Thank you HN, sorry HN

That said, I also agree with what dandrews says: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5348693 Don't overexert yourself trying to help. If you think helping others will help you, then sure, go right ahead! But please be focused on your own recovery. We'll need a stable leader if we want to do this right ;)

In any case, I would add that the set of actions that matter and make a difference is not a perfect subset of the actions that feel like they're important. That is to say, you never know when something that seems like a small act on your part can change someone else's day...

So, to that end, though I missed the OP's original post, I'd challenge him or her to simply believe in some purpose – find something every morning that makes it worth interacting with others (and try to do so in a generous way) and you're likely to make a real impact, even if you're never aware of it.

I want to share a bit why I wanted to help with the rest of HN. I throughout my life thought many ailments were my "problem", ranging from simple depression, bipolar, alcoholism, drug dependancy and tried the methods successful for each one to "cure me" to no avail.

A couple of years ago however a psychologist gave me his opinion of ADD. Just simply knowing what it was has helped me enormously. It gave me a set of tools to fight the issue. It turns out that all of those other things were epiphenomena of the ADD, parts of the vicious cycle of the upswing when you start seeing the light, elation with a new achieved high you get from some measure of success, followed by the eventual downfall and depression when you see that you are still not making headway. This cycle would repeat and still affects me a bit.

In my case what helped was a stricter regiment of food supplements (especially D, Omega, B6, B12 and calcium) and using Mountain Dew (yes, I know it's a horrid substance) to elevate myself in the afternoon. This coupled with Mindfulness meditation allows me to stay relatively productive. I'm in the process of getting medication for ADD after reading Flower for Algernon and realizing that refusing medication is akin to Charlie refusing the operation (read the book if you haven't, it's remarkably well written).

Before this realization and change in behavior I was flunking out of CompSci @ University. After that change I managed a whole year of full coursework and graduation. I managed to get a job and am managing to achieve the goals we (me and my boss) set for my work.

My point is: You might think you have a specific problem but in reality you might have another problem, but the symptom is what you notice. ADD should really have been obvious when you look @ my life a certain way (having studied everything from medicine to economics to accounting to philosophy and finally CompSci). I had seen many professionals and only one of them hit the proper diagnosis. The funny thing was once I knew the problem, I had tons of tools I had learned about elsewhere to combat it and the only reason I think he was right is that the methods worked!

One of the things that keep me focused is helping others. It kinda gives me a good reason to maintain myself in fit spiritual condition (agnostic, spiritual here simply means connected with my fellow man). A friend of mine is graduating this spring and he tells me he wouldn't be, if I weren't helping him with his maths. Once he graduates, I need to find someone else to help. It gives me strength to know that the help I received, I can pay forward. I'm glad far_far_away is doing that too.