Perpetual Avoidance, or Afraid of People - Chronic Pain As a Result of Inaction

[henderyjem]

Hello there, FDR.

 

I am a guy who has been actively listening to Stefan for, surely, 5 years at this point. It started in my parents house where Stefan randomly came up on YouTube for some reason. It is extremely blurry, and I could not for the life of me tell you exactly when the voice of FDR first entered my life, which is testament to how much of a cloud of fog I was really in back then.

 

Introduction:

 

I come from an extremely abusive household. Not only was I abused and screamed at almost every day, but I was "shielded" from the world; I was not an attractive or cute kid back then, my parents did not make me care for my hygiene, hairstyle or style of dressing, so not only did they set me up for social failure psychologically, but also physically as it would be very hard for me everywhere due to looking as abused physically as I was psychologically. I was very aggressive towards people, which was learned behavior (I'm not going to attribute said behavior characteristics to my inherent child self since the behavior of a child is modeled by the parents). This made my parents punish me for it, and so their self-fulfilling prophecy had come full circle, and this is mostly what occurred in the relationship with my parents; they model bad and unhealthy behavior, I use said behavior with peers, parents find out, punish me - repeat. They used this kind of method of humiliation and self-esteem annihilation all the way into my 20's. This is how crazy they really are. They could treat me like a 10-year old at 22. Of course, since we live in the West, anti-psychotic medication and psychological disorder diagnoses were also used as ammunition for the claim of "the bad kid", and so I was force-fed Risperdal among other crazy, child-destroying child medication that evil parents use in the West when their children learn their bad behavior and the parents don't like it. And, of course, the notion that I was sick was supported by the entire society, including all my extended "family" with whom I no longer talk to and don't intend to (as if "talking" was even there to begin with; talking implies mutual respect and curiosity, which didn't exist).

 

However what I am proud of is that I never accepted my set of "diagnoses" received by psychopath doctors, used as slander by my parents and reinforced by the rest of society. I always knew the horror story I was forced to live as a child, and I almost always felt perpetual terror, because I knew I was a helpless child within a situation controlled by freaks who purposed to be my parents, and the world around me fully agreed with them. I never really had friends. I had one "best friend" with whom I used to spend the summers together, but it wasn't deep at all, and given where he is today, it's safe to say he had (and still has) major issues, even more so than me.

 

I don't remember anything from before the age of approximately 10. I have only foggy, shady memories of mostly negative and humiliating events (which is not what you want your childhood memories to be scattered with). The entirety of the childhood that I remember was like a caravan dragged by a horse, taken wherever the master wanted to go without ever having the ability or possibility to signal preference or need, me being the caravan and my parents (mostly dad) being "the master".

 

My school situation was completely meaningless. I kind of sensed nothing I did in school was ever going to be useful, and every day felt pointless, which it was. My classmates however had somehow managed to conform to the slo-mo like, soul-destroying environment there. Although maybe 0,5% of my free time were good times with much playing around with neighbor kids and other classmates, most of my time at home were spent playing video games. This is why video games, the world inside them, the characters and the stories are key moments of my childhood, and they gave me more than I could ever dream my parents would give me. The stories of The Legend of Zelda touched me deeper than anything in my childhood.

 

Fast-forward to my twenties, and I'm pretty much completely isolated in front of the computer. Knowing about and suffering from my social issues, I submitted to my ineptness and instead began to consume more video games, TV-shows and films. It wasn't until I started doing a sport I came to love that I saw I had potential to "do something", but now we're talking about the age of above 20 already, and doing my sport didn't do much to help increase my social skills and self-esteem. It became my safe haven, and seeing as you can do it alone, it also became a way to isolate myself. So pretty much a quarter of my life on this earth has been spent avoiding crucial life-skills and social development. I spent most of 2016 mourning for this, and the recent months have been extremely painful realizing all that I am currently realizing, so much that I've had nightmares almost every night, moaned myself to sleep due to being in so much emotional and psychological pain, not being able to sleep more than 3-4 hours every night, and waking up feeling like I haven't even slept. This went on for probably 1,5-2 months. I took the money I had and traveled to another country, and I feel a lot better now, but these things still need to be acted on productively, and so this is why I felt like it would be a good start to start a dialogue on FDR about these things.

 

Now I sit here well into my 20's well aware of the fact that I still need to do the work in order to become socially skilled and bring a stronger sense of confidence.

 

A description of the issue:

 

I feel I don't have the right to exist, and every move I make in public feels awkward. I feel like a machine trying to figure out how to move every limb, to relax and be OK with being around people. I am working online now and just got my first paycheck, but I am still partially dependent on my parents which is a huge, huge issue considering the history with them which I wrote about above. I feel handicapped socially. Sometimes I speak so quietly people ask several times what I say. Sometimes I speak incoherently so that people don't even understand what I'm saying.

 

Much of this is a result of emotional and psychological responses I sometimes get being in public, and I can get immense social anxiety. All this is despite the fact I have quite a handsome voice; people have told me this, and I've had practice in singing and can pull off notes quite well. Yet, I these facts completely "disappear" whenever anxiety and emotional responses arises. You could describe it like I feel like I turn into a child. If I'm inside my apartment and feel like a strong, handsome man, in public, I can suddenly start feeling like a pre-pubescent 12-year old boy. This phenomenon is very hard to turn around, and so far I have just gone back to my place and waited it out, and I'm OK the next day. I am usually by myself since said anxiety and responses have made it very hard to socialize and get new contacts (I surely don't want to make friends as my 12-year old, scared self), so I'm doing pretty much all social interaction on my own. I have friends, but they're not in my city as I've had a history of first connecting with people online, then meeting them. This is because the Internet as a platform of interaction helps prevent anxiety and emotional responses from ruining my communication and interactions with people. I'm sure you can relate to this to some extent. But I realize that I must do the work to be able to have as giving interactions in real life, because I don't want to spend my life staring at a computer screen, hoping I will be able to nit bonds with people online. It's also hard, because so far, the people I've made it work with have all been far away.

 

This shit has also made me avoid social stuff altogether for extended amounts of time, and the social isolation only make this worse because I become comfortable alone (as I can be myself on my own), and then when I go out, the world is even more scary and it's even harder socially after isolation. The problem, that is, is that I hide my "self" in public and often go out of my way not to "upset" anyone by being myself. This is illogical though, because you are more likable when you are confident, so all of this shit only sets me up for further social failure, and I feel like this very moment is where I have the option to decide whether I will fall down further on the slippery slope, or whether I will turn this into something good. Also, approaching girls is one of the major things I need to correct as I've never approached one. Said anxiety and the emotional and psychological issues can make me feel almost retarded around them, even though I'm quite an attractive young man which I've been told by many girls and guys, so I believe it has to do with my child-self not feeling attractive back then and those same emotions still being around today inside of me. As I want to find a mate to have a relationship with, this is another issue which is of very high priority.

 

 

So I'm writing this post as an introduction, just to get the word out there. Stefan has helped me immensely, but he has helped mostly with the realization part and learning about myself in terms of self-knowledge, and most of the FDR work done I have done in isolation on my own. The other part begins now. The things I talk about in this post are tangible, physical things that I have to act on in order to improve and are different from self-realizations.

 

So, FDR. What do you think?

 

- henderyjem

[Sima]

Congratulations with the effort to be a human. A lot of people are just plain animals. Another question: how do you look for other people, who are emphatic and clever? Because I often was simply annoyed by people who don't care how the person next to them feel, what's happening to that person. There are people who try to get a connection to dysfunctional ones, but after some time they get tired. How much you encourage nice people to connect to you: smile, eye contact, reply.

Also try to learn to understand body language, for that is good to go abroad, where you don't know the language, therefore have to read the faces and gestures more.

 And keep in mind, that everyone (99%) of people are in pain, the QUESTION is :  which kind they are: those who give others pain, because they are themselves in pain, or those, who think its enough of that pain, let's do something nice for each other. 

[henderyjem]

Congratulations with the effort to be a human. A lot of people are just plain animals. Another question: how do you look for other people, who are emphatic and clever? Because I often was simply annoyed by people who don't care how the person next to them feel, what's happening to that person. There are people who try to get a connection to dysfunctional ones, but after some time they get tired. How much you encourage nice people to connect to you: smile, eye contact, reply.

Also try to learn to understand body language, for that is good to go abroad, where you don't know the language, therefore have to read the faces and gestures more.

 And keep in mind, that everyone (99%) of people are in pain, the QUESTION is :  which kind they are: those who give others pain, because they are themselves in pain, or those, who think its enough of that pain, let's do something nice for each other. 

 

Thanks for the reply, man. Well, I haven't done much to connect to people at all. Like it says in the title, I perpetually avoid acting on my feelings and desires, so even if I want to connect with that very cute girl, and despite me knowing I am an attractive young man, I have avoided it, completely ignoring the person and fleeing the situation. That's why I decided to start writing on FDR, because I feel like I'll soon implode from the pain caused by basically ignoring the world; ignoring myself, and hiding from everything and everyone. I gotta take some first steps now!

 

Thanks for reading and entering the discussion!

[mgggb]

Hello there, FDR.

 

I am a guy who has been actively listening to Stefan for, surely, 5 years at this point. It started in my parents house where Stefan randomly came up on YouTube for some reason. It is extremely blurry, and I could not for the life of me tell you exactly when the voice of FDR first entered my life, which is testament to how much of a cloud of fog I was really in back then.

 

Introduction:

 

I come from an extremely abusive household. Not only was I abused and screamed at almost every day, but I was "shielded" from the world; I was not an attractive or cute kid back then, my parents did not make me care for my hygiene, hairstyle or style of dressing, so not only did they set me up for social failure psychologically, but also physically as it would be very hard for me everywhere due to looking as abused physically as I was psychologically. I was very aggressive towards people, which was learned behavior (I'm not going to attribute said behavior characteristics to my inherent child self since the behavior of a child is modeled by the parents). This made my parents punish me for it, and so their self-fulfilling prophecy had come full circle, and this is mostly what occurred in the relationship with my parents; they model bad and unhealthy behavior, I use said behavior with peers, parents find out, punish me - repeat. They used this kind of method of humiliation and self-esteem annihilation all the way into my 20's. This is how crazy they really are. They could treat me like a 10-year old at 22. Of course, since we live in the West, anti-psychotic medication and psychological disorder diagnoses were also used as ammunition for the claim of "the bad kid", and so I was force-fed Risperdal among other crazy, child-destroying child medication that evil parents use in the West when their children learn their bad behavior and the parents don't like it. And, of course, the notion that I was sick was supported by the entire society, including all my extended "family" with whom I no longer talk to and don't intend to (as if "talking" was even there to begin with; talking implies mutual respect and curiosity, which didn't exist).

 

However what I am proud of is that I never accepted my set of "diagnoses" received by psychopath doctors, used as slander by my parents and reinforced by the rest of society. I always knew the horror story I was forced to live as a child, and I almost always felt perpetual terror, because I knew I was a helpless child within a situation controlled by freaks who purposed to be my parents, and the world around me fully agreed with them. I never really had friends. I had one "best friend" with whom I used to spend the summers together, but it wasn't deep at all, and given where he is today, it's safe to say he had (and still has) major issues, even more so than me.

 

I don't remember anything from before the age of approximately 10. I have only foggy, shady memories of mostly negative and humiliating events (which is not what you want your childhood memories to be scattered with). The entirety of the childhood that I remember was like a caravan dragged by a horse, taken wherever the master wanted to go without ever having the ability or possibility to signal preference or need, me being the caravan and my parents (mostly dad) being "the master".

 

My school situation was completely meaningless. I kind of sensed nothing I did in school was ever going to be useful, and every day felt pointless, which it was. My classmates however had somehow managed to conform to the slo-mo like, soul-destroying environment there. Although maybe 0,5% of my free time were good times with much playing around with neighbor kids and other classmates, most of my time at home were spent playing video games. This is why video games, the world inside them, the characters and the stories are key moments of my childhood, and they gave me more than I could ever dream my parents would give me. The stories of The Legend of Zelda touched me deeper than anything in my childhood.

 

Fast-forward to my twenties, and I'm pretty much completely isolated in front of the computer. Knowing about and suffering from my social issues, I submitted to my ineptness and instead began to consume more video games, TV-shows and films. It wasn't until I started doing a sport I came to love that I saw I had potential to "do something", but now we're talking about the age of above 20 already, and doing my sport didn't do much to help increase my social skills and self-esteem. It became my safe haven, and seeing as you can do it alone, it also became a way to isolate myself. So pretty much a quarter of my life on this earth has been spent avoiding crucial life-skills and social development. I spent most of 2016 mourning for this, and the recent months have been extremely painful realizing all that I am currently realizing, so much that I've had nightmares almost every night, moaned myself to sleep due to being in so much emotional and psychological pain, not being able to sleep more than 3-4 hours every night, and waking up feeling like I haven't even slept. This went on for probably 1,5-2 months. I took the money I had and traveled to another country, and I feel a lot better now, but these things still need to be acted on productively, and so this is why I felt like it would be a good start to start a dialogue on FDR about these things.

 

Now I sit here well into my 20's well aware of the fact that I still need to do the work in order to become socially skilled and bring a stronger sense of confidence.

 

A description of the issue:

 

I feel I don't have the right to exist, and every move I make in public feels awkward. I feel like a machine trying to figure out how to move every limb, to relax and be OK with being around people. I am working online now and just got my first paycheck, but I am still partially dependent on my parents which is a huge, huge issue considering the history with them which I wrote about above. I feel handicapped socially. Sometimes I speak so quietly people ask several times what I say. Sometimes I speak incoherently so that people don't even understand what I'm saying.

 

Much of this is a result of emotional and psychological responses I sometimes get being in public, and I can get immense social anxiety. All this is despite the fact I have quite a handsome voice; people have told me this, and I've had practice in singing and can pull off notes quite well. Yet, I these facts completely "disappear" whenever anxiety and emotional responses arises. You could describe it like I feel like I turn into a child. If I'm inside my apartment and feel like a strong, handsome man, in public, I can suddenly start feeling like a pre-pubescent 12-year old boy. This phenomenon is very hard to turn around, and so far I have just gone back to my place and waited it out, and I'm OK the next day. I am usually by myself since said anxiety and responses have made it very hard to socialize and get new contacts (I surely don't want to make friends as my 12-year old, scared self), so I'm doing pretty much all social interaction on my own. I have friends, but they're not in my city as I've had a history of first connecting with people online, then meeting them. This is because the Internet as a platform of interaction helps prevent anxiety and emotional responses from ruining my communication and interactions with people. I'm sure you can relate to this to some extent. But I realize that I must do the work to be able to have as giving interactions in real life, because I don't want to spend my life staring at a computer screen, hoping I will be able to nit bonds with people online. It's also hard, because so far, the people I've made it work with have all been far away.

 

This shit has also made me avoid social stuff altogether for extended amounts of time, and the social isolation only make this worse because I become comfortable alone (as I can be myself on my own), and then when I go out, the world is even more scary and it's even harder socially after isolation. The problem, that is, is that I hide my "self" in public and often go out of my way not to "upset" anyone by being myself. This is illogical though, because you are more likable when you are confident, so all of this shit only sets me up for further social failure, and I feel like this very moment is where I have the option to decide whether I will fall down further on the slippery slope, or whether I will turn this into something good. Also, approaching girls is one of the major things I need to correct as I've never approached one. Said anxiety and the emotional and psychological issues can make me feel almost retarded around them, even though I'm quite an attractive young man which I've been told by many girls and guys, so I believe it has to do with my child-self not feeling attractive back then and those same emotions still being around today inside of me. As I want to find a mate to have a relationship with, this is another issue which is of very high priority.

 

 

So I'm writing this post as an introduction, just to get the word out there. Stefan has helped me immensely, but he has helped mostly with the realization part and learning about myself in terms of self-knowledge, and most of the FDR work done I have done in isolation on my own. The other part begins now. The things I talk about in this post are tangible, physical things that I have to act on in order to improve and are different from self-realizations.

 

So, FDR. What do you think?

 

- henderyjem

 

Welcome to the community, I enjoyed reading your post. You seem to be going through a lot of what I have and still am going through.

 

Take what I am about to say with the knowledge that I am not a therapist nor do I intend to be one in the future. That said, you seem to have a lot of anxiety. Have you ever considered that you are right? You managed to navigate an abusive childhood, being drugged, and managed to come out with your true self still intact, no college debt that you mentioned, or alimony. Thats more than most can say. Maybe anxiety is your subconscious mind telling you that something or someone in your environment is dangerous. If you feel anxious about talking to a woman maybe you're right. Maybe there's something about her that you are unconsciously picking up on that would result in disaster if you got into a serious relationship with her. 

 

However, I'd like to hear more about why you don't feel you have a right to exist. 

[henderyjem]

Welcome to the community, I enjoyed reading your post. You seem to be going through a lot of what I have and still am going through.

 

Take what I am about to say with the knowledge that I am not a therapist nor do I intend to be one in the future. That said, you seem to have a lot of anxiety. Have you ever considered that you are right? You managed to navigate an abusive childhood, being drugged, and managed to come out with your true self still intact, no college debt that you mentioned, or alimony. Thats more than most can say. Maybe anxiety is your subconscious mind telling you that something or someone in your environment is dangerous. If you feel anxious about talking to a woman maybe you're right. Maybe there's something about her that you are unconsciously picking up on that would result in disaster if you got into a serious relationship with her. 

 

However, I'd like to hear more about why you don't feel you have a right to exist. 

 

No, I am not right. At this point; at this amount of avoidance, I am very, very wrong about what I've done so far. And it's not just "sometimes", but all of them. It's all me, and I need to change this in order to be able to even interact with girls in a productive and satisfying way. This applies to guys as well, but not to the same extent. It's just that I don't have proper bonds with people in life yet, and I'm almost 25 now. It's starting to hurt very, very much, and often it feels like I'm going to burst. In recent months, I haven't been able to go to bed and lie there without immense emotional and psychological pain.

 

About the no-right-to-exist thing. Well, I had a serious sports injury in 2015 which I haven't healed yet, and so I haven't been able to do what I love, and therefore I look somewhat different; I am not as super ripped and monstrously muscular and athletic as before, and I don't know how long it will take until I am recovered fully, and it kills me. I feel like people (mainly girls) won't want to talk to me while I'm in this condition since I am not my ideal me not being able to push my body to the very limits (not to the brink of injury). I did, however, feel like this when I was at my prior best, so it's not just physical; I still need to to the psychological work as well. Well, to summarize it, I feel like I don't bring anything to a situation with people. Like, that I am a third wheel of some kind. Maybe this is because I haven't had any really fulfilling interactions and friendships yet? I literally have only had dysfunctional "relationships" with girls and guy "friends" who all turned into mush and ended with tears, anger or a sense of hopelessness.

 

It's like I have avoided potentially positive relationships just to go back to the madness and continue living in darkness. I think that all the pain experienced recently is my body's way of saying "enough is enough", and so I really need to start making changes, developing my social skills and creating good friendships and relationships.

[mgggb]

No, I am not right. At this point; at this amount of avoidance, I am very, very wrong about what I've done so far. And it's not just "sometimes", but all of them. It's all me, and I need to change this in order to be able to even interact with girls in a productive and satisfying way. This applies to guys as well, but not to the same extent. It's just that I don't have proper bonds with people in life yet, and I'm almost 25 now. It's starting to hurt very, very much, and often it feels like I'm going to burst. In recent months, I haven't been able to go to bed and lie there without immense emotional and psychological pain.

 

About the no-right-to-exist thing. Well, I had a serious sports injury in 2015 which I haven't healed yet, and so I haven't been able to do what I love, and therefore I look somewhat different; I am not as super ripped and monstrously muscular and athletic as before, and I don't know how long it will take until I am recovered fully, and it kills me. I feel like people (mainly girls) won't want to talk to me while I'm in this condition since I am not my ideal me not being able to push my body to the very limits (not to the brink of injury). I did, however, feel like this when I was at my prior best, so it's not just physical; I still need to to the psychological work as well. Well, to summarize it, I feel like I don't bring anything to a situation with people. Like, that I am a third wheel of some kind. Maybe this is because I haven't had any really fulfilling interactions and friendships yet? I literally have only had dysfunctional "relationships" with girls and guy "friends" who all turned into mush and ended with tears, anger or a sense of hopelessness.

 

It's like I have avoided potentially positive relationships just to go back to the madness and continue living in darkness. I think that all the pain experienced recently is my body's way of saying "enough is enough", and so I really need to start making changes, developing my social skills and creating good friendships and relationships.

 

You seem very ambivalent about meeting girls. In my experience, I don't avoid activities that are 100% pleasurable to me but I do avoid things that are both positive and negative. For instance, I'm currently avoiding a trip to the dentist to get a cavity filled because it is painful to do so even though it is positive in the long run. The positive aspects of a relationship are companionship, sex, children, etc, but what are the negatives in your mind that are holding you back? For me its thoughts of divorce, child support, finding myself with someone as crazy as my mother and becoming my father. What are the negatives that you perceive, real or imaginary?

Do you think you are only worthy of being loved if you are ripped and muscular? By that logic the most you can ever be loved is in your mid 20-30s at your physical peak.

 

As a thought experiment, consider your actions up to this point as generally the right thing to do in the story arc of your life. What does that say about your environment and those in it?

[henderyjem]

You seem very ambivalent about meeting girls. In my experience, I don't avoid activities that are 100% pleasurable to me but I do avoid things that are both positive and negative. For instance, I'm currently avoiding a trip to the dentist to get a cavity filled because it is painful to do so even though it is positive in the long run. The positive aspects of a relationship are companionship, sex, children, etc, but what are the negatives in your mind that are holding you back? For me its thoughts of divorce, child support, finding myself with someone as crazy as my mother and becoming my father. What are the negatives that you perceive, real or imaginary?

Do you think you are only worthy of being loved if you are ripped and muscular? By that logic the most you can ever be loved is in your mid 20-30s at your physical peak.

 

As a thought experiment, consider your actions up to this point as generally the right thing to do in the story arc of your life. What does that say about your environment and those in it?

 

I don't even know (not 100%) what the negatives are since I haven't approached girls yet. However I fear humiliation, such as becoming red in the face, making the situation super awkward and wanting to sink through the floor.

 

Me being physically strong has a huge impact on my character and general well-being, psychologically and physically. Remember, it is not that I am not as strong now, but that I'm injured and haven't recovered yet. Look up disc hernia and read what the people say about it. I don't think there are many injuries that can be likened to hell. This is one that can.

[mgggb]

I don't even know (not 100%) what the negatives are since I haven't approached girls yet. However I fear humiliation, such as becoming red in the face, making the situation super awkward and wanting to sink through the floor.

Have you ever been humiliated before by a woman when you were younger?

 

 

Me being physically strong has a huge impact on my character and general well-being, psychologically and physically. Remember, it is not that I am not as strong now, but that I'm injured and haven't recovered yet. Look up disc hernia and read what the people say about it. I don't think there are many injuries that can be likened to hell. This is one that can.

You did say you felt disconnected before you were injured too. Would you mind if I recommended a few books that helped me on self growth?

[henderyjem]

Have you ever been humiliated before by a woman when you were younger?

 

 

You did say you felt disconnected before you were injured too. Would you mind if I recommended a few books that helped me on self growth?

 

Yes I have. There was a girl in second grade which I had a "feud" with. We were both known for it. She would lie about me having "done" things to her, and she told about it while we were sitting in a circle during a "mate discussion" as these crazy ass feminist "teachers" called it. They always sided with the girl, and she never asked a me a single question about said instance, which she had just made up and was now lying about in front of the entire class, ultimately humiliating the shit out of me. Of course, due to the lack of bonds with my parents ("a lack of bonds" isn't the right way to put it, since it was all abuse, but I'll just say that for the sake of the story) I did not stand up for myself, and I felt I couldn't. I sat there with my head held down, feeling singled out for all the children to see and judge. She was a raging bitch. I don't know what initially created this whole "feud", but out of many conflicts during my childhood, this is not one that I recall me having been the initiating force for.

 

This story set aside, I remember feeling shy around girls even before this. I'm getting the sense that I did not have "normal" interactions with girls and that the majority of interactions with them was humiliating towards me, so if that is true, then it is probably imprinted in me as an "initial" picture of "what girls are like".

 

I was also quite humiliated by girls in late grade school. At that point my self-esteem was that bad I could barely even talk. One girl once put up her red shirt next to me because she wanted to compare it to my red face, which was red because I got embarrassed. I just sat there and did nothing. A complete horror story. There were Muslims in that school threatening to murder me, so that is a huge reason for why my self-esteem was that low. Fuckin' circus!

 

 

And oh yeah, please recommend away! =) I'd love me some new reading material.

[Jaeger]

I don't even know (not 100%) what the negatives are since I haven't approached girls yet. However I fear humiliation, such as becoming red in the face, making the situation super awkward and wanting to sink through the floor.

That is a normal physical reaction.  It is your body language saying "I find you attractive" to the girl.  If you take the time to look at the girl's face you might be surprised she is also red in the face and feeling awkward.  That is her body language saying "I find you attractive too".  At that point I don't think it matters what you say or how well your prepared speech is.  1. You will not remember it.  2.  If you do remember it,  it will not come out the way you planned it.  You will feel like the biggest goof in the world but she will love you all the more for it.  Then you will be like

"wow, how did I get so lucky".

 

That's step one, the next step will be dating her to find out if she shares your values and if she is able to negotiate.  Opposites tend to attract (My wife is an introvert and I'm an extrovert for example), so learning to negotiate is the best skill to have if you want a successful relationship/marriage.  Unfortunately that is not a skill being taught by most  parents today so make sure she comes from an intact family where that skill was modeled for her.  Not saying that children from broken families can't learn the skill only that it is a lot harder.

 

If you parents or future in-laws are not good examples of negotiation then take some relationship classes or better yet find the old couple who has been married forever, like 40 years, and ask if they will mentor you.  They will know all the tricks to staying happily married.  I have a feeling the #1 rule for the husband is keep being the goof for your wife.  I've only been married 19 years so I'm not there yet, Still working on it.

[mgggb]

And oh yeah, please recommend away! =) I'd love me some new reading material.

How to talk to anyone, By Leil Lowndes

The power of habit, By Charles Duhigg

How to stop worrying and start living, By Dale Carnegie

Thus spoke Zarathustra, By Friedrich Nietzsche 

 

In my experience, those four books are probably the ones that helped me the most.

 

 

Yes I have. There was a girl in second grade which I had a "feud" with. We were both known for it. She would lie about me having "done" things to her, and she told about it while we were sitting in a circle during a "mate discussion" as these crazy ass feminist "teachers" called it. They always sided with the girl, and she never asked a me a single question about said instance, which she had just made up and was now lying about in front of the entire class, ultimately humiliating the shit out of me. Of course, due to the lack of bonds with my parents ("a lack of bonds" isn't the right way to put it, since it was all abuse, but I'll just say that for the sake of the story) I did not stand up for myself, and I felt I couldn't. I sat there with my head held down, feeling singled out for all the children to see and judge. She was a raging bitch. I don't know what initially created this whole "feud", but out of many conflicts during my childhood, this is not one that I recall me having been the initiating force for.

 

This story set aside, I remember feeling shy around girls even before this. I'm getting the sense that I did not have "normal" interactions with girls and that the majority of interactions with them was humiliating towards me, so if that is true, then it is probably imprinted in me as an "initial" picture of "what girls are like".

 

I was also quite humiliated by girls in late grade school. At that point my self-esteem was that bad I could barely even talk. One girl once put up her red shirt next to me because she wanted to compare it to my red face, which was red because I got embarrassed. I just sat there and did nothing. A complete horror story. There were Muslims in that school threatening to murder me, so that is a huge reason for why my self-esteem was that low. Fuckin' circus!

 

That'll do it. Our brains are extrapolation machines. Why did you not feel comfortable going to your parents for help with the girl telling lies about you? I'm not saying you should have, but what did you expect would happen if you did that prevented you from doing so?

That's step one, the next step will be dating her to find out if she shares your values and if she is able to negotiate. 

 

 

This. Having high standards is super important, so long as you strive to attain them yourself. 

[henderyjem]

The fact is this: I don't have a life. It is dangerous to act as if I do in these sorts of circumstances as it allows my brain to adjust even more firmly to the nightmare at hand.

 

I cannot be a man unless I push myself out from the deeply advanced psychology my brain currently resides in. I avoid everything, because I am isolated, and because I am isolated, my entire body pains, and training socially will feel like pulling a 250kg bar. Being with somebody whom you trust while training socially, on the other hand, is extremely good. It allows your entire system to focus the social energy on him or her, and you can do it together by going out into town and being social together with strangers without issue, because you won't care about their reactions as much since you are "connected". This is why bonds are so important. I currently have no bonds, and therefore every single detail of every interaction can bother me to no end since my mind and body are desperate for contact, bonding and ultimately intimacy. I have no body, but I was given an opportunity by someone I had been talking to prior to meeting. We had a good time, and I felt I wanted to make it an "introduction" to ourselves rather than starting the social training immediately on that day. He suggested we meet again and "make friends with girls" -- the exact thing I need as a person. This is not to get laid, but to re-train my entire fucking fucked up brain to, in real life, understand that girls aren't dangerous. This will lead me to become much less afraid of girls I actually have "on the radar" that I want to get to know, and eventually it will even make me comfortable talking them.

 

What happened next: The guy I was going to go out and do this with said no 3 times in a row. The first time he said "yeah, let's do it tomorrow instead." And since that time wasn't "set in stone", I proceeded by believing the next day would happen, so my mood increased to the skies, and prior to going out just to practice socially, my social comfort increased BEFORE the actual thing. And so I go back home after having had decent, casual social interactions throughout the day with strangers. Not a word. I call him up and AGAIN he says "yeah, let's do it tomorrow." I am absolutely raging at this point, swearing and going mad that the absolutely marvelous mood and mindset I was in would go UNUSED a second time after having scheduled some real-time social training with I guy (thought I could) trust! I am convinced that doing this sorts of social practicing is what I need in order to progress in life. Even more so than money and becoming financially stable, since you can do a job for 40 years and continue to ignore girls and becoming a man anyway. I am literally going out of my way to make this happen.

 

So, this guy now says for the THIRD FUCKING TIME that we can "do it tomorrow instead", but this time I don't believe it's gonna happen. Lo and behold, the next day he says "listen, I need to go to my home town to retrieve some documents. I don't know when I'm gonna be back."

 

My reaction: I receive a fast shoot of adrenaline followed by me sinking back into the chair, releasing my muscles, almost closing my eyes, feeling like the life in me had been sucked out of me. Next day I wake up without the will to even get out of bed. Every dopamine receptor completely depleted, feeling like someone had taken a spoon and carved out a piece of my soul, and, of course, I am alone, and no one is coming (like Nathaniel Branden says).

 

It's like the universe dangles the solutions to the problems I have spent my entire life avoiding only to take it away EXACTLY when I feel the most ready to "kick some ass", which is something that has happened several times. It's almost as if when I feel the most alert, confident, strong, witty and good about myself, "the universe" JUST HAS TO counter those feelings with blowing me off completely, putting me back at square one. And what has square one meant the previous times? It has meant this: Social isolations for months or even years! This is why I know that whenever I feel the best, that is when to act. I had a really social guy, seemingly nice which I trust(ed) to be nice enough to help me with at least communicating with girls. One does not need to be best friends to make something like this happen.

 

Now, I don't know if this guy is blowing me off, or whether he really has some pressing issues at hand in need of immediate fixing. Frankly I do not care. All I care is whether the "bond" is still comfortable enough for me to go out and do this with him once and for all. I hope that me being so fucking pissed isn't going to make it impossible to do what I want to do. Like I said, we hung out before, and it felt like a good introductory "hangout" for US and not for socializing with strangers on the street, which is why I wanted to save that for next time. But "next time" hasn't happened yet.

 

Backstory about my need for socializing and training myself to not make it a life-or-death scenario:

 

My entire system has adjusted to a life of isolation. 2016 was a year-long prison sentence in an apartment without ever interacting with another human being. Who knows, if I don't take this opportunity, maybe the next prison sentence will be another 2 or 3 years in a disgusting apartment in a country where people are anti-social (I am currently in a more social country, and I don't have unlimited resources to wait for this dude)

 

I have seen people go into their forties avoiding things like this. It's not pretty, and there's no "turning back". Healthy individuals can learn this at 16. I am 24 now, and I am already "freaking the fuck out" -- something I consider a healthy thing. People that aren't "freaking the fuck out" who are older than me I consider crazy, since it will only become harder and harder the older you get, and people stop cutting you slack the older you get. People will easily cut an 18-year old slack for being "awkward" since the assumption is that they are still learning because they haven't had time to develop because of their age. A 30-year old is a different story. The reasons are implicit, and if you want people to cut you slack in that age, then you at least gotta tell them you've been through hell, but even then it won't be "slack" they'll be cutting you, but sadness and pity. There was a time where I did not freak the fuck out, and that time is lost and could have been used to do exactly what I am set to do right now.

 

Last time I had a similar opportunity was in the autumn of 2014. That's 3 years. 3 god-damned years! And you can't do it with just anybody. They kind of need to "be better than you" in this area, so you need to find someone that is better than you, bond a bit, create a win-win situation somehow by offering them something, and then casually go and do it with them.

[Jaeger]

Yes I have. There was a girl in second grade which I had a "feud" with. We were both known for it. She would lie about me having "done" things to her, and she told about it while we were sitting in a circle during a "mate discussion" as these crazy ass feminist "teachers" called it. They always sided with the girl, and she never asked a me a single question about said instance, which she had just made up and was now lying about in front of the entire class, ultimately humiliating the shit out of me. Of course, due to the lack of bonds with my parents ("a lack of bonds" isn't the right way to put it, since it was all abuse, but I'll just say that for the sake of the story) I did not stand up for myself, and I felt I couldn't. I sat there with my head held down, feeling singled out for all the children to see and judge. She was a raging bitch. I don't know what initially created this whole "feud", but out of many conflicts during my childhood, this is not one that I recall me having been the initiating force for.

 

This story set aside, I remember feeling shy around girls even before this. I'm getting the sense that I did not have "normal" interactions with girls and that the majority of interactions with them was humiliating towards me, so if that is true, then it is probably imprinted in me as an "initial" picture of "what girls are like".

 

I was also quite humiliated by girls in late grade school. At that point my self-esteem was that bad I could barely even talk. One girl once put up her red shirt next to me because she wanted to compare it to my red face, which was red because I got embarrassed. I just sat there and did nothing. A complete horror story. There were Muslims in that school threatening to murder me, so that is a huge reason for why my self-esteem was that low. Fuckin' circus!

 

 

And oh yeah, please recommend away! =) I'd love me some new reading material.

I'm so sorry for the cruelty you experienced by these girls.  I couldn't imagine the humiliation.  Now I know that your "red in the face" isn't your run of the mill, boy meet girl awkwardness, as I assumed in my earlier post.  Please forgive that assumption.

[henderyjem]

I'm so sorry for the cruelty you experienced by these girls.  I couldn't imagine the humiliation.  Now I know that your "red in the face" isn't your run of the mill, boy meet girl awkwardness, as I assumed in my earlier post.  Please forgive that assumption.

 

Yes. Of course, you didn't know. I appreciate that, but I understand that I that is a goofy reaction some can get. I think I can make it goofy in time, as well. But it has its associations with humiliation, yeah. Well, and I have never had any of those sweet, tingly interactions with girls. All I got was pain, humiliation and yet more pain. And I'm almost 25 now, which is the reason why I am panicking, and rightly so. People often get surprised when I tell them about this as I am quite a handsome fella with lots of meat on me and I am athletic with, so given these characteristics, skills and potential, it becomes extra painful when realizing what my life "could be" taking the necessary steps for creating such a life which is, yet again, another reason why I'm panicking the hell out. And there's literally nobody who is helping.

 

6 months have passed since I last interacted with a human being, and that sucked, because it was a person I had contacted on the Internet and, as many are aware, Internet people can be pretty fucked up, since the Internet is where people go when they lack the balls (for a lack of a better term) to go out in the streets and approach EXACTLY the girl you're attracted to -- on the Internet, you get what the Internet provides you, and that's usually very, very sucky people. Your choice, and I choose real life now! When I talk about "the Internet" I mean people who use the Internet as their main source of social interaction. When the Internet is their main source for that, it almost always is for extremely bad reason, and they're going to weigh you down because of how troubled they are.

 

And now a guy has blown me off after dangling the very thing I want the most in life. It is unbelievable how much pain I have and am going through. And I have been "on the brink" of breakthroughs sooo many times it's crazy, and every time something has happened that "post-poned" it, and there I was, right back in the fucking isolation again.

 

Problems in isolation cannot be solved in isolation! Therefore I believe I need a "partner" with me which is what I'm trying to get.