I used to just go in, do my work (school or professional) and get out… job done, go home and hide… please leave me alone! I apparently don’t know how to dress, look, behave, be grateful… all I know is how to take advantage of people, and I should do more to pay people back…

With all this wonderful lack of self esteem, and constant fear of having to owe someone for anything they give, do or say to me, kept me down and feeling overwhelmed at times. It sounds like what you feel is worse than this, but I hope I can give you some perspective with what follows, if you can relate to the previous statements, if not, please disregard, as I do not mean to tell you i have the answers, or that you need to fix your self, or that I know this is “just what you need to read to get better!” I am just hoping that seeing the following might help spark something positive in your mind
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All that stuff in the beginning, about who I felt I was, was related to constantly being told by a caretaker that I was all those things… those were constant themes…. I never met anyone’s standards, and even if I did, I better keep it that way (like there was no faith I could sustain any success). Essential I had little compassion provided to me.

I had no ambition, no reason to do anything. Then one day I ran into an old friend, who asked me if I wanted to join him and his friends from work (where I ran into him) for a movie. He knew what I had gone through as a child, and maybe knew this is what I needed…. that human interaction started something great.

Does this mean I think you need to run into an old friend, or fall into the perfect social situation to get along with people? No. this helped, but it wasn’t enough to get me totally out of my depression… it was when I finally started talking to people and saying what I felt, not what I thought I should feel. it was when I made real connections that things started to take off. This old friend got me started by inviting my out again, and I talked to those people and started to feel human…. then I started to get back into what I loved, writing, thinking (just thinking about things), looking up strange facts and watching documentaries… I got back in touch with what I loved as a kid.

I am not sure what you can do, but after feeling a little more human around other people, i started to pay attention to me, and not what I was told in the past about me. when I got in touch with myself, things really changed. It has been 14 years, and I still battle with these old emotional weights, but in the mean time, I have married and am finding some success, which is growing better with every weight I finally learn to let go, but it takes time!!! Please hang in there. You need to figure out how to get in touch with yourself, that kid that was perfect, but perhaps never got the chance to shine. think back to your past, to things you used to do, like drawing, playing with legos, pretending to be a dancer…. then go out and try it… go get a drawing pad, a box of legos, or dance in front of the mirror like no one is watching, except that kid inside you. reconnect to that joy inside you, and you will find your way….

Good luck and be loved!

Hi Jara,

I’m not going to pretend to know exactly what you’re going through. But I hope to offer a new perspective.

You said you’re looking for a ‘simple fast solution’. Let’s start here.

Instead of looking for the quick fix, think long term. Any kind of Band-Aid will likely be temporary and short lived. Look for a way of thinking which you can live by, day in day out. The road to feeling better just may be a slow march with little successes along the way. Also consider that NO ONE has everything figured out, and we’re all a work in progress. And at any point in your march, it is possible for you to have peace of mind. Take it slow.

You talk about ‘ugly’ and ‘good’ as labels for people. It’s easy to sort people in a simple way as this, being either one or the other. But people are simply not all good or all bad. Each and every one of us has the potential to do good or bad. Sometimes we do good, sometimes we do bad. Sometimes our definitions differ among people of what good or bad are. Sometimes our own definitions of these change over time.

I accept that I’ve done hurtful things to others. I’ve screwed up. But I also do my best to learn from these experiences, to get a better understanding of myself. Doing hurtful things to others does not make me a hurtful person. I am a person who has done hurtful things. This is a big difference. I’ve also done a lot of good things. Though that does not necessarily make me a good person either. I am a person, who does things, good, bad, right, wrong, constructive, destructive, and on and on. Of course, I strive to do good, though I make mistakes like the human that I am. I do my best to take responsibility for those mistakes and try to learn from them. Notice I say ‘do my best’ and ‘try to learn’. Even if I fail, I feel my good intentions have a positive affect on me.

My point is that there is often a pressure to be a ‘good’ person. It can get blown out of proportion to the extent of attaining perfection. This is impossible. And it distorts our view on who we are, in a bad way.

My hope is to take this pressure off of you. To tell you that mistakes happen. It’s ok to fail. Feelings get hurt. Things get destroyed. But also, lessons can be learned, things can be rebuilt, we can feel better.

I suggest that you think of one thing you enjoy doing. Something easy enough you can do pretty much any day. And just do it. Do it because you enjoy it.

After you’ve done it. Think of another thing, and do that.