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> ...now be the best person in other people's lives. ...Why? I've spent most of the last ten years trying to do just that. Do you know what it has gotten me?

> ...now be the best person in other people's lives. ...Why? I've spent most of the last ten years trying to do just that. Do you know what it has gotten me? Let me tell you what it has gotten me: friends and family that never call unless they need something; an utterly depleted bank account; a complete lack of respect or even human regard from my peers; a pile of strife and struggle and pain and misery and not one single positive thing to show for it other than impotently small differences in the lives of sycophants. No, do not live for others. Never live for others, because nobody will laud you for it -- in fact, people will find it laughable and openly sneer at you for it. He wrote, "In the aftermath of emotional implosion; friends, family, colleagues and even strangers will metamorph into an invasive species from planet Concern," and I thought, "pfft, that must be lovely." Further, I really wish people would stop talking to people with depression as though they were in boot camp for Turning Their Lives Around. e-shouting "find professional help!" is a sure sign of someone who has never actually tried seeking professional help, because here's the thing about a lot of "professional help": the professionals really suck. How do you think someone feels after sharing their troubles with a cold stranger for an hour, getting merely a few minutes' advice and another appointment at the end, and then paying for that? And when that person has tried 2, 3, half-a-dozen professionals, how do you think they begin to feel then? Your commandments here strike me as being like an extrovert's advice to an introvert: "these are my values, and you must live by them! It is unacceptable for you to not go to parties!" If a person wants to change, then perhaps you might be of some help to them -- and then only if you spend more than a minute's effort banging out a comment on your keyboard. I haven't yet finished reading his screed, but so far it sounds to me like he is not only not asking for help, he is openly rejecting it, in which case I doubt anybody else should have much to say about it.

groby_b 14y ago
"I can't find a good professional, so using professional help is useless" - that is an odd conclusion to come to. Yes, many shrinks suck. It sucks dealing with them. I'll still shout "Find professional help" if that's what it'll take for that person. And that's the case here. You(OP) don't go and write a whole long screed how you'd like to be left alone to then justify said screed on a site like HN without actually, at some level, wanting to interact with people. Which means you(OP) have an issue - what you(OP) say and what you do is not congruent. Find somebody you can relate to, and ask for their advice. Doesn't need to be a shrink. Priest, Guru, Life Coach, whatever works for you. Work out which one of the two you want, and then live accordingly. Edit: Clarifying "you"
- thaumaturgy 14y ago
  (Upvoting you just to move your comment above jpxxx's blithering stupidity.) I can't tell from your comment if you think I'm the author, but just FYI, I'm not. > I'll still shout "Find professional help" if that's what it'll take for that person. And that's the case here. OK, here's the thing, and it's really the only point I care to try to make here: telling someone to find professional help is not helpful. In fact, it's probably harmful, because it's the number one, most predictable piece of advice anybody can expect to get. So, being told over and over again to "find professional help" -- a task which is dramatically more difficult than the effort required to write those three words -- just makes people want to talk about their problems openly even less. i.e., "I'd talk about it, but they'll just tell me to find professional help, I really don't need to hear that again." It's also harmful in that it's another kind of a dismissal. Surely you can see that "find professional help" could be interpreted as another way of saying, "Go away, I can't help you"? "Go find someone else and pay them to listen to you." -- I'm sure this isn't what you or anyone else means to say, but this is what it sounds like to someone with depression.
  - HNaTTY 14y ago
    I have a treadmill in my basement, but three times a week I pay $5 to go to the rec center and run on their treadmill. Maybe half the time I use weights but usually I just run and then go home. I pay the $5 because it encourages me to get the best use of my time. I have a similar philosophy with going to work instead of working from home, and also with vegetables (I hate vegetables and do a lot of gardening). I think "find professional help" is more akin to "you can get that if you want it and are willing to do the hard work" than "I can't help you", although I understand that it's hard being the recipient of that comment, which is often casually thrown out (and not at all out of the ordinary for K's story), and easy to take a negative view of it. Objectively it's not bad advice--everybody needs a sounding board IMO, it's a helpful tool to unwind after an eventful day.
  - intended 14y ago
    Sup. What you've said is something I understand and its a nice angle on an issue I haven't seen in this particular way in a while. I'm on the opposite side of your stand. I've seen far too many people "Help". In all cases, the damage they cause casually is far greater than if they just said "you need help, get a doctor!" So (1), in general saying "hey you need to get to a professional" is the least bad thing people can say, and for the sake of the sufferer, this is all I can hope for. I've spent, or once HAD spend, an inordinate amount of time listening to people, both with and without unusual issues. I Listened in the way I learnt I would want to, with focus, concern, and no judgement. I would still tell people to go get to a doctor. But, I would never let it come across as a shut down or a brushing off. "hey, this is a question I can't answer for you. I believe someone with training and experience would be able to help you with this better than I could. The last thing I want to do is say something and make your life harder." (I believe this can be put better, preferably without any of the "I") So it comes down again to the kind of person listening on the other end. From what I can tell, this will always be someone who isn't cut out for the job, especially if you are depressed. In all practicality saying "you need to see a doctor" is the average least bad thing that can happen to them.
jpxxx 14y ago
I don't appreciate some self-loathing bitch drafting on my thoughts for misanthropy points. You know what sucks worse than trying to find competent professional medical attention in America? Blowing your head off with a gun and leaving your decomposing meat for someone to find and clean up. Those are the stakes here. This author wrote a novella about watching his life reduce to nothing, then wrapped it in a wordpress, threw a vanity domain up, and submitted it to a hivemind. If it was about the quaint, quirky charms of a minimalist lifestyle then you special electronic snowflakes could give each other all the handjobs you want and nobody would mind. But as this piece documents severe emotional trauma from a childhood marked by abandonment, drug abuse, emotional abuse, (and probably sexual/physical violence) it seems to -me- that he needs help, is looking for social oxygen, and is trying to figure his situation out. It's not a pretty picture, and the more he rambles about how his sister won't let him eat ice cream the more confused he's going to be about the issues in his life and the fundamental plumbing in his head. Don't confuse depression with a lifestyle choice.
- undupe 14y ago
  It sounds like you're replying more to feed your ego as an expert advisor full of "tough love," rather than to actually help OP. There's no better way to steel a depressed person's resolve to stay depressed than to criticize him further and to not listen to him. You're telling him exactly that ("TL;DR"), that he is not worth listening to.
  - jpxxx 14y ago
    Egotistical self-serving tough love vendor? Guilty as charged. But he now has a googleable term for something that's undoubtedly been causing him grief and unexpected outcomes in life, and that's probably the best I can do from where I sit.
- dromidas 14y ago
  Just because you're a shut in doesn't mean you're depressed. Most people are incredibly vapid. I don't like interacting with most people because of this reason. Being a shut in is not as depressing as it seems. Perhaps you are an extrovert and simply cannot comprehend this.
noname123 14y ago
Hi Sir, Thanks for spelling out the truth. For those who are young and impressionable, listen to this man. Let me paraphrase his two points, 1) Being a nice person will not only earn you any affection you crave but the opposite, contempt for being an agreeable person. 2) Professional help is an oxymoron. Psychiatrists waste money and time. In my humble opinion, fundamental human problems involve three things, social class, money and sex. Sanitized into our civilized world, it means "pursuing your passion," "entrepreneurship," and "being a good citizen." Shrinks will not grant you any of those things. You have to do the dirty work yourself.
- gnosis 14y ago
  "Being a nice person will not only earn you any affection you crave but the opposite, contempt for being an agreeable person." This has not been my experience. I like nice people, and dislike assholes. I know plenty of other people who feel the same. Of course, there are people who are attracted to assholes, but if you're interested in their affection then you might want to take a deep, hard look at why. "Professional help is an oxymoron. Psychiatrists waste money and time." There are lots of different types of psychiatrists and psychologists in the US and around the world. The most popular type of therapy in the US right now is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), but there are many, many others. If one therapy (or one therapist) doesn't work for you, that doesn't mean that another won't. "In my humble opinion, fundamental human problems involve three things, social class, money and sex." You might want to look at Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs.[1] From most basic to the highest needs, they are: * Physiological needs * Safety needs * Love and belonging * Esteem * Self-actualization * Self-transcendence Your "social class, money and sex" only really cover the bottom four levels, and completely ignore the need for self-actualization and self-transcendence. While Maslow's heirarchy is controversial, I personally think it's quite myopic to ignore the need many people have for getting beyond the lower levels in to the quest for self-discovery, self-development, and self-transcendence. "Shrinks will not grant you any of those things. You have to do the dirty work yourself." Psychologists and psychotherapists can certainly never "grant" you anything except a (hopefully) sympathetic ear. A good therapist can also help you get insight and offer good advice, but you will certainly have to do a lot of hard work in the therapy session and as homework. To think that on your own you can achieve anywhere near the amount of insight, healing, and growth that you could with the help of a good therapist is (usually and for most people) overly optimistic. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs
groby_b 14y ago
Replying here since your reply to mine is too deeply nested: Yes, "ask a professional" can be misread as "I don't care about that person". What it means when I say that is "I am not qualified to help you. You're in deep shit, and you need help. You really should find somebody who is qualified". If I happen to know the person, and they're in my area, it comes together with a number or two where they could find somebody competent. And with a clear statement that I expect them to call, plus follow-ups from me if they called. I'm a persistent nag if I have to :) I'm also pretty clear about the fact that if they keep coming to me with their problem, I expect them to do something about it. On the Internets, it's hard to do more than say "go see a professional". The OP laid their soul bare, but I don't know them enough to give them any better advice.
- thaumaturgy 14y ago
  You sound like a good person -- at least you put some effort in. The only other comment I'd have here is that sometimes it's better to simply listen than to expect someone to change. Believe me, I get that it's emotionally draining to hear someone vent and rehash the same personal issues over and over and over again; but, sometimes, they just want someone to talk to, not someone to tell them what they need to do. It's up to your judgement whether or not you (or anyone else) has time or room in your life for that, and whether or not it'll do any good if you do.
astine 14y ago
No, do not live for others. Never live for others, because nobody will laud you for it -- in fact, people will find it laughable and openly sneer at you for it. He wrote, "In the aftermath of emotional implosion; friends, family, colleagues and even strangers will metamorph into an invasive species from planet Concern," and I thought, "pfft, that must be lovely." I know that I'm just a stranger on the Internet, but it sounds like you need to find yourself a better peer-group.

groby_b 14y ago

"I can't find a good professional, so using professional help is useless" - that is an odd conclusion to come to. Yes, many shrinks suck. It sucks dealing with them. I'll still shout "Find professional help" if that's what it'll take for that person. And that's the case here. You(OP) don't go and write a whole long screed how you'd like to be left alone to then justify said screed on a site like HN without actually, at some level, wanting to interact with people. Which means you(OP) have an issue - what you(OP) say and what you do is not congruent. Find somebody you can relate to, and ask for their advice. Doesn't need to be a shrink. Priest, Guru, Life Coach, whatever works for you. Work out which one of the two you want, and then live accordingly. Edit: Clarifying "you"

thaumaturgy 14y ago
(Upvoting you just to move your comment above jpxxx's blithering stupidity.) I can't tell from your comment if you think I'm the author, but just FYI, I'm not. > I'll still shout "Find professional help" if that's what it'll take for that person. And that's the case here. OK, here's the thing, and it's really the only point I care to try to make here: telling someone to find professional help is not helpful. In fact, it's probably harmful, because it's the number one, most predictable piece of advice anybody can expect to get. So, being told over and over again to "find professional help" -- a task which is dramatically more difficult than the effort required to write those three words -- just makes people want to talk about their problems openly even less. i.e., "I'd talk about it, but they'll just tell me to find professional help, I really don't need to hear that again." It's also harmful in that it's another kind of a dismissal. Surely you can see that "find professional help" could be interpreted as another way of saying, "Go away, I can't help you"? "Go find someone else and pay them to listen to you." -- I'm sure this isn't what you or anyone else means to say, but this is what it sounds like to someone with depression.
- HNaTTY 14y ago
  I have a treadmill in my basement, but three times a week I pay $5 to go to the rec center and run on their treadmill. Maybe half the time I use weights but usually I just run and then go home. I pay the $5 because it encourages me to get the best use of my time. I have a similar philosophy with going to work instead of working from home, and also with vegetables (I hate vegetables and do a lot of gardening). I think "find professional help" is more akin to "you can get that if you want it and are willing to do the hard work" than "I can't help you", although I understand that it's hard being the recipient of that comment, which is often casually thrown out (and not at all out of the ordinary for K's story), and easy to take a negative view of it. Objectively it's not bad advice--everybody needs a sounding board IMO, it's a helpful tool to unwind after an eventful day.
- intended 14y ago
  Sup. What you've said is something I understand and its a nice angle on an issue I haven't seen in this particular way in a while. I'm on the opposite side of your stand. I've seen far too many people "Help". In all cases, the damage they cause casually is far greater than if they just said "you need help, get a doctor!" So (1), in general saying "hey you need to get to a professional" is the least bad thing people can say, and for the sake of the sufferer, this is all I can hope for. I've spent, or once HAD spend, an inordinate amount of time listening to people, both with and without unusual issues. I Listened in the way I learnt I would want to, with focus, concern, and no judgement. I would still tell people to go get to a doctor. But, I would never let it come across as a shut down or a brushing off. "hey, this is a question I can't answer for you. I believe someone with training and experience would be able to help you with this better than I could. The last thing I want to do is say something and make your life harder." (I believe this can be put better, preferably without any of the "I") So it comes down again to the kind of person listening on the other end. From what I can tell, this will always be someone who isn't cut out for the job, especially if you are depressed. In all practicality saying "you need to see a doctor" is the average least bad thing that can happen to them.

jpxxx 14y ago

I don't appreciate some self-loathing bitch drafting on my thoughts for misanthropy points. You know what sucks worse than trying to find competent professional medical attention in America? Blowing your head off with a gun and leaving your decomposing meat for someone to find and clean up. Those are the stakes here. This author wrote a novella about watching his life reduce to nothing, then wrapped it in a wordpress, threw a vanity domain up, and submitted it to a hivemind. If it was about the quaint, quirky charms of a minimalist lifestyle then you special electronic snowflakes could give each other all the handjobs you want and nobody would mind. But as this piece documents severe emotional trauma from a childhood marked by abandonment, drug abuse, emotional abuse, (and probably sexual/physical violence) it seems to -me- that he needs help, is looking for social oxygen, and is trying to figure his situation out. It's not a pretty picture, and the more he rambles about how his sister won't let him eat ice cream the more confused he's going to be about the issues in his life and the fundamental plumbing in his head. Don't confuse depression with a lifestyle choice.

undupe 14y ago
It sounds like you're replying more to feed your ego as an expert advisor full of "tough love," rather than to actually help OP. There's no better way to steel a depressed person's resolve to stay depressed than to criticize him further and to not listen to him. You're telling him exactly that ("TL;DR"), that he is not worth listening to.
- jpxxx 14y ago
  Egotistical self-serving tough love vendor? Guilty as charged. But he now has a googleable term for something that's undoubtedly been causing him grief and unexpected outcomes in life, and that's probably the best I can do from where I sit.
dromidas 14y ago
Just because you're a shut in doesn't mean you're depressed. Most people are incredibly vapid. I don't like interacting with most people because of this reason. Being a shut in is not as depressing as it seems. Perhaps you are an extrovert and simply cannot comprehend this.

noname123 14y ago

Hi Sir, Thanks for spelling out the truth. For those who are young and impressionable, listen to this man. Let me paraphrase his two points, 1) Being a nice person will not only earn you any affection you crave but the opposite, contempt for being an agreeable person. 2) Professional help is an oxymoron. Psychiatrists waste money and time. In my humble opinion, fundamental human problems involve three things, social class, money and sex. Sanitized into our civilized world, it means "pursuing your passion," "entrepreneurship," and "being a good citizen." Shrinks will not grant you any of those things. You have to do the dirty work yourself.

gnosis 14y ago
"Being a nice person will not only earn you any affection you crave but the opposite, contempt for being an agreeable person." This has not been my experience. I like nice people, and dislike assholes. I know plenty of other people who feel the same. Of course, there are people who are attracted to assholes, but if you're interested in their affection then you might want to take a deep, hard look at why. "Professional help is an oxymoron. Psychiatrists waste money and time." There are lots of different types of psychiatrists and psychologists in the US and around the world. The most popular type of therapy in the US right now is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), but there are many, many others. If one therapy (or one therapist) doesn't work for you, that doesn't mean that another won't. "In my humble opinion, fundamental human problems involve three things, social class, money and sex." You might want to look at Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs.[1] From most basic to the highest needs, they are: * Physiological needs * Safety needs * Love and belonging * Esteem * Self-actualization * Self-transcendence Your "social class, money and sex" only really cover the bottom four levels, and completely ignore the need for self-actualization and self-transcendence. While Maslow's heirarchy is controversial, I personally think it's quite myopic to ignore the need many people have for getting beyond the lower levels in to the quest for self-discovery, self-development, and self-transcendence. "Shrinks will not grant you any of those things. You have to do the dirty work yourself." Psychologists and psychotherapists can certainly never "grant" you anything except a (hopefully) sympathetic ear. A good therapist can also help you get insight and offer good advice, but you will certainly have to do a lot of hard work in the therapy session and as homework. To think that on your own you can achieve anywhere near the amount of insight, healing, and growth that you could with the help of a good therapist is (usually and for most people) overly optimistic. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs

groby_b 14y ago

Replying here since your reply to mine is too deeply nested: Yes, "ask a professional" can be misread as "I don't care about that person". What it means when I say that is "I am not qualified to help you. You're in deep shit, and you need help. You really should find somebody who is qualified". If I happen to know the person, and they're in my area, it comes together with a number or two where they could find somebody competent. And with a clear statement that I expect them to call, plus follow-ups from me if they called. I'm a persistent nag if I have to :) I'm also pretty clear about the fact that if they keep coming to me with their problem, I expect them to do something about it. On the Internets, it's hard to do more than say "go see a professional". The OP laid their soul bare, but I don't know them enough to give them any better advice.

thaumaturgy 14y ago
You sound like a good person -- at least you put some effort in. The only other comment I'd have here is that sometimes it's better to simply listen than to expect someone to change. Believe me, I get that it's emotionally draining to hear someone vent and rehash the same personal issues over and over and over again; but, sometimes, they just want someone to talk to, not someone to tell them what they need to do. It's up to your judgement whether or not you (or anyone else) has time or room in your life for that, and whether or not it'll do any good if you do.

astine 14y ago

No, do not live for others. Never live for others, because nobody will laud you for it -- in fact, people will find it laughable and openly sneer at you for it. He wrote, "In the aftermath of emotional implosion; friends, family, colleagues and even strangers will metamorph into an invasive species from planet Concern," and I thought, "pfft, that must be lovely." I know that I'm just a stranger on the Internet, but it sounds like you need to find yourself a better peer-group.