/R9K/ - Robot - 9000

Ya know what? I'm sick and tired of this "woe is me" bullshit over not getting the perfect teenage relationships.

>>8155
The system raised us on alienation and gig-economy exploitation, selling love like a fucking loot box through christcucked dating scene. Then it grinds us down—into isolated wage-slaves, porn-brained dopamine addicts, stripped of real connection.

I'm in early 20s community college, my social life has been full parabolic decline. My childhood was pretty good and had tons of friends, my early teens were alright and had a few but trustworthy friends, by late teens i fell into a deep depression and lost them all. Now it feels like starting from zero, everyone has their own little groups.

While I can make acquaintance perfectly fine, it's like impossible to upgrade from there and doesn't help that most people bore me and I'm a little selective for friendship. At this point I think I'm better off grinding my way and focus on networking with acquaintances since all relationship feel so transactional

I guess moving to a bigger city would help too

>I had a winning streak between 2014-2018 and I still didn't feel much better than what I do now.
Yeah that's the thing, I sometimes envy people with regular social connections but then I remember people can also feel alone or unfulfilled in them, and many say they're stuck with shitty friends and stuff.
Like when I started falling into depression I had some friends check on me while I pushed them away, having people around me didn't help at all and actually was a source of stress.

Humans are so fucking weird

>>8169
Thats why we should abolish the institutionalization of adolescence.
That's part of the problem.
How can prime age adults function when they're treated like a kid but expected to function like adults?

>>8172
You've had a good run. Most image board users never had a rich social life throughout their childhood.

I'm you should stop obsessing over looking for kumbiya.

If you're in college don't waste time with unnecessary electives. Just get straight to the point.

>>8174
Yeah, every day I'm more convinced it's impossible to balance out hobbies/family/friends/career/health whatever, unless you're born mega rich you have to sacrifice some. I've made progress on my hobbies, I'm about to graduate and already have an internship arranged when I almost dropped out of school some years ago. I don't have friends in part because I can't be arsed mentally lol

>You've had a good run. Most image board users never had a rich social life throughout their childhood.
The bizarre thing is, throughout my childhood and early teens I had selective mutism, they thought I was autistic (apparently I'm not or at least not enough to be clinically diagnosed) and very introverted except for when I was with trusted people. And actually it was when I was most successful with friends, extroverts would "adopt" me, my energy was more focused on a few people, etc

Now I'm so different many ways. My depression sort of reseted me and turned my existential dread into nihilism, but the feel-good nihilism type, like I don't give a fuck anymore what people think. I've become more uninhibited, I can strike conversation with anyone, a lot less social anxiety. I've gone to parties alone and made acquaintances for the night, traveled alone, managed to get a gf even when I literally couldn't physically talk to girls before. If you saw me in class you wouldn't think I suffer from social isolation so much when I get along with everyone, in class presentations as a kid I used to break down crying from anxiety, now I've made the whole room laugh

Now of course I'm still the same person, introverted, with the same internal dialog and still have many struggles but knowing where I come from it's insane, I can say I'm about average now and for me that's a lot. So I think people now see me and think I'm someone at least decently competent at socializing, so they don't bother engaging with me in the way they did before, now it's me who has to abide by their rules, take more initiative, whatever. Problem is I have no experience with that. Also I suffer from impostor syndrome a lot

Your worst enemy is your own mind, I legit think even the most autistic retard has a lot to offer to people granted they know when shit is cringy and when it can be quirky and work on your favor.
Trust me people don't give a flying fuck. Your past only matters so much as you let it define you

>>8169
i dont think that this is adressing the crux of the problem
capitalist dating culture has developed on and out of a strong romantic tradition built around the idea of finding your "other half" as someone who complements you perfectly and shares all of your values and interests, but this is a fundamentally wrong and destructive view of love that reduces romance to a consumerist activity, so its no wonder that it has devolved into the "sexual marketplace" and other such degenerated concepts
the truth of love is that total absence of commonality is its bedrock; if you can fully embrace someone who is utterly alien to you, then that is love in its most sublime form. the deepest connections emerge from learning to live with inherent conflict and tension
the opposite situation would be falling in love with a clone, pure narcissism that is shallow and can only lead to perpetual loneliness, yet this is the ideal that we are essentially being sold on a daily basis as the "healthy" and "natural" relationship

>>8176
>Trust me people don't give a flying fuck. Your past only matters so much as you let it define you


People always say this yet they always obsess over the "woulda could shoulda". They judge and condemn the youth for flaws/nuances.

>>8177
>the truth of love is that total absence of commonality is its bedrock; if you can fully embrace someone who is utterly alien to you, then that is love in its most sublime form. the deepest connections emerge from learning to live with inherent conflict and tension
the opposite situation would be falling in love with a clone, pure narcissism that is shallow and can only lead to perpetual loneliness, yet this is the ideal that we are essentially being sold on a daily basis as the "healthy" and "natural" relationship


This is a fucked up moralistic take on "proper love". And irony is, capitalism romanticises conflict and difference far too much as virtue.

"Variety is the spice of life "
Indeed it is, but that doesn't mean that any random difference will work. Only certain differences will work

>>8142
>I'm a failed normie.
We all are, anon.

>>8196
>This is a fucked up moralistic take on "proper love"
okay fair enough, what im trying to say is just that love requires a certain kind of alienation in order to really mean anything, otherwise its just narcissism, trying to turn people into objects that reflect you perfectly
love doesnt mean finding someone that fits you like a jigsaw puzzle piece, at some level love requires a radical acceptance of difference
>And irony is, capitalism romanticises conflict and difference far too much as virtue.
capitalist culture constantly pushes the illusion of a harmonious society under siege by external forces, internally there is no tolerance for conflict and difference
in the context of relationships this applies too, those who arent "like us" are treated as something to avoid rather than embrace

>>8196
>falling in love with a clone
Das hot.
>capitalism romanticises conflict and difference far too much as virtue
It emphasizes team conflict and differences in consumption. So while it tries to differentiate people, that differentiation is very shallow, on the level of target demographics. Deleuzeans and Stirnerites would say that capitalism doesn't differentiate us enough. Or, rather, capitalism differentiates us in a very superficial way. That is not to say that finding similarities between people is bad. It's just that these are all surface-level categories. Therefore you don't become more "different" if you're trying to fit into a "different" category, you are born different. As all of us do. We're just duped into thinking that we're the same.
>>8203
>those who arent "like us" are treated as something to avoid rather than embrace
THEY NOT LIKE US! THEY NOT LIKE US! THEY NOT LIKE US!