Wondering if things really do change

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Tealeaf

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In a month I'm moving out of an area where I barely know anyone to an area where I know absolutely no one. I'm the last of the people I knew in high school to leave the area, and for the past couple years I've dwindled down to nothing. It's been several months since I last went out with anyone not family on a social outing.

I think it was months ago that I simply gave up trying to meet people, after getting too tired of trying to keep up a mask of being friendly, happy, and funny in the face of rejection, loneliness, mismatches, and constant stress. I couldn't please people with who I was so I stopped spending my time on them at all and just focused on hobbies. No one new came into my life for it.

This is a much nicer place to live that also allows pets, so I can finally start keeping birds. Apparently there's another woman there with birds, and a whole wing for people who keep dogs and another one for cats and other miscellaneous pets. This should be a positive change but really I just feel apprehensive about it, like change happens on the surface in my life but that's all. Like I'm going to go here and wind up sitting inside every night indefinitely, feeling just as low as I've felt in this area for the last few years. I've been a misfit my entire life and no amount of reading, practice, or self-improvement has ever impacted that past the surface.

I'm looking to move up in my career too, taking certification tests in a month, but I fear I'll somehow get stuck in jobs like service or retail for my entire life despite my best efforts. I've been studying almost every day but I feel like I'm just putting on a show.
 
I know how you feel. I'm in much the same situation (minus the moving part). In fact, moving to a place where I don't know anyone, away from the little bit of family and friends I do have, is just... the thought of it fills me with an empty, isolated sense of terror. Even though I'm probably going to have to move sometime very soon (although I do have one option that would actually put me closer to my only real friend), but it'll all depend on finding a job.

Part of the reason I'm so apprehensive is that I don't have an easy time leaving my comfort zone and especially really putting myself out there to do things. I don't do it here, and I feel I'd have even less motivation to do it elsewhere. I also have the same concern that no matter how I better myself, it's all just BS and any employer will see right through it, and I'll be stuck in retail the rest of my life.

I guess I don't have any real advice or encouragement, but I do understand why you feel how you do. Hopefully you'll be able to advance in your career and realize it's because of your own hard work and intelligence, not some fickle chance of fate. And hopefully I can manage the same thing, and actually believe the same one day.
 
Tealeaf said:
This should be a positive change but really I just feel apprehensive about it, like change happens on the surface in my life but that's all. Like I'm going to go here and wind up sitting inside every night indefinitely, feeling just as low as I've felt in this area for the last few years. I've been a misfit my entire life and no amount of reading, practice, or self-improvement has ever impacted that past the surface...

I'm not so good at writing long smart sentences in english, so I'll be short.
This paragraph made me cry... I understand how you feel, and I'm really sorry you feel that way.

Try not to think about that...just do what you need to do when you move there, your job, studying, animals,... Go with a flow. Don't think negative but don't have too high expectations either...just go.

6-7 years ago I moved to a big town, I was alone. But In time I met a couple of friends, but it was collège so it was somehow easier... I just wanna say that you don' t know what can happen there, will you meet people you like. You'll see.

Wish you luck and all the best. :)
 
New place new mindset. Once you get there don't stop exploring the area. Little at the time, take your time.
Talk to the other lady about birds, invite her over for tea if she turns out ok. Get to know your neighbors.
Ace those tests. I know about being stuck in a crappy job that doesn't have anything to do with what you are good at. Getting your foot in door is the hard part. I was at the point of packing my honeysuckle and going back home. After trying all over the place ended up in my field. Long drive (and I don't like driving) barely paying more than what I was making. I think back and I'm surprised I stayed determined for that long. You can do it too. Keep the target in sights.
 
Tealeaf said:
I fear I'll somehow get stuck in jobs like service or retail for my entire life despite my best efforts.

el Jay said:
I also have the same concern that no matter how I better myself, it's all just BS and any employer will see right through it, and I'll be stuck in retail the rest of my life.

I don't know if I can really give advice on this, as I have found myself almost paralyzed by this same fear. I'm looking for jobs and trying to figure out what I can stand to do for working, what I could be at least sort of interested in, what I am even qualified to do, what I can learn, what path I want to set myself up for - and I get overwhelmed by this fear that it doesn't matter what I do or how I try to move up, I'll be stuck in retail or service minimum-wage crap jobs all my life anyway. It's definitely kept me from putting forth my best efforts. It's that root fear I have had all my life - the fear of being fundamentally not good enough, fundamentally mediocre. The fear that I am, at my core, in my heart and soul, a loser.

I try to counter it though by thinking it out. If I just keep applying, then there should be something, somewhere, that I can get that will be in something other than retail or service and pay better than minimum wage. I try to remember that growing up, people told me I was smart. I CAN do things. I just try to hammer the belief into myself that I CAN do better than that.
 
If there's anything I've learned in my life it is this:
Nothing ever changes unless you change it.

So my advice is, take responsibility for yourself. If you feel you're sitting at home every night alone and want someone to hang out with, guess what? You have to change that by just going out and finding someone to hang out with.
What I find the most helpful in these situations is simply the realization that there is literally nothing to stop you but yourself. So you simply just do not let fear control you and then everything becomes available to you.

As for the work thing, I can't say I'm all too successful there, but I do know that employers are almost always ridiculously idiotic and they really do just want some show, almost a circus act. Maybe it's to make their own lives less boring. Make you do some tricks for a few cheap laughs. I don't know. And even then it's not really a guarantee, by any means. You need to know how to leverage the situation, too. And when things don't weigh in your favor you need to be prepared to move on.
The easiest way to never see change is just to sit and stay where you are. That should be obvious but a lot of people really don't seem to get it.
So many people seem to want to believe they're doing everything right and that the world is one day just going to stop, realize its mistake, and then wrap itself around them and comfort them and give them everything they've always wanted. That it's all just going to turn out fine if they just sit and wait or whine about it long enough. I have no idea what sort of fantasies they live in but that sort of thing is obviously nothing more than pure delusion. I wish people would stop thinking like that.
 

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