I would like to think it’s the former but how can one really tell? I get the impression that I spend more time thinking about things than the average person. I attempt to be as accepting as possible. Yet, I can’t help but to still feel ignorant from time to time. It’s frustrating and confusing and sometimes I don’t like the person that I seem to be.
So what can I do about it? Nothing, it seems. I would like to say “To hell with it all” but that makes me extremely uncomfortable. It seems to confirm my suspicions of my own inferiority.
It’s probably just because I don’t have a girlfriend.
Maybe if I was more clever…or attractive…
…sans ‘more’.
Alright, that’s enough self-loathing for one night. I’m usually more upbeat that this…honest.
That’s me exactly. I think a lot about things (part of the reason why I have trouble sleeping at night, my overactive mind) but my knowledge isn’t very worldly. I need to read the news more… or something.
Trying to better yourself because you sense inadequacy is sometimes preferable to remaining in stasis because of perceived perfection. This seems like one of those times.
Meditation involves trying to make your mind blank; to not think of anything. It takes time to learn and is not easily accomplished. My point originally was that I doubt if you think more about things than the average person. It is what you are thinking about not the act itself. Then I realized that maybe you should try to learn to meditate because it gets your mind off of the worries you seem to be having.
Whoa. Just based on that, you sound like my female equivalent.
My mind drives me crazy when I want to get to sleep. I have to play alphabet games to keep my mind from rambling all over the place. (I’ll pick a topic - movie titles, for example - and go through the alphabet, naming a title that starts with each letter.)
And, sometimes, when I’m trying to read, I have to read the same page over a few times. I don’t just stop reading and start thinking about something else. I’ll actually read a whole page while thinking about something else, and then can’t recall what I just read.
I see you’re also a fellow Canadian. (You were born and/or raised in Canada?) And then there’s our user names. What’s up with that? I know the story behind mine.
Wait, I just checked out your website. I see your a Mariah Carey fan. I should have recognized the song reference. I have her first album. It was one of my favorites during high-school.
I’m surprised the other guys didn’t tease me about that fact. (They must have been closet Mariah fans, hiding their Mariah CDs inside their Guns ‘n’ Roses CD cases. )
Take Dr Phil’s advice. Change your internal dialog. The more you tell yourself you’re inferior, the more inferior you’ll feel.
Having a girlfriend will not change how you feel about yourself. How do you expect someone else to love you, when you can’t do that yourself? Get to know the guy inside.
My mother used to say to me, ‘Elwood’—she always called me Elwood—‘In this world, Elwood, you must be oh-so smart, or oh-so pleasant.’ For years I was smart. I recommend pleasant—and you may quote me on that.
–Elwood P. Dowd (Jimmy Stewart) in ‘Harvey’
I was the same way – smart – for many years. Now I’m trying pleasant, but I think in today’s society, not to mention the business world, you need to be both. Just being oh-so smart is not enough, you have to be oh-so pleasant, too.
Being pleasant requires good bullshiting skills. So maybe you’re on the right track without even knowing.
If you have Showtime, watch for Penn and Teller’s Bullshit, namely the episode on love.
It is mostly good bullshitting in the beginning, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Just learn to play the game and don’t compete where you can’t win. By that I mean, don’t go to the downtown meat market if you’d be better off picking up linux chicks, or something. It can undermine your confidence. Anyway, you don’t want the girls that would go after those half-nekkid well tanned and toned beef hunks with six-pack abs, glistening nipples, and monstrous glorious pen…
I digress. I wish I could explain it better, it’s not an insult. Just find a place where there are girls where you aren’t completely out of your element, if that makes sense. Maybe buy a $200 kite and go show it off at the local kite hill. Find non-pretentious girls, they are out there. And Bullshit them. It doesn’t mean LIE, it means chat yourself up, make yourself appear confident (not cocky) and at ease (cool but not aloof), and you’ll automatically be attractive. In short, be yourself with a humble-yet-sly eye of the tiger. Don’t be afraid to get shot down, but don’t push it. Let them come to you. Build your ego.
After you overcome the BS obstacle, you can write your own ticket. You can afford to pick and choose, wait 'til you’re 30 with no worries, whatever. Have fun, live life, don’t worry about it, and they’ll come to you.
oh yeah, one last thing: Don’t watch Dr Phil, it’ll ruin you, make you susceptible to manipulative women, and curse you to a wretched existance.
Yeah, a lot of times when I’m reading, I’ll start thinking about something else. I’ve ‘read’ two or three pages without really ‘reading’ them. Then I have to figure out where I left off last. It ends up being a real pain in the ass.
Anyways, as far as my love life goes (which wasn’t really the main reason for OP but since you bring it up… ) I think **Eleusis[b/] hit on the main issue here: confidence.
I believe myself to have something of an over-developed sense of humility which isn’t exactly the best thing to have when attempting to court members of the opposite sex. However, guys I have seen around me who *do[i/] have that confidence tend to be jerks…and that’s something I don’t want to be. I suppose the happy medium is the answer but the question is how to find that. At what point do you make distinction between being overly cautious and being a jerk?
Alright, that’s enough rambling for me. Thanks for the support, y’all.
) I think **Eleusis[b/] hit on the main issue here: confidence.