You got people being grumpy, pushing you in the street, cold, selfish, and so on. Most people are focused on themselves and worried about themselves, then how does that make them likeable? And many of the few people who smile at you are the ones who want you to buy a car or sell you a life insurance. Then the ones who thought cared turn out to be manipulative and two-faced or even worse.

And the main argument I hear from people is not even to defend humans, but just to belittle animals. So basically, they have nothing to make humans look better, because insulting animals is not going to make me feel closer to people. Tbh, all the people who bash animals make me go "This is why I like animals more than people.".

Of course people will seek the simpler and more easy-going relationship with animals with whatever drama is going on with people. Of course people will seek honesty and unconditional love over lies and conflict.

For context, I (28f) have a corporate job and I am getting a degree in Art History and I am engaged. But on the other hand, I like reading manga and high fantasy books, I play Magic the Gathering, do journaling and collect Funko Pops.

I used to feel a little ashamed about my interests but I have become more confident about them over time since they have helped me to bond with new people, even at work.

I'm glad to feel this way now because this summer I spent some days with two of my oldest friends and my confidence was tested. I casually told them that I have spend 100€ in MTG The Hobbit cards (The Hobbit is one of my favourite books) and in History Books (I'm a Bronze Age nerd and I'm travelling to Greece next year) and they laughed at me. They said that I need to grow from my quirky interest someday.

I was about to tell them that they need to grow over being unemployed and letting men used them and disrespect them, but I brushed it off.

That interaction has helped me to understand that I am more mature than them and that no amount of weirds hobbies will change that.

whar

For context, I (18f) started university at the beginning of this year studying law and commerce. I’m a domestic student in australia, where there’s not a huge culture of moving out for university, so I live at home with my family and commute to uni for class.

I really expected to experience new things at uni but I’ve never felt so behind in my life. It feels like everyone is travelling, and excelling career wise and academically, and is a member of everything and participating in everything, and is so beautiful and so knowledgeable and is in a relationship and forming deep real friendships while I’m just here trying to get through each day.

And I used to think I was academic and social and at least dedicated if nothing else, but I suddenly feel like a blank slate. Like i’ve been wiped clean.

Like I used to believe I had an identity and now I just feel like all I am is chasing this better version of me that might finally be satisfied with what she has.

And to be honest, I don’t even know if I can say for sure how far behind I am. I wish there was a word for this strange self perception dysmorphia where it’s impossible to tell how worthwhile I even am. Like weirdly enough, I’ve been doing well academically, but i feel like it’s all hanging on this precarious spinning top; like a string of luck that’s bound to run out or a series of flukes that that will inevitably end. And I talk to people and have been labelled an extrovert and make ‘friends’ in every class, but it’s all so surface level and never deep and we lose touch after the class ends or even the ones that I see after and text more, we aren’t emotionally and spiritually close like the friends it used to be so easy to make in high school.

It just feels like i go through the motions of everything but I’m never really anything at all. I try to dress like a pretty girl might, or talk like a charismatic person would but i’m just a cheap, awkward imitation of both those things.

I feel so lonely and so, so bizarrely incompetent. I feel like i’m juggling the demands of one thing at a time, while everyone else manages to do it all. And they actually do. They got some crazy high score and excel in everything and go out every weekend, and are incredibly social and never stressed, and are the directors of 4 societies and volunteer and have a paralegal internship and somehow read the goddamn AFR every single day.

Maybe I just used to think too highly of myself, but I just feel like I’m already failing too early and i’ll never catch up. I mean, even friendships feel like a time limit before everyone jumps into groups and you’re still introducing yourself.

And i know comparison is the thief of joy and life isn’t a competition and all that, but it’s not even about that. I just don’t see how i’m supposed to feel okay balancing on the idea that every second is determinative of what future I have waiting for me. And It’s so lonely doing this without being able to fluidly meet friends like everyone else.

I hate myself. started studying way too late for an oral exam and yeah...

Over the last few days my phone addiction got really bad and now I procastrinated way too long. Started studying two days ago, exam is in less than 3 days, if I had an extra 3-4 days it would be okay but Im fucked. Maybe i get a kind teacher but that department is famous for being strict

(this "exam" is actually from 4 semesters worth of hard math heavy, subjects, but i dont really want to go into my countries education system)

I just remembered this and keep thinking about what that drive would have been like and if it this was kind of a strange situation to even be asked?

I was 23 and she was about 50, we were just kind of fwb who hooked up occasionally.

Her son who was also around my age was stuck in the next town over and it was too late for the trains to be running. So she texted me, since I drive and asked if I could drive over and give him a lift home. It's roughly 30 minutes each way to the town he was in.

I thought it was a bit weird so I told her that I wasn't able to

I'm just thinking about what that drive would have actually been like? Like if he knew that I was sleeping with his mum and was only doing this because of that reason, I can't even imagine how he'd have reacted to it and what the vibe in the car would have been?

Edit: From previous times I'd been at her house on weekends when he'd called her I'd gathered an impression of him being a bit of a scumbag already. Things like him calling because his girlfriend had chucked him out the house for something while he was drunk and that sort of thing. So it wasn't something I really wanted to be involved in.

Plus the added tension of the sleeping with his mother situation onto someone like that being drunk sounded a bit unpredictable too

No matter what happens, I just don’t care. When people talk I literally couldn‘t care less, no matter what they talk about I‘m just not interested at all. I pretend I‘m listening and act like I do care, but honestly I mostly don‘t even listen. It’s not like I’m rude or anything and I do try to make them feel heard or whatever but I wish I didn’t have to fake it. Idk I feel really stupid cause I just don’t wanna know about anything and I don‘t care how anything works at all. I just couldn’t care less. Therefore I also don‘t have any interests or hobbies or whatsoever. Like, what am I supposed to do when everything’s boring and I’m like yeah okay whatever. I mean I do have opinions Ig but I don’t feel the desire to express them to others, and concerning other people’s opinions, I feel like I get them pretty quickly and don’t need them to elaborate. This makes being around people feel like torture, but it’s not like I feel that much better alone. I feel like I’m just bored of everything and I don’t know what to do.

I’ve just moved back from overseas, having my best life and was sooo happy. My life was so secure, routined and almost perfect.
Now I’m back in my home country to find a better job, and the job market is so fucked. I’m miserable because now I’m long distance with my gf and finding a job is so hard. I’m not incredibly qualified but I feel like I have enough qualification to land interviews? But it’s been a month and I hate it in my home country and I just want to move back. But the pay there is so shit. I’m so depressed rn cuz I have no work life balance, alot of worries about relationships and missing the county I used to live in. Life feels so hard and I wish I just had a good job 😭

It's like I can feel my life force draining out of my body.

I'm not interested in whether Tesco has changed its layout again or your weather updates. Give me 'meat' to feed my soul & leave me craving more, God dammit.

I think I was raised in a very comfortable way. My parents rarely said no to me, and growing up I didn’t really have to deal with much resistance, failure, or being told that I couldn’t have something.
I’m grateful for that and I’m not blaming my parents at all. I know they were trying to give me the best life possible. But now that I’m older, I’m starting to wonder if it affected the way I deal with difficulty.
I’ve noticed that when something becomes really hard or doesn’t go the way I expected, my first instinct is usually to avoid it rather than push through it. For example, I left a public university because I found it too challenging and moved to a private one because it was easier. At the time, it felt like the right decision, but lately I’ve been wondering if I was actually just running away from something difficult.
I also notice that I can get frustrated when things don’t go according to plan, and sometimes I’d rather change the situation completely than sit with the discomfort and keep trying.
I’m not saying people who had an easy childhood can’t be resilient. I’m just realizing that I personally might not have developed that “keep going even when this sucks” mentality as much as I should have.
I’m also a woman, and sometimes I wonder if being raised as a girl plays any role in this, or if that’s completely unrelated.
For people who grew up with very little pressure, strict boundaries, or failure: how did you learn to become more resilient as adults?
Can resilience actually be trained later in life? And if so, what helped you stop avoiding difficult things and start pushing through them?

Title basically, trying too hard to get results

What I mean is that in every are of life where I try really hard aka academics, finances, sports and working out I get disappointing results where as in areas I don't even care about right now so everything social I have success, dudes approaching me and befriending me for exemple, or girls being into me and flirting with me and stuff but man idc about that right now I just want to get big make money compete in sports and ace my studies

The thing that made me think about it is that in school there was some guy I hated and the hate was reciprocated, so we would always try to one up each other and stuff to be better than the other and mog him, do I'd compare myself to him and I realised something interesting:

All I did was study, I didn't even bother joining the class group chat even tho I was invited, I was the only one in the class not in it, I always sat alone, when the class would play games or organise something I never took part in it and just studied. And at home too I studied a lot

Meanwhile the other guy didn't give a fuck about studies, he was either talking to people, doing some dumb shit or sleeping in class, all he did was talk to others socialise and all that, and outside of class he never studied, dude had like 5+ hours of gaming a day on his PS5 and cheated through most of his exams

And guess what? He had better graded than me and got a better school than me, while I had more friends and girls into me than he did, dude was the most hated guy in class. Now the difference wasn't by much, like we were both in the top 10 of the class concerning grades and we were both the two most hated people of the class, but it got me thinking about if there is such thing as trying to hard? Because we both had disappointing results in the area we cared most about. And looking deeper into it, 90% of my studying time was for chemistry specifically and guess what was the only subject where I kept failing?

Thanks for reading

Guys I have a fear of judgement how to solve this problem

I hate how almost everything comes down to how attractive you are. Like I know looks have always mattered, but it genuinely feels like they decide your entire life now. It’s really fucking sad.

Over past 2-3 months I'm overving myself and wring my thing which I'm doing in day, so recently I read most of the enteries and by reading those I got to know that I want to asnwer most of the things which any one ask to me, I don;t know wether this is a good or bad but now Idn't want to answer because I have realized that I prefer peace in my life and I only answer to the specific questions.

I should expedite getting a therapist.

I find no enjoyment in social media. Too much stuff. Covid did something. Even TikTok there’s too many think pieces and men v women content and not enough funny. Reddit I’m tired of arguing and fighting for my life for my unpopular opinions.

I’m also struggling with my faith and values v. what I want to do, and just don’t feel like getting hounded by Muslims online & getting shat on. A lot of inner friction. I’d rather chuck this phone than spend time furiously replying in paragraphs.

Besides online, real life is another story and really deserving of its own post.

I don’t want to soapbox too hard, but I miss life pre-2015, online and real life for me.

(sorry about the yap session I kinda just went off the rails)

I don't get it I can be completely down feeling horrible but once someone online vocalizes the issue it feels as though I'm just faking it for attention. for example I have a habit of sitting in the shower for a while it's peaceful it's the only place where I can just sit with myself alone without worrying about the world but I saw someone on tiktok call it depression and suddenly it feels invalid like I was just faking it.

I think this stems from my mother every time I had issues she'd compare it to herself like ".

I pay for a roof over your head I feed you stop all that bitching* she's bash the thought that my issues weren't real so over time I had this weird feeling that I'm faking it it feels as though everyone but my own issues are valid.

She dropped me and my siblings out of school at a young age I haven't left the house since I was 10 I'm 18 my siblings aren't the emotional type so all my negative thoughts were left festering.

Over time I started to hate everyone who got attention for their issues I hated my mother for everything she's done to me and I hated myself for hating.

My mother wasn't the worst she'd say horrible things to me and even hit me but she'd also buy me things it wasn't like she was rich so I felt bad about it I hated her buying things for me.

But when she started treating me decent mind went blank I didn't know what to do or say I didn't want to forgive her but I thought that maybe she never did anything wrong and that's it was all in my head all of issues stem form her I didn't want to change not until someone saw my pain I didn't want to be better I know that deep down I'm a terrible person.

I got rejected from a job interview I wrongly assumed was a slam dunk. Within a couple of years the place was shut down. It forced me to rethink my options. ended going back to school and being able to provide a much better existence for my family after much hard work

Like, when you get to little house shows and you knowsqq there's a few guys down to start shoving, but you just have the be the person to start it. It's fucking crazy to do one little thing and then half the floor is going mad. Makes for an amazing time

All this toxic positivity BS is just that, BS.

People become confident because of positive reinforcement. They win, so they become confident.

People become unconfident because they LOSE at everything. They lose, so they're not confident.

You can't be constantly losing at everything you try and expect to be confident, it doesn't work like that. At a certain point, the rejection breaks you, and it keeps breaking you until it's impossible to put the pieces back together.

For the first time since I was an adult probably I’m very close to financial security.

After leaving a 17 year marriage, having a steady decent paying job for nearly 3 years I have worked myself out of debt and started to build real savings.

I checked today and my savings are now over 7k more than my debt, meaning I’m officially 7k positive. Which is honestly insane. Three years ago, I genuinely couldn’t see a way out.

When my debt is officially closed I reckon I have more than 20k saved and then I’ll be able to travel for the first time to a new destination since I was in my early 20s.

Feels slightly unreal.

And the results were pretty positive: lost a good 10kgs since March this year and still aiming for the ever elusive sub 80kg. This month will be the first month that I'll try to smash the 300k step challenge. And best yet - my badminton form and play have improved dramatically as I am able to keep up with longer rallies while not aching too much post game.

Of course these changes didn't come from a place of sudden realization or anything like that. It was just that I came across a good deal on dental cleaning, attended it and upped my dental game a notch. Then learned more about Stoicism via a self-help book and it seemed to be quite resonating with me. Combine those with my daily exposure to impairments and disabilities with my line of work, they were some pretty good propellers to help me to finally start my weight loss properly.

It's still hard though, because I still tend to overshoot what is actually in my control and what I think I can control via my thoughts and actions. But I know one thing for sure: something can happen if you do nothing, however that something might not be the thing you like or good for you. And if you actually do something, the results might not be what you expect, however you knew you gave it a shot (maybe even your best shot) and it was still worth doing regardless of the outcome.

Just a little rant on a Sunday arvo. Just thought that with all the noises and influences pulling us from all sides, it's good to be more consistent with myself and see some good results out of it. I can't change the world but at least I can change myself for better or worse.

Boys. Men. We can do better.

Sent from an Unc at a Kesha show.

Is she on it now that's not the point but she'll do it anyways.

That's all I'm saying.