. I deserve better than that, so I am pissed.

I've been placing ads on the Internet looking for friends. And of course a romantic lover. I am just at my wits end, being shy and anxious makes having a social life so difficult. I don't want to keep doing this alone.

/end rant.

My character does not appeal to most people. When I was younger I used to quiestion why I was a loner. A few years ago I realised nobody was under any obligation to like me, be friends with me, have sex with me etc. If these things are to happen it would have to be through my own efforts.

I chose not to make the effort. I find it a demeaning charade trying to make people like me, and the result is a lonely, friendless, semi-celibate existance. But the main thing is that I came to accept it was not unfiair, there is no entitlement for these things.

Your post indicates you feel some way angered and hurt by the actions or indifference of others. In my view it is not unfair. You have no right for people to treat you in the way you wish. Coming to accept this fact is the most important thing.

Physical exercise is good, go to the gym or running etc. If romance/sex is important then it can always be paid for.

Mortimer wrote:If romance/sex is important then it can always be paid for.

Paying for romance will get you a VERY low grade of romance.

Mortimer wrote:Your post indicates you feel some way angered and hurt by the actions or indifference of others. In my view it is not unfair. You have no right for people to treat you in the way you wish. Coming to accept this fact is the most important thing.

I see what you're saying here. Yes, you are correct, there is no written law that says if I do "x" I will get "y". Life is very random sometimes. However, people do like me, people that get to know me that is. It is my avoidant behaviour that makes me lonely. And I still see it as unfair, because I seem to have little control over this, it is a constant struggle that many other people don't seem to have. I have experienced abuse in my life that has contributed to my social anxiety. That is, in fact, unfair. That being all said, there is no written law that says this world is fair. It's not.

In spite of what you say, I do have the right to be pissed off at the way people have treated me. Whether it will do me any good or not to work through this anger remains to be seen. But it's damn more empowering than sitting around crying.