12-01-2002 20:37									#31
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There's nothing you can do that can't be done
Nothing you can sing that can't be sung
Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game
It's easy

Nothing you can make that can't be made
No one you can save that can't be saved
Nothing you can do that you can't learn how to feel in time
It's easy

All you need is love
All you need is love
All you need is love, love
Love is all you need

All you need is love
All you need is love
All you need is love, love
Love is all you need

Nothing you can know that isn't known
Nothing you can see that isn't shown
Nowhere you can be that isn't where you're meant to be
It's easy

All you need is love
All you need is love
All you need is love, love
Love is all you need

	12-01-2002 21:14									#32
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Hey, hey

...why do you want to date "chicks"? I understand that dating is the norm where you're at, but if you're a genuine non-conformist, that should be pretty irrelevant to you. It's not consistant to involve yourself in a potentially romantic relationship with somebody whose overall outlook on life is this shallow, unless you're just in it for the sex.

The overall succes rate of your life does not equal the number of dates you've had or how many times you've been smashing pumpkins, and I don't really think you honestly believe in the melodramatic stuff you've written.

You could consider some light medication. I suffer from winter depression and I take a nature product which I think has helped me significantly through December. Of course it doesn't win anybody any friends or otherwise affect our concrete problems, but it helps changing the general perspective of things.

	12-01-2002 22:44									#33
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Read www.askmen.com all over. Then come back to us in six months and brag.

	13-01-2002 00:39									#34
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quote: Go out with one of the band b1tches, Mac. I bet they're hot.

I always had a thing for those flag chicks. MMmm they were hot...

And as for you Faded Glory, you said you had more game than Glenn Robinson, what?

	13-01-2002 01:49									#35
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Life sucked when I was still in Highschool, and life still sucks years after.

Love changes all that, though after a month or two you'll find out that you've been misled, and that love is just an illusion.

Depression is a lifestyle, but certainly not my prefered one. Sadly, I have to face it and live with it, lest I kill myself.




I'm suffering from clinical depression (as some "veterans" here might know. Been on anti-depressents for a while (3 different ones during a 18 month period), though didn't go to a shrink. Little has changed since I became depressed (4 years ago now, though it might have been going on before that too), though I am better able to face my depression now and live with it. At least I've made some progress I guess. I still feel down quite a lot, probably as much as in the past, but I can get myself to do things now (at least to some degree).

My "condition" may be worse (or better) than that of some of you, but many of the feelings are recognisable.

About love. I have been "in love", but it's only a short lived flight from life. Come to think of it, in the end I was the one ending all the relationships I was in. They weren't that many though, and I didn't get my first "date" till I was 18 years and 6 months old. The making out and making "love" parts followed. It feels good inside (not talking about physical feelings), it makes you happy. At least for a while. It just doesn't ever last, and certainly hardly any relationship lasts a lifetime anymore. Love is a temporary feeling, a short term feeling of happiness and joy. It feels great while your in it, but if I look back on it all, it wasn't that special. In the end it doesn't give your life a new and lasting meaning. In the end, it doesn't change anything. And that was the biggest setback. When I was 16, 17, I believed that "love" would cure it all, or at least give new meaning to my life. At that time I believed getting a single date would make me feel better about myself. Now some years later I realise it hasn't changed anything.

If you think life sucks, then "love" will not change your mind. It might for a while, but in the end you'll feel the same.

Friends actually do help though. And since friendships tend to last longer than relationships, they have a longer effect. When I spend time with my friends I am able to stop worrying and forget about life, and that does make me feel a lot better. I never had close friends either sadly. Only recently I made some new friends, and one pretty good one too. Though it wasn't my initiative.

Sadly there isn't a simple cure to make yourself feel better about life. The only real cure is coming to terms with yourself and your life. And that just doesn't come over night. I am trying though, but at this speed it will take many years (if it comes at all).

	13-01-2002 01:57									#36
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Well said MarkL.

Trying to find happiness through someone else never works. Gotta work on yourself and then people will just fly into your life out of nowhere.

	13-01-2002 02:17									#37
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quote: Well said MarkL.

Merci

quote: Trying to find happiness through someone else never works. Gotta work on yourself and then people will just fly into your life out of nowhere.

This is obviously not what you want to hear or believe. I didn't want to either. I still don't want to believe it actually. It's hard, extremely hard, and it doesn't yield results on the short term. Sadly, there isn't another way or a quicker way, and that truly sucks.

	13-01-2002 02:22									#38
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Sorry was at electronic applaince show in Milwaukee


Mac didnt go off and kill himself did he?

	13-01-2002 03:41									#39
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Still here, watching the Eagles dominate the Bucs.

I'm cool, last night I just really needed to say that stuff and get iut out of my system.

Flag wavers? = Color Guard = Whore Core (not many looked good)
I'm not in band any more anyway. I really wish I could be in a real band, play ska or something, that would be cooool.

I did see a shrink once, but I have no problems getting along with people older than me, and enjoy those conversations (although I'm realizing that my parents can't follow my conversations as well as they used to...). I'm just not very good at "small talk". Ah, well, my goal now is to find a couple roomies for an apartment next year and go on one date before I discontinue being a teenager. That and keep my grades up. Stupid classes getting in the way of life.

Is there a better quarterback than McNabb?

	13-01-2002 05:52									#40
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but "THe Myth of Sisyphus" by Albert Camus might help a bit.
that...and taking time out for yourself.

	13-01-2002 13:40									#41
	Re: Life, what a sick joke Got spare money?

quote: Originally posted by MacTBone I'm doing this because of self-pity (why else?) yet, I loathe myself for it. I'll say right now I'm a whiny ***** and you shouldn't listen to me, but here it goes.

It's always a good idea to listen to people, even if they are whiny. You might learn a bit that way .

quote: I've never gone on a date. All of my experiences in that dept. have sucked. I've asked girls out, and they politely decline. Once, I got a girl to go to some russian dancing music thing and she ends up bringing another guy, and eventually starts going out with a totally different guy. I've liked many ladies and wanted to ask them out and they either have a boyfriend (or fiance) or they make it pretty clear that I can't 'touch the hem of their garment'.

Neither have I. True, I am younger than you, but I have no problem with that. Dating girls is for guys who want to have sex or a wife. At the moment, I want neither, and don't intend to want either in the future. Of course, instincts might change that, but an intellectual mind (high self-esteem ) watches itself.

quote: You can be a non-conformist, but only if you look like one. Well what if I look normal but act a little weird? As in geeky, strange, laughing at inappropriate times (I have a very ironic sense of humor), speaking my mind, telling people the blunt truth sometimes, being totally silent at times and being an extremely talkative person at other times. I hate all the pretentiousness in society. If it were up to me, everyone would wear a sign on their heads that printed exactly what we were thinking. No room for confusion and no way to have idiots be respected.

... my thoughts exactly. I look very very normal (though overweight) to the outside. I wouldn't call myself a conformist, but not a non-conformist either... I dress the way I feel fine. That means that, for example, I don't wear jeans: I don't feel comfortable in them. My clothing style hasn't changed for years, save going towards more and more boring grey and black. However, my behaviour changes very steeply according to my mood. When I'm sleepy I'm talkative and tell dull jokes at a continuous pace. Usually, when I'm completely "in my mind", I sit in corners, or, if possible, go for a walk so that I don't have to speak with anyone.

quote: OK, now we move onto not having any friends, at least none that matter. In my senior year of High School all my friends left: most to college, but one to Austin, Texas because of his parents' divorce. So then I feel as depressed as ever and eventually get into serious trouble and 'through adversity become stronger'. Yeah, well it got me through High School. Then I went to College, the great melting pot of ideas. Sure everyone accepted me, unlike in High School where I was just a band nerd, but my roommate was a psycho freak. Now, I have a decent roommate and I still haven't made any good friends and whenever I go home from College I'm reminded how much of a ****ing moron I am that I can't get a date OR a friend.

I'd say that I have only one real friend, and even him I see ~twice a month now. However, I have no problem with it. If I have personal problems I can open myself to pretty much everyone.

quote: I haven't even done any of the crazy stuff most people have. I've had a little champagne at a wedding and I had a coke and rum (which I drank in two hours). Me and some friends (when I had some) threw small pumpkins at mailboxes once (and hit two out of the whole batch). I got caught at a now out-of-business dept. store stealing (definitely my lowest point ever). That's it. There's the gritty details of my life, all the bad stuff I've ever done aside from lying to people or other minor things in my childhood.

I've never had any alcohol. I have never even thought of stealing from stores. Probably the craziest thing I have done in my real life has been swimming far to sea (my mother told she was afraid I would be thrown around by strong sea winds or something). Or maybe it was eating a cookie on a table without using my hands? Still, people around me tend to view me as a slightly insane person because I tend to associate quite random things with each other, and usually do speak what is in my mind. This means, of course, that the things I speak about are usually quite random.

quote: I'm not a spiritual person, or none of this would be much of a problem because I would have something to believe in. Now, all I have is self-pity, books, music, games, and the Bears. And the only big Bears fans I know are online.

I'm an atheist, and anti-spiritual. If computers are not counted as a hobby, I have absolutely no hobbies. I don't play much games, I have no idols (save Linus Torvalds, the only person whose autograph I have ), don't even read much books. Then again, I don't have self-pity, either. For some reason I have been able to dodge it all this time.

quote: I don't even play music anymore, and even if I did I wouldn't be able to play live. There is nothing in the world like playing in front of a full crowd.

I have never played any instrument. However, I have given a speech to a crowd... Went there, spoke quickly, bowed a few cents and walked away as quickly as I could. I'm not a bit better than you in even this issue.

quote: Don't you wish it all meant something? All I want is to go on at least one date, have one true friend, and be able to say, "I've lived." Right now all I can say is that, just like everyone else, "I'm dying."

I don't say I have lived, nor I am dying... I say I am living. I live even when I ramble, writing this message. I live when I walk in the solitude of country roads. I live when I spam the Istvanistani OT. I live when I write my essay answers to exams. I live when I sleep. I live.

But nice to hear that you're feeling better anyway .

	14-01-2002 02:25									#42
	Re: Life, what a sick joke Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

MacTBone:

Oh man, I understand completely the **** you feel. But you really can't wallow in self-pity. Also I am not speaking from a position of superiority either. I regularly wallow in self-pity, I am completely celibate, a virgin at 24, I have no friends where I live, or next to none. Do as I say, not as I do as that old addage goes. Making friends can be difficult, very difficult, especially in the place I live. Yet despite this, I have a quite active social life elsewhere, I have friends in different places. And one of the things that makes me realise I need to get out of this place. At derek said, finish your degree or whatever you are studying and get out, find your place, your spiritual home, your niche, somewhere where you can be you and be respected for that.

Get out. If you don't like your life, change it. And the best impetus for change is a change of surroundings, the slate wiped clean.

	14-01-2002 03:14									#43
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Yeah Harrison, you are a bit too worldly to be stuck in Hull like that. It's kinda like grounding an eagle and sticking him into a chicken coop.

Harrison sounds like he's the life of the party when he gets out of town. It's like all that pent up energy actually gets a good outlet somewhere.

	14-01-2002 03:22									#44
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You know what, that probably sums it up quite well. All that pent up social energy being unleashed in one massive go I am trying to get out more though, luckily with Iain very close we can go out for nights out in York or Hull. As for relationships, well, that is a 'work in progress'

	14-01-2002 03:49									#45
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I pretty much have the same problem. I have no friends, and basically no social life whatsoever.
I'm in my last year of university (I'm 21), and basically all I have to do is write my thesis (which I still have no ideas for, so I'm living in some kind of a void right now). Basically all I've done the last 6 months is waste my time behind the TV and PC, and occasionally drop by at university.

Staying isolated for so long obviously doesn't make the situation any better, because it only makes it harder to "escape".

I do have a "purpose" in life though. I want to go to Japan when I've graduated, and preferably this year. I'm sort of making the first steps now, although I keep postponing writing the e-mails... I'll be following a course in Japanese too starting in February.

I also got my hair dyed blue and red recently. The haidresser I went to was the more wild one, but still the people next to me loved my hair and said they wouldn't dare do anything as extreme. I even got spontaneous (positive) reactions about it from people I passed on the streets... That made me feel pretty damn good!

	14-01-2002 15:49									#46
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I'd do something like that with my hair, but alas, I work in a hospital and I don't think it would go down too well

	14-01-2002 16:43									#47
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Good luck to you guys, mild depression can be beaten with a large amount of effort and a little bit of risk.

	14-01-2002 19:03									#48
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MacTBone:

If you think a social life or a love life or doing exciting things or even having fun is essential to life, then you have already let them influence you too much. Learn to take pride in being an outwardly Dull Person (like I do (I tried a purity test on the internet recently and scored 98.6%, and I'm damn proud of it)), and if you have a different mind than others learn to take pride in that and make good use of it. If you call not participating in the aimless concerns that most people have "dying", then dying is a great thing.

http://www.dullmen.com
http://www.singlegoal.com

	14-01-2002 21:22									#49
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Conversing with the opposite sex is easier than you think. Or the same sex for that matter. It's simple. TALK ABOUT THEM. Ask them a few questions about themselves and let them do most of the talking. Almost everyone likes talking about themselves. Let them. The side benifit is that you will learn about their interests and determine if you even want to be friends or more with them.
A couple of interactive comments, like "now that is interesting" and a few smiles (yes, a smile does more for you than anything else possibly can) can sustain a one sided conversation for a considerable long time. And there's less chance of saying something stupid. As long as you don't have a "laugh from hell" even the most socially inept person can handle it.

Once a person thinks the've impressed you with the "wit" (sometimes real, sometimes imagined) they'll feel much more comfortable with you.

Eventually the discussion will come around to you, but by then, you shouldn't feel as awkward.

A little self confidence works wonders too. If you think everyone is going to think you're a loser, your body language will send that message. If you have a little self confidence your body language will reflect that. If you can't bring yourself to convince yourself that you're self confident, try don't giving a Sh**. It's easier and the body language is very similar.

RAH
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Rejection is a fact of life, don't let it get you down, just keep trying. Eventually the odds will be in your favor.

	14-01-2002 21:53									#50
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I bet RAH was one of the True Playerz in his day.

In fact, I bet he still could be!

	14-01-2002 21:58									#51
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Just like you then Stew

All you can be is be yourself. But women have proven to be harder for me. Not for being friends of course, but anything else. It's hard to teach an old dog new tricks.

	14-01-2002 22:01									#52
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As a follow up to Rah's point it's good to get people to talk about themselves but have to actually listen to what people say. No good getting them to talk about themselves if you aren't really going to listen. And don't be afraid to talk about yourself, that's harder in someways but the more you give the more you'll get back in return.

	14-01-2002 22:03									#53
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Well said Rah

Oh how I wish I was 18 again and would know what I know now. Women are just as insecure as guys, and are looking for approval just as much. Just giving a compliment about cloathing or their hair in a conversation does wonders.

One thing I never understand though, are those guys that NEVER have girlfriends but turn down perfectly nice girls for some stupid excuse because they think the girl would be commented on by friends. SO what? When I was 19 I would hump every girl I could (some would require a few beers in advance, but still).

Just remember this little piece of knowledge that I picked up once from the Oprah Winfrey show :

'Men use love to get sex and women use sex to get love'

Before you know it you're contemplating living together.

	14-01-2002 22:06									#54
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Yeah, MikeH is right. You also need to talk about yourself, but when you do that, as much as possible you need to make "me too" statements - but not overtly of course.

For example, try and find holiday destinations you've both been to and liked - talk about those. See what she liked about the places, listen to her and then a little bit later repeat to her what she said to you but in a different wording. Works a charm

Alternatively, find sports you're both into, interests you have, etc - and try to keep the conversation in areas where you both have similar experiences.

	14-01-2002 22:08									#55
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quote: Originally posted by Boddington's Alternatively, find sports you're both into, interests you have, etc - and try to keep the conversation in areas where you both have similar experiences.

You may find you are both into watersports

Well I dunno, it is hard to just strike up a conversation with a complete stranger. I need some kind of inlet, some way to start a conversation, ie, an introduction, otherwise I just can't do it.

	14-01-2002 22:09									#56
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And very important...BE POSITIVE!

Don't be moaning about how TV ****, how you hate your town, how crime is so high...

People associate feelings with people - if you talk about negative things with a girl, she'll associate negative connotations with you.

	14-01-2002 22:12									#57
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quote: Originally posted by Provost Harrison You may find you are both into watersports Well I dunno, it is hard to just strike up a conversation with a complete stranger. I need some kind of inlet, some way to start a conversation, ie, an introduction, otherwise I just can't do it.

It's also hard to get a degree and attempt a PhD but you can do that. It's a challenge...RISE TO IT!

	14-01-2002 22:15									#58
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quote: Originally posted by Provost Harrison You may find you are both into watersports Well I dunno, it is hard to just strike up a conversation with a complete stranger. I need some kind of inlet, some way to start a conversation, ie, an introduction, otherwise I just can't do it.

Well: 'Hi, are you into watersports?' woud be a VERY nice start!

	14-01-2002 22:16									#59
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Yes, well, different horses for different courses eh. This one causes me greater problems than any other.

	14-01-2002 22:16									#60
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quote: Originally posted by Boddington's I bet RAH was one of the True Playerz in his day. In fact, I bet he still could be!

Nothing could be farther from the truth. I was always paralyzed by fear of rejection, and a couple of rejections would just hammer the point down. I wish I could go back to when I was 15 and explain this simple concept to myself. Women would have been a lot easier to deal with.

The real smart men learn this early in live. Others learn it in their late twenties because they just don't give a crap. The rest of us learn it after getting married, when there is no longer any pressure, and we see how easy it could have been. I've learned to be a True Player but alas, can't take advantage of it.

RAH