Low Self-Esteem

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>>18456682
What you need is a god damn hobby that fills you with pleasure, joy and sense of accomplishment. Surely you have something in mind unless you want people to randomly suggest stuff to you (which is fine if you need that)?

>>18456712
Thank you for the reply. It gives me something to think about. I used to play they keyboard a lot but got frustrated with not playing as well as I liked and sold it...Considering to grab a decent one not too expensive and just take another crack at it....

Again appreciate your reply bro.

>>18456682
get back into lifting

>>18456682
Have you tried cognitive behavioral therapy? It's the most effective form of combating anxiety disorders and would probably help you a lot. It involves teaching your brain to not constantly feed you negative thoughts, and replacing them with good thoughts. That's the cognitive part, the behavioral part involves purposefully putting yourself in stressful situations to desensitize yourself to them. Though it sounds like your main problem is the negative self talk, so maybe only the cognitive part will be useful to you.


Also, meditation. It's not hippy woo-woo stuff, there's currently a flood of scientific articles coming out showing the positive effects on the brain of even small amounts of daily meditation.

76 Benefits of Meditation, with scientific sources:
http://liveanddare.com/benefits-of-meditation/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoLSRGzZwow

>>18456845
Will definitely take this into consideration. Thank you!

Tell me what exactly are you insecure about

You alienated most of your friends by smoking weed? That's weird, it must've been really bad. I smoke pretty much every week and it hasn't impacted my life in any bad way, I met quite a lot of interesting people.

As other anon said, find a hobby. Or better, find a philosophy. I had a big problem with self-esteem because I didn't care about anything other than what people think about me. But again, I was depressed because I lacked a sense of direction in my life and I don't know what exact problem do you have.

>>18456730
Creating or playing music sounds like a fine hobby. I've personally had intentions of creating music and throwing it up on YouTube or some shit just to see what the reactions or tractions it would get. Crafting something will be work but getting to a final product I can approve of sounds like fun. My problem is that free time is short and when I do have it, I get lazy.

If you weren't going to suggest that, I was going to infer that you get into astronomy at least from now until the end of August. If you live in North America, there will be a total solar eclipse visible on the 21st of August.

>>18456870
How did you get rid of your depression?

>>18456870
I think I'm afraid of putting myself out there, and maybe getting rejected for it. I'm literally spending 30 min+ rewriting, rewording, and debating whether I should make this post at all for no other reason other than this resistance that is holding me back from doing so. I feel like most people don't really give a fuck about what I have to say, so I shouldn't even bother saying anything. I understand this is just my insecurities haunting me so i'm just saying fuck it and post anyways. I do this a lot when I text people. I spend a much longer time than I really should debating wether what I'm saying is the right thing or what I really mean etc. Sometimes I won't even reply and rarely take the initiative to contact people. Because of this my social life is very poor.

As far as weed goes my relationship with Mary Jane has been all kinds of fucked up. Long story short I experienced damn near God-Status euphoria that rivaled LSD and shrooms I've taken when I first REALLY got high from weed. Ever since then I was absolutely obsessed with the feeling it gave and chased it for 4 years straight. I've smoked myself into panic attacks and just outright shitty states of mind countless times because I wanted to experience that high again. Real talk probably over 80% of my highs have put me into a shitty state. I ignored all the signs and just ruined weed for myself by abusing it as much as I did. I was very stubborn and admittedly stupid about the whole thing.

>>18456901
I had problems with my identity and self-esteem, I lacked a sense of direction and felt like my whole life was built on pretending to be somebody else. I had no hobbies and no interest in anything other than respect from other people.

I started spending more time with my closest friends. Got to know more people, looked at myself from a different perspective, took drugs. Stopped running away from reality. I got interested in politics, economics and philosophy. Cut my hair after having the same haircut since primary school. Bought new clothes. Got drunk every weekend and talked to strangers, since it's so much easier while drunk. Soon I realized that people started liking me. I realized that I actually have a likeable personality, but I enjoy being myself more than receiving attention from others.

I think the worst part was the feeling of alienation and permanent loneliness. Now that I think about it I was really retarded. I thought that I'm different and I'll never change (and improve my life).

I think what changed the most is that I started trying without expecting anything in return. For example, two years ago I was scared of picking up girls in clubs because I've never succeeded before. Now I know how retarded that was. It doesn't matter who you are if you're making a first impression. Sometimes you'll make an ass of yourself, sometimes you'll get laid. Trying is always better than doing nothing, and even trying can be fun.

Nobody's perfect, but everyone can improve. I changed so much throughout last two years that I couldn't be friends with myself from 2015. Hell, we'd probably fucking hate each other.

>>18456965
I can relate to this post a lot.

Thank you for sharing.

>>18456963
>I think I'm afraid of putting myself out there, and maybe getting rejected for it.

LITERALLY ME. I had this problem for a long long time. The trick is - if you get rejected, don't act like it matters to you. What you have is one of the most unattractive traits out there, but you can get rid of it. What I mean is, never act like you value opinions of other people about you more than your own. Never ask if somebody likes you, never act like you care more about the other person than yourself.

Your relationship with pot seems completely different than mine. I started smoking three months before I started fighting my depression and it helped me a lot. I never used it as an escape from reality and never treated any of the "live in harmony" and "just let go of your ego" things my friends talked about seriously. I mean, I always enjoyed our debates about philosophy, but sometimes it was just random shit.

Weed made me feel even more insecure, but soon I got used to thinking about myself and other people rather than other people thinking about me.

I've also done acid and molly. Acid was really interesting, but I didn't take anything I experienced other than my thoughts too seriously, unlike my friend who "interacted with an outer dimension" and soon became a big fan of Terrance McKenna and Alan Watts. You should never make your happiness or lifestyle dependant on things like drugs, hobbies or people. I know I sound like a character from a shitty cartoon, but happiness comes from the inside. It's better to have an attitude that makes you content no matter what happens than live a life in which you do something you really like doing. That's why some people have such problems with drugs, breakups, videogames, porn.