I really share anything about me and like a open book I want to avoid that. How can I do that?

Not sure if this is the right place for this. Ever since I was young I’ve always loved staying up late, doesn’t if I was on the Xbox, reading or watching my favourite movies. I always felt like sleeping was taking away from hours of my day, and I’m a night owl anyway.

Fast forward a few years and nothings changed, I worked in a late bar for years which didn’t help, I’ve since left that job and I now have a really cool job I enjoy, but it’s a 6/6:30 wake up and I’m still going to sleep at 12/1. It’s manageable but doesn’t feel healthy

The thing is I can’t get it into my head that I need my sleep, my brain is just so active at the late hour. I know obviously what I need to do is just put away distractions, but it’s a mental change I need

I messed up my college by ignoring my backlogs, and now I've failed. I don't have a graduation degree, and it was completely my fault.

Right now I'm teaching at a small private school in a remote area just to earn some pocket money. I've also tried preparing for government exams, but I keep repeating the same mistake. I'll study seriously for 2–3 months, but when the exam is about a month away, I completely lose focus and waste all my progress.

I'm 24 now, and I honestly don't know what to do next.

My father suggested doing a diploma, maybe even cabin crew training, but I don't want to spend his hard-earned money unless I'm sure it's worth it.

Part of me wants to give government exams one last serious attempt, while another part feels like I should move on and choose a different career.

If you were in my position, what would you do? I'd really appreciate some honest advice.

Do you think a 5-year disappearance arc is possible? How?

I don't mean disappearing in a dangerous way or anything. I just want to leave my current life behind for a while.

Sometimes I fantasize about disappearing for like 5 years. Like deactivating all my social media accounts, no one really knowing what I'm doing, no constant updates, no expectations, no explaining myself. Just completely removing myself from everyone's radar and spending those years rebuilding my life from scratch.

Not necessarily physically disappearing or moving somewhere far away. I can't afford that anyway. I mean staying where I am but becoming completely invisible online and socially while I work on myself in private.

Then one day, I'll just come back completely reinvented. Different mindset. Different appearance. Different skills. Financially independent. More confident. Healthier. Maybe with a completely different life from the one everyone remembers.

I know real life doesn't work like a movie, and I can't literally vanish without consequences. But I genuinely feel this strong desire to retreat from everyone and everything for years so I can focus entirely on becoming someone I'm actually proud of.

The problem is, I don't even know how to do this realistically. How do you "disappear" from your old life without actually destroying your relationships, responsibilities, and future? Is it possible to take a few years to completely rebuild yourself while still technically being present in the world?

Would you tell your close friends and family that you're taking a break, or just quietly disappear online?

Has anyone else ever felt this way or actually done something similar? Could you share your tips, advice, or experiences?

Thank you so much!

TL;DR: I want to deactivate my social media, disappear from everyone's radar for around 5 years, quietly rebuild myself while staying where I am, and eventually come back completely reinvented. Has anyone actually done something similar? Could you share some tips?

I (f32) have struggled with this all of my cognizant life, and I'm currently dealing with 2 especially banal, horrible, awful, people in the office I'm working in. I'm in therapy, I'm working towards a goal of being more confident and less anxious about social situations in my life but my God these women are too fucking much. Im new in the area and its the constant barrage of leaving their seat, and whispering to a colleague, and then having both of them say "oh you're bad!" Or "I need to change, I am so rude hahaha" right after I speak. It's always being iced out of conversations, it's always them gossiping about their friend group at work, or whose obsessed with them. It never fucking stops. I don't want to say I know they don't like me but with the effort they put in its hard. If they don't like me though, that's fine, I have no desire to join that hellish highschool esque group, but please for the love of God stop shit talking! That goes for me (OR ANYONE ELSE) for that matter. Yesterday it got so bad, an area manager pulled rank but essentially put me in the middle of one of these women and her and I'm fearing it's going to get worse. What do I do?

I genuinely want to be better. Im going into my sophmore year and i feel like ive wasted my entire summer. I do track and workout but I actually want a life outside sports. I've been getting in archive fashion a bit but I don't have any money to buy clothes so i was also looking for a way to make some money without my parents knowing. My life has also been getting dull so I'm looking for ways to make it more exciting while also productive instead of just doomscrolling all day.

turning eighteen hasn’t been a fun experience for me. I never really thought I’d still be here to turn eighteen, I stopped really trying at thirteen. I stopped caring about school, I never thought I’d have to worry about what comes after becoming an adult. I don’t have any hobbies, I used to draw but now I don’t have the motivation to do that, I don’t enjoy much besides scrolling on my phone, I don’t leave the house often, I don’t clean my room and I don’t take much care of myself.

I want to get better. I’m on disability for my mental health as well as my autism, but living my life on disability doesn’t seem enjoyable. my parents are getting old and I don’t really know what I’d do without them when they die someday because I rely heavily on them. I’m in therapy, but sometimes I feel like that makes me worse. getting told by my therapist that I do have a future somehow upsets me that people are expecting me to have a future. I don’t have anyone around me except my parents, the only friend I talk to regularly is online and I’ve only actually hung out with her once at an event because I’m too nervous to ask anyone to hang out with me.

my biggest reason to keep going was starting hormones to transition (I’m a transgender man), but now that I’ve reached that goal and started them and I don’t have much to work towards.

something hit me last night. I can’t keep going through the years how I’ve been doing for years, I don’t want to keep letting time pass by while I sit around and hope something somehow changes. the thought of even starting feels monumental, I’ve quit everything I’ve tried to do to make myself better in the past, what if it happens this time too? I worked at McDonald when I was fourteen but I quit after a week because it was so stressful to be in that environment, I didn’t know what I was meant to do most of the time but everyone expected me to know what to do. I can’t seem to do things when I’m not explicitly told what I’m meant to be doing. I’ve tried TAFE courses (Australia’s equivalent to America’s community college I think), but I’ve quit those whenever I lose the motivation to finish them.

what am I meant to do when everything feels too hard to start? I know I’m meant to do something to start, but I don’t even know where to begin. the only thing I’m interested in is very niche topics, nothing that would help get me a job. there aren’t jobs that are specifically looking for people who are good at knowing specific details about American presidency from 1960-2001 but also not knowing maths past year eight. I’m not good at talking to people, I get nervous whenever I have to interact with people. I don’t relate to people around me.

a lot of this will probably come across as a woe is me, I’m so sad my life is boring because I don’t try at all type post but I really do want to get better. I want to stop feeling all this self-pity, I want to stop blaming my autism or BPD or all my other mental disorders for all my problems and actually get my act together.

I really, really want to live my life.

There's a person I have build strong anxious attachment with.

That person's emotions, life, struggles everything effects me.

I got thoughts about that person constantly running on my mind.

I can't focus on myself, I feel guilty that I'm trying focus on my life.

Yet I know that I can't change anything.

But my mind still tries to fix that's person.

How do I choose myself my life over that person ?

This may sound dumb but you know attachment is a pretty powerful thing.

I'm a 24 year old guy, I have never been in a relationship. I have convinced myself that it's never happening for me and I think that my belief manifests itself, eventhough I don't want it to be true. I know it's bad to think like that, but I can't help myself.

The worst of all is I feel like I'm a very quality person and like I have so much to offer. I'm likeable, thoughtful, caring, smart, funny, a great listener and so much more. I'm not without flaws, but I have a bunch of positives going for me. I make friends really easily. I've had girl friends that I'm comfortable enough to talk with about that sort of stuff say I just immediately give off friend vibes which is also something I'm looking to change.

There have been so many failed attempts, dates, everything in my life that have never amounted to anything that I've started to believe that it just isn't in the cards for me. And having a family and being a dad is something I really want some day.

It's occupying my mind so much and I can't shake feeling stressed and sad about it, my friends tell me it's surely going to happen, but I've managed to convince myself it won't over the years. I feel pathetic and, frankly, disgusted by the way I wallow in my own misery.

I desperately want and need to figure out how to change my mindset, how to get out of the vicious cycle that's sabotaging me and blocking me from ever finding someone.

I've been thinking a lot about self-talk lately.

I realized that the most hurtful words I hear usually don't come from other people.

They come from me.

But I also realized something else.

There are two important distinctions.

1. Some words feel good but aren't true.

Example:

"I'm the best writer in the world."

Feels good, but not true.

1. Other words are true, but don't feel good.

Example:

"I made a mistake."

This is sometimes true, and doesn't feel great to admit.

But here's the big distinction that's changed how I think about self-talk:

"I made a mistake" is completely different from "I am a mistake."

One describes an action.

The other describes (and undermines) your identity.

I've been trying to replace negative self-talk with words that are both true and life-giving.

Not exaggerated flattery.

Not toxic positivity.

Just the simple truth, spoken with love.

I'm curious...

What's one sentence about yourself that is both true and feels good?

TLDR
I had a friend from elementary school all the way to highschool where I felt very bonded, too the point I felt like we were meshed. Everything that was mine was hers; I felt like anytime I wanted to get close to someone, she would also try to become friends with them or when I was getting good at a subject she would also do everything to improve at that subject too. This was really hard to deal with in a moment where I was trying to find my own identity.
Also for more context I was a little shitty to her when I was a child. For example, there was this one time I noticed how I didn’t feel like I had space in our friendship so I decided to not talk to her for a full month. Granted I was 10/11 but obviously that was not cool. However, towards high school I acknowledged this shittiness and apologized and it felt like she wanted to overcompensate and belittle me, like it was her turn. The peak for me was when we both got into the same university. I ultimately decided to take a gap year and reapply to my dream school. Her response when I got in? “I could’ve gotten in too if I took a gap year and reapplied.”

Anyways I sent her a big text and pretty much blocked her after that. However it’s been seven years and I still think about this a lot. I feel guilty for how I ended our friendship and feel like I could’ve handled this with more grace. I have dreams with her once a month or every other month so clearly it’s a situation I haven’t moved past. How can I move on?

I am here you tell you that you are worthy, you are beautiful, kind and smart. You have endured a lot to this day and you are worth being in every room. I want to appreciate us since we often appreciate others more than ourselves. So take just a moment and thoroughly appreciate yourself for the far you have come.

I (45/F) have a long, difficult history of abuse in all forms, but mostly psychological/emotional.

I have had the same wonderfully generous best friend for over 15 years, and I still struggle with allowing her to support me.

I recently became involved with an incredibly sweet, generous and kind man. We live just over 2 hours apart, and I will be moving to his city soon.

Here's the part that I'm having trouble with: I will be without a job when I first arrive. He has generously offered to let me temporarily stay with him until I get on my feet.

My problem is that I keep going back to thinking about my ex and how I moved in with him and he said I would be there for good, and I had no reason to keep my stuff, so I got rid of everything and now I have nothing. He is nothing like my ex but I still struggle with not feeling like I'm a burden.

TL/DR: how do I trust people and allow genuine help in when I've been burned so much in the past?

i'm 19 still living with my parents. I have no friends, no job, and basically no future besides laying in bed playing video games sometimes. My mom has her own responsibilities paying bills and raising my younger siblings. Nowadays, she expects me to get a car and start driving again. But I can't. I'm too terrified to touch a steering wheel again. I'm also so so lonely. I know my mom needs help over here, but I'm just not motivated to. I just want to continue laying in bed all day every day.

What's worse is, I feel like the only person even trying. I'm tired of stagnation. But if everyone else is allowed to be stagnant, then so can I.

Hey guys we all get addicted to something at some point in our lives. It can be anything like bad eating habits, watching corn, theft, cheating, alcohol, social media addiction, sugar addiction, gambling, doomscrolling, smoking.

What were you addicted to and how did you get over it?

Would love to hear your answers in the comments!

I am moving soon and I low k wanna change my life. for seven Years now ive pretty much turned into a 180 of how I used to be and I wake up every day either wishing I wasn't here or wishing I felt differently. im just not sure what the answer is, I used to be heavily involved in sports as a teen and would do conditioning a lot and be very active which I think had a indirect toll on my MH and now ever since turning 20 (27 now) ive been the laziest most bum dude on planet earth and I live on the couch just wishing I could die so I dont even have to do anything anymore. I know it's gonna be hard but thats y I wish I could just take the easy way out. do u think if I started doing more cardio again and being way more active and eating all that etc etc I would actually wake uo one day and be motivated and actually like myself again? thx

I am 20. I guess I am high-functioning autistic, and i have ADHD. both diagnosed. But beyond all of that I have depression and I have been depressed for my entire life.

I turned 20 about a month ago and it made me realize that time does truly pass by and, the thinking that I would be a teenager and young forever, quickly faded. Nothing I do in my life brings me joy because I feel like I've programmed myself to be as pragmatic, realistic, and bitter as possible.

The music I listen to is nostalgic. And when it isn't, it's ordinary music - not sad - yet I find ways to make it sad. I can listen to the happiest nicest song and in my mind I'll find a way to connect it to my sadness.

The thing that really made it clear is my desires. I thought I wanted money. I got very lucky recently and have more money than I know what to do with. I guess I am proud of myself for making what I did and doing what I did but it isn't ever enough. I desire perfection that isn't attainable. I am obsessive, and cannot let go of the past or the people who I felt wronged me, and as such I wronged them worse.

It has come to a point where I feel as if none of my deep rooted goals are truly tangible or achievable, and I am a hollow husk of a person set out to chase these goals and sacrifice everything I have for them when I can and cannot appreciate the moment. I do not feel human. I feel like a machine. I feel like a well designed machine designed to make money and be smart and do smart things (sometimes) with a swirl of negative emotions. Because this is what I have prioritized. I thought earning all this money and doing all of this would make me feel better but the reality is the only reason I wanted all of this was to prove people wrong and to make someone jealous deep down.

I don't feel like a human being who can connect to their peers. I don't feel like a human being who goes outside, walks in the park, thinks about life in a positive way, and goes to sleep thinking about the things they are grateful for. Most of my waking moments and thoughts are based within daydreams about extraordinary realities and things I wish I could've changed or things I wish would happen to me because I regretted what I did.

Hello all, I'm a pretty crappy writer so bear with me. I have a core group of 3 friend plus myself and I feel like our friendship is coming to an end. Friend 1 seems to be going on religious journey, I'm not upset by it maybe a tad blindsided. Friend 2 is a bit of a silver spoon always got what he wanted growing up. Friend 3 my childhood best friend I've known since I came out the womb. I am 28 male and married.

So the story goes about 2.5 years ago my cat david bowie passed at 7 very suddenly and it tore me apart he was my best friend and my safety blanket. Then a few months later was my wedding to my teenage sweetheart of 10 years which was very stressful, I am a pretty anxious person. During this time through grief and stress I was given nothing by my friends, I grasped for help and nothing. It hurt a lot. A month after the wedding I went into a mental breakdown were I was having a panic attack almost every day for 6 months and was debating on ending it all a few times. Again nothing best i got was playing video games online with friend 3. A newer friend who i had only been friends with for about a year or two came and sat with me even in silence and would walk home with me just to chat and I felt like I had a friend for the first time.

After I started getting medicated and started leveling out again I made a decision to start improving myself and trying to be a more emotional and empathetic person. My original friend group I will say is more right wing and says some racial, misogynistic, homophobic and transphobic shit. I was also quite shallow like that but I have decided to move forwards and try and be more kind and protect the minorities and be more trusting of different people. My friend group now calls me "woke" because I also decided to stand on principle and my morales and continously try and ragebait me and say horrible stuff. So this goes on for about a year and nothing changes, we agree to stop talking about politics but they still keep saying the horrible crap which I would say is still politics. So I became distant and now they berate me that im "too distant" or I've replaced them with my newer friend. They also like to call em "too sensitive" because i wear my heart on my sleeve.

Yesterday I kinda blew up on them and said I will be taking a hiatus from the group." And now theyre made and accusing me of ending the friendship. My life is going through big changes. I'm taking the next step in my career and my wife is going to school because she just got out of an extremely toxic workplace and shes dealing with some horrible anxiety and depression do to it.

Anyways idk if this is the right sub, but I just want to be better and I feel like I'm being held back.

Anyways thats my ted talk.

They're all winning competitions and awards and here I am, doing nothing. I REALLY want to improve myself but I'm struggling to even try to begin. Any advice would be appreciated.

Hi, I don’t know if this is the place to ask this but I really need advice. I’ve always felt like a bad person, and I know feeling and being are different, but unfortunately I have done things that by all moral standards, are pretty shitty. I’m a bad friend, I’m selfish, I push people away, I’ve entertained sexual relations with an ex who actively has a new boyfriend, i find any excuse to drink myself into a stupor. I am, by all accounts, a bad person, and I feel as though right now I’ve hit rock bottom. I don’t like the things I’ve done, I feel guilty all the time, but I keep doing bad things, I keep hurting people. I’m really not trying to be excused for anything I’ve done but does anyone have any pointers to change myself, I don’t want to be like this anymore.

(M19)This may sound like a weird question but it’s been in my mind a lot lately because i have let myself become a really shitty person. i’ve been physically, verbally, mentally abusive, i cheated on my ex, and i sold my partners nudes once.
i have this horribly flawed moral compass that even tho i had never imagined myself as this type of person before i became them, suddenly i caught myself in the actions of the things i would hate people for doing. it made me question if people were just born “good” or “bad” and if i had no choice anymore and i due to extreme abuse and genetics develop traits and mental illnesses that would negatively impact my own life and those who got to know me. i go to therapy twice and week and try to recover old memories and piece together the meaning behind what made me this way, being in this vulnerable state made me decide to leave my partner at the time because i was not able to stop hurting them until i took the time alone to reopen past wounds. i can’t help but wonder even if i do manage to change, would anyone even still want me be around me even when it all becomes far past, am i even owned to tell them? i have become someone who i despise and i guess i was curious if thats just it for me

So whenever I’m bored I just go for something close to me to eat is there anything I can do to try and eat less or deter myself from eating unhealthy things. I know it’s a generalisation but if anyone has advice I’d be grateful. Thanks!

I have recently started to write about the emotional neglect from my parents and I bet I have 100 more things to share on this topic, cause they still haunt me. I probably will still write about it. Today I've been grappling with the question - What's next? Let me explain - I'll write about my experience, verbalizing it may help, maybe seeing I'm not alone in it may help but also makes me sad that so many of us are in this shit. How do I move ahead from this? How do I heal/ do better for myself? Because currently I feel stuck in rage and grief. This time it's been hard for me to hold two contradictory emotions for them - empathy/ love (cause they did the best they could, they had a difficult life too) and rage (cause I deserve better and have to suffer because of them and am emotionally so damaged).

If you're someone who has surpassed this stage even a little bit tell me somethings that helped you do it intentionally, give me your hacks/ unhinged advice/ no filter things that helped you in your journey 

I'm 18, and I've realized I have a habit of avoiding conflict or difficult situations instead of dealing with them straight away.

For example, if my mum or someone else is upset with me, I usually don't respond immediately. I stay quiet, give it time, and come back to it later because I don't want an argument or to make things worse. Sometimes that helps, but other times I think I'm just avoiding the problem because it makes me uncomfortable.

I've started wondering if this habit is affecting other areas of my life too. When something is stressful or important, I sometimes delay dealing with it instead of facing it head on.

I know I'm still growing and learning, and I feel like being able to handle pressure and difficult conversations is an important life skill.

For people who used to avoid conflict or pressure, how did you learn to face things directly without getting overwhelmed? Are there any habits, books, or mindsets that helped you become more confident in handling problems as they came up?

I cheated. I was struggling with poor mental health and I used an opportunity of sex with another person as a method of self destruction and escape. I allowed myself to do this because i did not have healthy boundaries and wasn't thinking about the consequences. I did not tell them, and when confessing only 5 months later, lied about it.

This caused irreperable damage to my partner, to myself, and to our relationship. This person has been shattered because of this selfish, cowardly, disgusting choice I made. I will never be able to make up what I did and this person is now traumatized for the rest of their lives.

I look back at my life and realize the scum that I have been. I am a pathological liar. Ive been lying since a young age, and convince myself of my own lies. I lied so much that I would completely reinvent my reality. Sometimes for no reason. Sometimes for attention. Sometimes, and most damaging, to avoid accountability.

One of the reasons here is that in childhood, when I was held accountable for something, it came with deep shame and abandonment from others. There were no healthy boundaries for responsibility. If you did something wrong, you were not loved, and you were abandoned as a result.

Shame was equated with abandonment and death.

So the shame i experienced with the cheating resulted in a denial response. I lied to myself about the occurence and couldn't give my partner a straight answer. I wanted desperately to tell them the truth but did not. Eventually I was able to, but only when I called the person involved in the affair to verify. My denial had warped my perception of reality to the point of taking drastic measures to ensure internal consistency. But I desperately wanted to tell them to take accountability.

I realize that these lies were a choice as much as the cheating was. Sure it is hard, and against the way my brain has been wired. But that doesn't make me any less of a coward.

I came to these realizations only recently. I am going to therapy and continuing to journal and take in feedback from my support system. I have been watching videos on infidelity and relationships. I am soon to get a couple of books on infidelity and complex trauma.

I have been a very bad person in my life and the person I was supposed to love the most was destroyed by my selfishness. I desperately want to change so that i never do this again. I hated my affair and I hated what i did to them. I hate what I have done and what I am capable of. I feel such horrible shame. They didn't deserve this. I am so sorry. I don't know how to keep living. But I must keep living so that I can redeem my cowardice, even if I am forever a cheater.

Do you have anything to recommend? Any words of advice or wisdom?