A year after my mom died, my dad went on a cruise and met his girlfriend. They are inseparable now. My dad is elderly.
Ask HN: How to be alone?
401–410 of 592 posts
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#402To get things out of the way: yes it is hard being alone. But it is also hard to be with someone and is very hard to take care of kids and family and such. And it is waaay harder to be with wrong person. There are no easy roads in life and being single is one of the easiest. Now I’ll focus on practical advise: - gym every day. No excuses. If you don’t know what to do or lack motivation- get a personal trainer. - besi…
gym everyday: I found great success with Pilates. It's usually me + 2-3 other people and the instructor. There's chatting during the session after you become regular. You get to have some social life while exercising. It also helps tremendously with posture, specially for someone who spends all his day in a chair.
It's still hard to do sometimes, like in stronger depressive episodes. But it's way easier than gym at least for me.
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#403Earlier quoted context omitted.
“Born alone” is beyond reductive, it’s plain wrong. You literally come out of another human who you must then feed on for months in order to survive.
You are born out of another human but even they can never understand you fully, they can never experience you fully, they can never know you fully. The problems of parents and kids are all coming from that and are old as time. If even parents can't do that there is no chance with other people. This is the trick of the universe, or a trade-off if you will: being completely alone also means being completely free in ter…
You're arguing for solipsism.
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#404Move to South America and let the problem solve by itself. Why fight a culture that enforces individualism? Just move to a place where it’s rare being alone. People in mexico and south are just different
I was almost about to suggest the OP to move to a small town in India. Here he/she will be fighting for privacy though ;). What a contrasting culture!
For humans at least seeing other people is a bare minimum. I would just go for a walk, wave at my neighbour/building workers, make small talk etc. I don't know how the cultural dynamics work, but can't you move back into your parents home? Just being alone with depression sounds terrible. I hope your situation improves soon.
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#405Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have seen this perspective a lot and I don't understand it at all. When I meet a stranger, I don't wonder if they exercise enough for me to befriend them. Same for their clothes-shopping habits, past some very basic threshold. Same for whether they pay for me. A lot of this advice for how to improve yourself so that other people like you comes off so incredibly vain, neurotic, and juvenile.
I firmly disagree with this advice as well; it strikes me as the sort of advice one comes up with when sitting around one's room wondering why one doesn't have any friends. The worst part about it is that it will get you doing all these activities that take up your time but don't really solve the friend problem. Making friends isn't trivial, but it isn't a complex thing - just ask people you sort of vaguely know to h…
Do you firmly disagree with all of it, or just the clothes and gym part?
I don't have any objection to suggestions like "help people" or "be [a] good friend" or even "cook" and I think they're a core part of making friends. Today I cooked dinner for two friends and just got back from driving one of them home. They've been similarly kind to me in the past. Friendships are built on foundations like this.
It's absolutely correct that you need to invite people to do stuff before you worry about whether you're helpful enough, but you also need to go from being two or more people who kinda sorta know each other to actual friends.
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#406This comment might get lost in here but in case you get to it: I come from the complete opposite side of the spectrum: I've been living alone for practically the entirety of my adult life and I'm not far off your age either. This may come across a bit like "there, solved it" advice but hear me out: During the first 6 months of COVID, I was the happiest I have ever been. Things weren't perfect but given the circumstances, I doubt it could have been much better. But at a point the complete absence of borders between work and life disappeared and it was the constant zoom meetings happening in my living room that really got to me. One evening I was scrolling around the internet and saw an ad for 3 month old puppies across town. The decision was spontaneous af but I figured that I might as well do it now that I was at home all day. 5 years later, I can say this was among the best decisions I've ever made. But a word of advice - think about it and do your own research. What I got was a dog that is definitely not for everyone. But if you are active and have the time and patience to dedicate to such a breed, trust me, you will never feel alone again.
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#407To get things out of the way: yes it is hard being alone. But it is also hard to be with someone and is very hard to take care of kids and family and such. And it is waaay harder to be with wrong person. There are no easy roads in life and being single is one of the easiest. Now I’ll focus on practical advise: - gym every day. No excuses. If you don’t know what to do or lack motivation- get a personal trainer. - besi…
> But it is also hard to be with someone and is very hard to take care of kids and family and such. And it is waaay harder to be with wrong person.
Strong disagree. It's a different kind of hard. People can handle hard. Running a marathon is hard but a million do so every year for no reason other than maybe it's hard.
The difference between taking care of kids and having a family is that it's meaningful and to most deeply satisfying. Sure there are some people that don't get any satisfaction, but I think it's fair to say that it's not the typical experience across every Western culture.
Let's stop pretending everything is morally equivalent. "I'm raising an autistic child to be a functional member of society", "oh that's nothing! I just mad Diamond II with 61% win rate over 200 games in League!"
I don't know what "being with the wrong person" means. There is no "right" or "wrong" person as the world doesn't revolve around you. If you're actually in an abusive relationship, you should get out obviously. But what's the alternative? Drifting. Emptiness. No purpose or companionship. Spending the rest of your lives with pets asking for life hacks on how to manage boredom. Video games, netflix, personal indulgence and self gratification, medication.
This is going to be weirdly controversial on this forum but is advice I would give to my children: most people should aim to do what we've been biologically evolved to do, namely find companionship and love w/ someone and raise a family. If you're an outlier and you have a shot of sending someone to Mars, sure, go all in on that, but for nearly everyone else, this is your best chance for a fulfilling meaningful life.
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#408To get things out of the way: yes it is hard being alone. But it is also hard to be with someone and is very hard to take care of kids and family and such. And it is waaay harder to be with wrong person. There are no easy roads in life and being single is one of the easiest. Now I’ll focus on practical advise: - gym every day. No excuses. If you don’t know what to do or lack motivation- get a personal trainer. - besi…
- gym every day. No excuses. If you don’t know what to do or lack motivation- get a personal trainer. Do you people even go to the gym at all? You need time to recover. Between 3 to 5 days is the most you can humanly do. And that's if you vary your exercises as suggested by a (good) personal trainer. Any more than that and you're just asking for overtraining syndrome. Doubly so if you're nearly 40. Edit: after seeing…
> Don't take advice from internet strangers
Incredible irony here and exactly what I was thinking as I read your comment. Get them internet points, kid!
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#409Hi,
It sounds that its not only the fact of being alone that is difficult, but that you are going through changes. You were used to a certain way of viewing life and maybe youself as part of that life, and this changed. It usually will take time to figure what do you want now. Long term there probably are no tricks to this, as there are no tricks to building a house. You just put them bricks one after another, see if they fit. But you are in control of this, and in some ways it may be exciting.
In practical terms: (a) Give yourself time to figure what you want to do now. You are in no hurry. (b) Talking to a psychologist may help a lot. If you think talking to a psychologist is wierd, know that at least most psychologists talk to a (another|) psychologist regularly. (c) Exercise is good. If you are not into it, start slow. Walking, situps in the morning, a few pushups. Do it because its something that is generally good for most people, and now you have the opportunity to build that habit. Not because its a trick or distraction. Also, you don't need a gym for this, but if you go to a gym, you'll be around other people. You wouldn't need to interact with them, but you might. (d) There are hobbies that are quite social. Theatre classes, Karate or BJJ, writing workshops or photography classes. Depends on what you're into.
Enjoy
Re: Ask HN: How to be alone?
#410I guess no one is going to say the obvious, so I'll bite.
Find someone else, make this a top priority. Forget online dating, just go out and try to make connections. Make this a top priority, much like trying to find a new job.
The rest of the people giving you coping mechanisms is just slop. Most people aren't meant to be alone. You sound like one of these people. You're looking for life hacks to deal with something that sounds like it's very much a choice. Do not go gentle into that good night. It's not going to get easier. And God forbid you have some medical issues which we all inevitably do. Who is going to take care of you? Who are you going to spend your last breaths on? Some passive musings to a nurse?