All things considered, my life is on a pretty good course. I have my own successful business that, if all goes to plan, should essentially have me set for life financially. I’m starting to invest in property, and I consider myself very lucky to be able to say at 26 that I basically have no financial woes. That’s something I very much appreciate cannot be said for a lot of people, including people close to me. There’s other good things happening too that I can’t talk about because they’re private. I think I’m also getting better at ignoring things that bother me and learning to laugh them off so I’m in a better mental state even if I still have perpetual issues with concern about ego, lack of self worth and feeling dumb.
What concerns me is the other side of life. Socialisation and specifically relationships. I am a firm believer that online friendships are not something to be shrugged off, and my friend group I’ve found online is better than any I’ve ever come across in person. Nonetheless, there is without a doubt a missing interaction when chatting online. I wish there wasn’t, but it’s just not the same. The presence of people, facial movements all add up to a superior interaction in person. Having met up with a lot of my online friends though, I can happily say that that gap isn’t as much of a game changer as I used to think though, and I’ve always found the online chatting experience carries across well into face to face meet ups. I guess everything is more or less ok there then? I would love to meet up more with my friends but circumstances and distances render that an obvious implausibility. Such is online life.
So, relationships then. Well where to begin? I am not someone that typically feels desperate for any form of intimacy. I do sometimes though, and that craving has quite literally never been fulfilled. I’ve never had a girlfriend, and I don’t look at the future with eyes on the horizon waiting for it to happen, because I don’t know what you’re supposed to do. Really, I have absolutely no idea. Life seems to have given me a fairly raw deal there. I went to an all boys school through my “formative years”, where my drive was for squarely male pursuits. For 2 years after that, I did sixth form at a mxied school which is the only 2 years of my life I’ve ever had any significant female interaction. There were a couple of girls there I was interested in, but I’d never have spoken up because I don’t know how to and I’m perpetually concerned that I wouldn’t be good enough for anyone in a relationship. The girl I was most interested in ended up in a relationship (of course) and all I could say to myself was “yeah, that guy is definitely better for her than I could ever hope to be”. That wasn’t self pity, it was me looking at it objectively. One of the issues I’ve always had as well is that I’ve never lived close to other people. Even at that school I lived 30 minutes away by car. How do you maintain a relationship when just physically going out is so problematic (it’s not like we had cars then). That’s part of why I’d tell myself I could never be with someone like her.
From there, I went to University. To do computer game programming....May as well have been at an all boys school. Hell, I even managed to end up in a dorm with only guys! That was like a 3% chance but I managed it somehow. I made basically zero female friends there, though since it’s University I can hardly blame the male dominated course for that. I don’t like activities like clubbing or anything else most girls seem to enjoy so I’d never put myself in situations where I’d meet girls. Besides, it’s not like any of those girls ever interested me anyway. I could count on one hand the number of girls I’ve felt anything serious for over the years. There have been a few recently but they’re all either in relationships or transparent out of my league or not interested so I’ve never attempted any kind of interaction there either. “What’s the worst that could happen?”. Well, they could say no and further to destroy any self worth I have I guess.
And if life wanted to cement my lack of female interaction further, it’s given me a work life that involves me sitting home alone, interacting with very few people yet again. I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do in this situation. People will probably say “go join some clubs or do activities”. The problem is I feel like I’m just this quirky guy who has weird interests and, for lack of a better word, I don’t think a “normie” girl would ever be interesting to me and vice versa. So the only girls I’ve been interested in are those within the online communities I’ve been apart of. Besides, I can’t think of any girl in the history of my life that has shown any serious interest in me beyond a passing conversation or forced interaction. I’ve never thought “yeah she’s interested in me”. Not once, in my entire existence.
I hope this doesn’t come across as some fedora tier complaining like “ugh, fucking friendzone, why don’t bitches like me”. It’s a genuine note of concern about my own existence, and I only hold myself to blame. I chose to lose a bunch of weight because I thought it might help. It did with some of my own sense of worth but it didn’t really change anything on any other front. I dress a lot better than I used to as well. When I do interact with people, I seem to be able to make them laugh, I always take interest in other peoples lives and I consider myself to be fairly successful in life as I said at the start. I don’t know what more there is to do. I’m obviously not an attractive guy which doesn’t help much, but I don’t know if it’s much of a deal breaker.
Is the only answer to “lower my standards” or re-evaluate what I want? That seems tragic to me. Why should anyone have to lower their standards for a relationship? That’s just a recipe for future unhappiness.
I guess I’ll just consider myself fortunate that my desires for intimacy are few and far between.
titsay
blakekathryn
tangentwithtanner
turnnoffyourmind
theartofmadeline
sugurugetos
gracieabrams
ellievsbear
