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I was talking with my sister a couple of days ago, and we started talking about being alone. She is an extrovert’s extrovert. When things were locked down for

I was talking with my sister a couple of days ago, and we started talking about being alone. She is an extrovert’s extrovert. When things were locked down for her, she got really, really depressed. At one point, she didn’t even care if she got COVID because she was slowly going insane not being around people everyday. Zoom, texting, etc. didn’t work for her. So for her, alone == loneliness. I am on the total opposite end of that spectrum. I can go days without speaking to anyone. Usually Thursday afternoon till Tuesday morning when my first required meeting is. For me, alone == bliss. I LOVE the self checkout lanes at grocers. Don’t even have to feign small talk with the checker anymore. Anyway, during the conversation she asked whether X was the last person I was in a relationship with back in 2017. And in thinking about it, other than some random dinners, I haven’t been in a relationship for 5 years. I hadn’t even realized it had been 5 years. My best friend at the time moved out of state in 2019, and I’ve not talked to them since. I do have one friend that still lives near me. We’ll text, but rarely see each other (they have an autoimmune disorder. So they’re very careful because of COVID). Other than saying “hi” to my neighbors when we happen to be checking the mail at the same time, I rarely see people outside of Zoom meetings. I started wondering if I should be lonely, and I’m really not. At this point, I’m afraid of what would happen if I really tried to cultivate a relationship (romantic or platonic) with someone. On the flip side, I’m wondering how much further I need to go to reach full hermit… On the bright side, I got to play with Twilio. I figured with my lack of human interactions, I should probably have a “dead man’s switch” checking on me. So I’ve got an app that will text me every couple of days. If I don’t reply back within a certain time frame, it’ll call a couple of people and tell them they might want to have a wellness check done on me :)

agumonkey 4y ago
After spending 15-20 years in introversion mode, I felt back the chill side of being with others. But at times I sense the isolation bliss.. I'd feel slightly lighter and freer when in the toilet or biking/hiking. Odd. Part of it comes from a need for depth .. and being with people you wonder how they feel, if they're ok, why did they think or say this but you can't communicate (or extremely rarely) so it piles up as a frustrating void turning into stress.
0xRusty 4y ago
This situation sounds quite similar to me. In my mid 30s now and the COVID pandemic has pretty much killed off the social life I used to have. A group of us moved from the UK to Canada about the same time 10 years ago and for a few years we used to do everything together. We'd be that big group at a restaurant on a Friday night, ordering cocktails and sat there for 3+ hours that everyone else rolls their eyes at. Someone would always be up for doing something at the weekend and no one was ever really alone. Today that group chat has gone cold. The last text message was from about Dec 2019. No one wants to do anything anymore, some have got married, some have had kids, some have bought that cabin up in the sticks and spend weekends there. I go to the movies alone now. Instead of going to restaurants with a group I now sit alone in McDonald's or maybe a ramen bar if I'm feeling fancy. I'm a loner, I'm not really interested in romantic relationships, I might get a dog one of these days but the time isn't right at the moment. Do I feel sad? Not really. I've kind of resigned myself to this realization that this is the way it's going to be. This is my life . It's lonely socially and I don't have a huge number of friends left, but I'm super busy at work. I'm in (and actively leading) teams calls from 9am to 6pm, monday-friday, literally non stop. I get home exhausted. My solution to all of this - VR. My oculus quest headset provides me with a great outlet on those fairly rare occasions I feel sand and lonely and need to reach out. I can play poker with a table full of people often with exciting and colourful lives of their own. I can watch a movie with a theatre full of people making witty or insightful comments at just the right time. I can play 1 on 1 mini golf with a stranger and have some deep interesting chats for an hour or so. For me this is enough.
ca98am79 4y ago
this is funny because I wanted to create a dead man's switch api that you could add to your programs. I have the domain dead.io and was planning to use this for it but never got around to it. You can see the project on introvert.com - let me know if you want to partner up on this

agumonkey 4y ago

After spending 15-20 years in introversion mode, I felt back the chill side of being with others. But at times I sense the isolation bliss.. I'd feel slightly lighter and freer when in the toilet or biking/hiking. Odd. Part of it comes from a need for depth .. and being with people you wonder how they feel, if they're ok, why did they think or say this but you can't communicate (or extremely rarely) so it piles up as a frustrating void turning into stress.

0xRusty 4y ago

This situation sounds quite similar to me. In my mid 30s now and the COVID pandemic has pretty much killed off the social life I used to have. A group of us moved from the UK to Canada about the same time 10 years ago and for a few years we used to do everything together. We'd be that big group at a restaurant on a Friday night, ordering cocktails and sat there for 3+ hours that everyone else rolls their eyes at. Someone would always be up for doing something at the weekend and no one was ever really alone. Today that group chat has gone cold. The last text message was from about Dec 2019. No one wants to do anything anymore, some have got married, some have had kids, some have bought that cabin up in the sticks and spend weekends there. I go to the movies alone now. Instead of going to restaurants with a group I now sit alone in McDonald's or maybe a ramen bar if I'm feeling fancy. I'm a loner, I'm not really interested in romantic relationships, I might get a dog one of these days but the time isn't right at the moment. Do I feel sad? Not really. I've kind of resigned myself to this realization that this is the way it's going to be. This is my life . It's lonely socially and I don't have a huge number of friends left, but I'm super busy at work. I'm in (and actively leading) teams calls from 9am to 6pm, monday-friday, literally non stop. I get home exhausted. My solution to all of this - VR. My oculus quest headset provides me with a great outlet on those fairly rare occasions I feel sand and lonely and need to reach out. I can play poker with a table full of people often with exciting and colourful lives of their own. I can watch a movie with a theatre full of people making witty or insightful comments at just the right time. I can play 1 on 1 mini golf with a stranger and have some deep interesting chats for an hour or so. For me this is enough.

ca98am79 4y ago

this is funny because I wanted to create a dead man's switch api that you could add to your programs. I have the domain dead.io and was planning to use this for it but never got around to it. You can see the project on introvert.com - let me know if you want to partner up on this