I’m 36, and while my love life has been varied and interesting, over the last few years I’ve started to want to settle down. I know it doesn’t happen overnight. But recently it’s been weighing on me more and more. I reminisce about past relationships. I feel hopeless about meeting someone in the future who shares my values.
On the one hand you hear things like “happiness comes from within”, but on the other we are social animals and 99% of us want to feel loved and to love.
Personally, when I was younger I caught myself using relationships to define my self worth and distract me from dealing with my own negative thoughts. So I started working on myself. I would sit in silence, with little to no distractions, for prolonged periods of time at least once a week (e.g. taking a long bath, or a road trip with no radio). This forced me to spend time with my own thoughts and, before long, something would bubbled to the surface (a past argument, memories of a past breakup, feelings of inadequacy, etc). Then I would take a look at that subject and / or allow myself to just feel any negative emotions. The objective was not to “solve” the issue, just to be mindful of it and understand why I was holding on to those thoughts. Eventually, I came to terms with most of my inner turmoil in one form or another. That got me to a place where I could be alone without being lonely and that, in turn, allowed me to be happy whether I was in a relationship or not.
Not sure if that is any help to you, but it worked for me.
So I started working on myself. I would sit in silence, with little to no distractions, for prolonged periods of time at least once a week (e.g. taking a long bath, or a road trip with no radio).
This is great advice to anyone reading and relates to OP here. Only modification I would add is rather than sitting idly, I used to hit the gym and/or run around a track with sound canceling headphones and no music or audio of any form, and simply marinated in my thoughts and self-reflection, while compartmentalising the physical pain and exhaustion as a way to physically improve myself while doing the same mentally. It was a good method of meditation.
I definitely recognise this. I’m a problem solver by nature. So as soon as a thought would pop up that I felt that I couldn’t handle, I just pushed it away.
But of course, these thoughts didn’t resolve themselves so they just stayed there.
It’s still not easy for me, but now when I have such a feeling, I just let it free. Most likely it won’t get solved, some things just can’t, but I get used to them, find a place for them, and in some rare cases even make it my strength.
You are not logged in. However you can subscribe from another Fediverse account, for example Lemmy or Mastodon. To do this, paste the following into the search field of your instance: [email protected]
No such thing. Ask away!
!nostupidquestions is a community space dedicated to being helpful and answering each others’ questions on various topics.
Rule 1- All posts must be legitimate questions. All posts titles must include a question.
All posts must be legitimate questions, and all post titles must include a question. Questions that are joke or trolling questions, memes, song lyrics as title, etc. are not allowed here. See Rule 6 for all exceptions.
Rule 2- Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material.
Your question subject cannot be illegal or NSFW material. You will be warned first, banned second.
Rule 3- Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here.
Do not seek mental, medical and professional help here. Breaking this rule will not get you or your post removed, but it will put you at risk, and possibly in danger.
Rule 4- No self promotion or upvote-farming of any kind.
That’s it.
Rule 5- No baiting or sealioning or promoting an agenda.
Questions which, instead of being of an innocuous nature, are specifically intended (based on reports and in the opinion of our crack moderation team) to bait users into ideological wars on charged political topics will be removed and the authors warned - or banned - depending on severity.
Rule 6- Regarding META posts and joke questions.
Provided it is about the community itself, you may post non-question posts using the [META] tag on your post title.
On fridays, you are allowed to post meme and troll questions, on the condition that it’s in text format only, and conforms with our other rules. These posts MUST include the [NSQ Friday] tag in their title.
If you post a serious question on friday and are looking only for legitimate answers, then please include the [Serious] tag on your post. Irrelevant replies will then be removed by moderators.
Rule 7- You can't harass or disturb other members.
If you vocally harass or discriminate against any individual member, you will be removed.
Likewise, if you are a member, sympathiser or a resemblant of a movement that is known to largely hate, mock, discriminate against, and/or want to take lives of a group of people, and you were provably vocal about your hate, then you will be banned on sight.
Rule 8- All comments should try to stay relevant to their parent content. Rule 9- Reposts from other platforms are not allowed.
Let everyone have their own content.
Rule 10- Majority of bots aren't allowed to participate here.
Unless included in our Whitelist for Bots, your bot will not be allowed to participate in this community. To have your bot whitelisted, please contact the moderators for a short review.
Partnered Communities
You can view our partnered communities list by following this link. To partner with our community and be included, you are free to message the moderators or comment on a pinned post.
Community Moderation
For inquiry on becoming a moderator of this community, you may comment on the pinned post of the time, or simply shoot a message to the current moderators.
Matrix Chat Room
To find & join our chat room, log into fluffychat.im(or any other matrix client) and put #nostupidquestions:matrix.org on the search bar.
Credits
Our breathtaking icon was bestowed upon us by @Cevilia!
Personally, when I was younger I caught myself using relationships to define my self worth and distract me from dealing with my own negative thoughts. So I started working on myself. I would sit in silence, with little to no distractions, for prolonged periods of time at least once a week (e.g. taking a long bath, or a road trip with no radio). This forced me to spend time with my own thoughts and, before long, something would bubbled to the surface (a past argument, memories of a past breakup, feelings of inadequacy, etc). Then I would take a look at that subject and / or allow myself to just feel any negative emotions. The objective was not to “solve” the issue, just to be mindful of it and understand why I was holding on to those thoughts. Eventually, I came to terms with most of my inner turmoil in one form or another. That got me to a place where I could be alone without being lonely and that, in turn, allowed me to be happy whether I was in a relationship or not.
Not sure if that is any help to you, but it worked for me.
This is great advice to anyone reading and relates to OP here. Only modification I would add is rather than sitting idly, I used to hit the gym and/or run around a track with sound canceling headphones and no music or audio of any form, and simply marinated in my thoughts and self-reflection, while compartmentalising the physical pain and exhaustion as a way to physically improve myself while doing the same mentally. It was a good method of meditation.
Personally, the gym is not good place to process things for me. Running works much better, especially without music.
Gym is great for self esteem though and the feeling of working on yourself. It definitely has a positive impact.
You basically just described Vipasana meditation! Are you related to the Buddha?
I definitely recognise this. I’m a problem solver by nature. So as soon as a thought would pop up that I felt that I couldn’t handle, I just pushed it away.
But of course, these thoughts didn’t resolve themselves so they just stayed there.
It’s still not easy for me, but now when I have such a feeling, I just let it free. Most likely it won’t get solved, some things just can’t, but I get used to them, find a place for them, and in some rare cases even make it my strength.