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I rebooted my social life

takes.jamesomalley.co.uk

101–110 of 433 posts

Re: I rebooted my social life

#101

Back in 2019, got to go to Hong Kong for a couple months for work and got to bring my family. I was about to turn 40 and realized that the place we were staying had a rock wall. In a somewhat "mid life crisis" spur of the moment decision, I decided to go buy shoes, a belt and a chalk bag (I did a lot of indoor rock climbing in college). We get there and the rock wall is a. closed and b. only for kids. Get back to the…

One of the things becoming an adult that people miss is that somebody has to set stuff up and that somebody can be you.

It's really easy to be in the mindset that someone else should have already set up the rock climbing club and that if it doesn't exist it just can't.

Turns out that someone can be you! (and this is the thing people miss out on, you can actively make your world more like the way you want it to be by being that leader yourself and doing so is often way easier than you think)

Re: I rebooted my social life

#103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think about all the things going on under the current US administration which include but are not limited to: flag burning ban[0], retribution against law firms for supporting opponents of the admin[1], antifa being designated a terrorist organization[2], deportation of anti-Israel protesters[3], threatening broadcast licenses[4], or suing pollsters because he didn't like the results[5]? We're equating th…

The president is a person and can make whatever proclamations he wants. Sometimes people will even do what he says! But the way the system works is: - orange man makes dumb obviously unconstitutional proclamation about flag burning - most likely nobody does anything about it, but if someone does there is a law suit - the courts are like 'lol no' - back to status quo ante

You're forgetting a step:

- The entire MAGA zeitgeist takes the president's word as gospel and shifts into overdrive in an attempt to enact his proclamation through: A) social pressure; B) new state laws; C) lawsuits of their own; or, when all else fails, D) just ignoring court orders.

Because the president (this one especially, but also his predecessors) is more than just a person.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#104

It's scary that community is a goal to attain here, it seems. Having everything optimized, what kind of life is that? Surely not one that's worth living. What would you say in 20 years about a life without connection, spontaneity, beauty, experience and all? Or where all of those points are checkboxes to be checked? I actually see a bunch of reasons for avoiding community like "they are all leftist and I can't say th…

Huh? What does what you are saying and community have to do with each other?

You know you can do both right?

Re: I rebooted my social life

#105
post #91

I came to the same conclusions as the author. Then I tried something like this and failed to get people interested. It’s draining for me to reach out to try and convince people, not sure if the social anxiety or the lack of executive functioning. Any tips for someone that understands and wants community but struggles with the building process?

I think you must be charismatic and somewhat attractive to inspire people to come hang around you. People will likely assume any event you invite them to will have other people that are similar to you, and by extension, if they are hanging around you it must mean they aspire to be similar to you.

This is the most jaundiced, obviously false, and self-pitying statement I have maybe ever encountered. Have you seen a group of people paint Warhammer figurines together? Or do Gunpla? Or play a roleplaying game? Are they cool and attractive? No! Are they having fun and bonding? Yes! The only incentive one would ever have to deny this is self-loathing covering up a fear of rejection. Go out there and do something dorky with people.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#106

Back in 2019, got to go to Hong Kong for a couple months for work and got to bring my family. I was about to turn 40 and realized that the place we were staying had a rock wall. In a somewhat "mid life crisis" spur of the moment decision, I decided to go buy shoes, a belt and a chalk bag (I did a lot of indoor rock climbing in college). We get there and the rock wall is a. closed and b. only for kids. Get back to the…

> - if you don't have a club or org for something that you're into, go start one

This is how I met most of my local friends; I went out and started a D&D game.

D&D is slightly tricky, because most people want to play a character, instead of be the DM - so, you either need to find a DM, or be the DM. I'm lucky - I love DMing.

Another problem is maybe similar to what OP was facing; I see many people joining our local Discord, looking for a game, but none of them or the people welcoming them seem to take the actual next step of picking a time and a place to meet and start discussing where and when to actually play.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#107

Posts like these make me question whether I even exist, or at the very least, doubt my humanity.

Sweeping self-loathing statements like that are actually a defense mechanism. Fear of rejection is so great that one would rather believe that one is worthless than have another person think one is slightly annoying. Better to self-sooth with self-abnegation than face the uncertainty of other's judgment.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#108
post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This stuff is valid, but a lot of it is more "be there in a crisis", which is not the day to day. For me, the significant thing about having local community is the ability to throw stuff together last minute. Not every gathering has to have a spreadsheet of guests and canva invites and endless emails booking a band, a keg, whatever else. A lot can and should just be "hey dudes, anything doing anything? Want to come o…

There was a period of time in my mid 20s when me and a close friend ot mine lived across the street from each other, and what you said here resonates with me strongly. It is such a massive boost to quality of life to just be able on a whim to send a text like “i am tryna grab some food+drink in 15min, you down?” and actually make it happen more than half the time (and being able to receive similar texts from the frie…

I miss that about dorm life in college. For 4 years I lived in an arcology with people who were the same age and economic class as me. Since the commute to anyone's place was 1-5 minutes on foot, you could get food, watch a movie, and drop out whenever without worrying about the sunk cost of fucking driving 15 minutes in a car-centric city from one detached SFH to another detached SFH.

I miss the arco. I miss the arco a lot.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you must be charismatic and somewhat attractive to inspire people to come hang around you. People will likely assume any event you invite them to will have other people that are similar to you, and by extension, if they are hanging around you it must mean they aspire to be similar to you.

This is the most jaundiced, obviously false, and self-pitying statement I have maybe ever encountered. Have you seen a group of people paint Warhammer figurines together? Or do Gunpla? Or play a roleplaying game? Are they cool and attractive? No! Are they having fun and bonding? Yes! The only incentive one would ever have to deny this is self-loathing covering up a fear of rejection. Go out there and do something dor…

All I'm saying is if you're going to invite people to something dorky, you will have better success if they are dorks.

Re: I rebooted my social life

#110
As someone who used to have a highly active social life and now finds IRL socializing to be mostly a dull chore, I always find it confusing to see so many people commenting to the contrary. My partner is slightly more social than me and gets out slightly more than I do, but generally we are homebodies and we like it that way.

Other people (at least in this country) are generally emotionally messy, unwilling to tolerate people with radically different views/values, and either intellectually lacking or overly predictable in their interests. The few times I find a candidate who isn’t like this, they usually have some kind of personality disorder that makes them too unstable for long-term friendship. When I was younger I often looked past this, but there’s only so many times you are willing to let a human wrecking ball into your life.

A good book is almost always better. The life of a deep reader and casual hobbyist is rich and fulfilling if your romantic needs are satisfied at home. I do not miss my former social life at all.

Just leaving this out there for any other wayward souls who may be annoyed by the conversation.

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