Nobody really “has a life” anymore, since the lockdowns and then the online corporatization of everything, along with the trend of deepening inequality and precarity.
Only when I accepted that I didn’t “have a life”, in the idealized colloquial way, could I really start living and feeling good about things I did. Also the idealized “life” was largely stuff I found boring.
Enjoy what you like, and if it connects you to other people and feels fulfilling, that’s a life.
At age 19 I was an extremely lonely mf, besides a few times a month doing things that kept going since secondary school, I had nothing going on in my life. Everyone from my school had gone on to university, mostly elsewhere.
When I made it into higher education I was still a weird socially awkward nerd, but I didn’t care. At a certain point I stopped caring about the outcomes of any social interactions, because pretty much the worst it could get was exactly what I was used to. I got really used to listening lots more than I talked, and having conversations that didn’t have perfect beginnings and endings. Before long there were people that actually seemed like they wanted to be around me. The performative charisma and over-the-top social normativity gave way by mid-20s, and the value that replaced it was actually having things that you cared about. So that suited me a lot better.
There is no unifying human experience, besides breathing, drinking water, excreting, and wanting to develop a personal distinction. Re-acclimatizing to the idea that there are no rigid expectations, nothing that you’re fundamentally incomplete for or missing out on or unworthy for lacking, does wonders for your social self.
Jfc that’s probably one of the best advice I got. I’m 20 rn and I just want to make a change for the better unlike my mid-to-late teens. Thank you so much!
Nobody really “has a life” anymore, since the lockdowns and then the online corporatization of everything, along with the trend of deepening inequality and precarity.
Only when I accepted that I didn’t “have a life”, in the idealized colloquial way, could I really start living and feeling good about things I did. Also the idealized “life” was largely stuff I found boring.
Enjoy what you like, and if it connects you to other people and feels fulfilling, that’s a life.
Damn, as a lonely mf that hits too close to home ngl.
At age 19 I was an extremely lonely mf, besides a few times a month doing things that kept going since secondary school, I had nothing going on in my life. Everyone from my school had gone on to university, mostly elsewhere.
When I made it into higher education I was still a weird socially awkward nerd, but I didn’t care. At a certain point I stopped caring about the outcomes of any social interactions, because pretty much the worst it could get was exactly what I was used to. I got really used to listening lots more than I talked, and having conversations that didn’t have perfect beginnings and endings. Before long there were people that actually seemed like they wanted to be around me. The performative charisma and over-the-top social normativity gave way by mid-20s, and the value that replaced it was actually having things that you cared about. So that suited me a lot better.
There is no unifying human experience, besides breathing, drinking water, excreting, and wanting to develop a personal distinction. Re-acclimatizing to the idea that there are no rigid expectations, nothing that you’re fundamentally incomplete for or missing out on or unworthy for lacking, does wonders for your social self.
Jfc that’s probably one of the best advice I got. I’m 20 rn and I just want to make a change for the better unlike my mid-to-late teens. Thank you so much!