Huge amount of people go through similar experiences to yours. Others start to lapse into an experience like yours and get scared - they go the other way and try to force social behavior on themselves, often becoming bullies or the kid you mentioned who hurt himself trying to show off to you.
So my advice (since you're obviously not posting something publicly and expecting to get away without advice shoved at you) - stop worrying about 'normal'. Stop trying to fit in or not fit in. There are no points to be won by having social interactions. Social interactions are so you can learn, experience and enjoy. Approach them like this, and walk away when it's not working and try again. Everyone is doing the same thing, social interactions are breaking everywhere, you just don't see it so much from a distance because people cling to the precious few social interactions which have actually worked for them.
Since you're trying to put things in terms of programming: if your program doesn't work/is slow because you're looping over the wrong thing, try again with a different loop, try a different data structure. You don't need to avoid 'if' loops in the future because they didn't work once. You don't need to keep trying to use an 'if' loop because its 'normal to use an if loop'. Excuse the terrible metaphor.
I don't mean "my ideas are better" or "I have superior reasoning skills". I mean "the tools that I use to reason about the world are not the same that most people appear to use".
It's the only logical explanation for the fact that several popular ways in which humans communicate ideas (e.g. lectures/podcasts or poetry/lyrics) seem meaningless and like an inefficient use of time to me. I'm a visual thinker, visual communicator, and I convert all the important ideas in my life into mental pictures and animations. Mnemonics seem like the most idiotic thing ever to me, like remembering a person's phone number instead of what they're like.
Here's another one: I don't have a voice in my head. When I learnt from reddit discussions that most people experience their inner thoughts as an inner monologue, I was flabbergasted. If I heard a voice, I would think I was going insane. To me, thought is a completely parallel process of association, words are simply not necessary, they only serve to unnecessarily clamp you down into linear trains of thought early on. For years, I assumed that "learning to think in another language" was simply a metaphor for a certain level of proficiency in constructing sentences on the fly. Apparently it's not.
There is a lot more variation in how our brains work than people are generally aware of. It's certainly not acknowledged in culture or education. I think this is where a lot of the sentiment of 'not being normal' comes from, and telling people to stop worrying about it is not productive. It's something they will continue to be faced with their entire lives, even as all the 'neurotypical' folks insist nothing's different about you and you just need to get out more.
We all have the same hardware - amazingly complex/simple neural links. We all have different inputs, which means we all think differently. This isn't the important part - the important part is that you can communicate with other people and learn from them - from their different ways of thinking.
So I agree, I never said you were normal. I never said I was normal either, or that anybody else was normal. The idea of normal is something you're forcing on the world. Others are trying to force their own idea of normal on the world too, and yet others are trying to change themselves to match someone's idea.
Throw that idea away and live your own life.
Also, there is a lot of acknowledgment and research in education into the different ways different people learn and how to identify and teach different people. Unfortunately, it's a wicked problem. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wicked_problem
I think that's pretty normal. A quick poll of the other three people in the room reveals that none of us experience an 'inner voice'. It's more like a stream of associations, some of which might involve vocalised words, others might involve images, sounds, or recalled emotions. Sometimes the associations are sequential, sometimes they are parallel. Steven Pinker refers to this as 'mentalese'.
Edit: also, this: http://xkcd.com/610/
It's more like talking to yourself. (There's a school of thought that language is thought; related is Sapir–Whorf). The limitation of words is a strength; it enables you to pin down ideas precisely, like butterflies for careful examination. But do it too soon, and they slip through the net.
Capturing thought in words implies that thought differs from words; but words are an important tool of thought. Linguistic thought seems a builtin for humans and our intelligence would be less if we did not have words - and not just for communication/collaboration and external storage.
BTW: There was a study of mathematicians done about a century ago IIRC, and it was found that about 70% of them thought visually about mathematics; about 15% verbally/linguistically; and only 5% thought in actual mathematical notation.
I eventually realized that for a few minutes after leaving that class, as I walked to my bus, my inner monologue was running in Spanish, too. I might be thinking about the same things, but the words used for them would be different. This would slowly click back over as I started hearing and talking to my fellow students, and I'd be back to normal a few minutes after that.
The thing is, this adaptive behavior isn't limited to extremes like EN vs. ES. There are different subsets of the language which swap in and out of my speech depending on who's around. I speak one way here on HN, for instance, knowing a bit about my potential audience. I wouldn't sound quite like this with random family members, after all.
What I'm guessing based on what you've said here is that this adaptation might not be a universal thing. Maybe some people just have their preferred language and use it no matter what their audience might be. Perhaps other people pick up on this and think they're "weird" since they're not using the common "code" of the rest of the group. Curious.
Ha! I thought I was pretty strange for doing that too. Unsurprisingly I always like to squiggle on pen and paper to visually organize things. I'd draw boxes and arrows. Or I like computer languages with pattern matching (like Erlang and Haskell). It might be related.
Also I speak 3 (human ;-) )languages and understand 4. 2 of those I learned in parallel while growing up. That has helped me form abstraction that are common between the two and not necessarily tied to either one.
While we are at it. I never knew what to answer when people say "so what language to do you dream in". I always think "huh, people I guess dream in languages?". Because in my dreams and experiences happen but they are mostly visual (with exceptions).
Supporting anecdotal evidence: I usually learn best with written words and supporting visualizations. My mother and youngest brother on the other hand are highly visual, and have an awful time with written words. They need imagery. This is all contrasted to the auditory method common in our schools, and this is just within my family.
Feynman on the distinct modes of thinking that people possess:
(I have known people who talk out loud often enough about whatever preoccupies them that I must assume that they're in-their-head doing the same thing much of the time, so these people do exist - I just question if they're most people).
I do find myself remembering things I've read, said, or heard, when they seem relevant. I have vast amounts of "knowledge" that's waiting to be connected to real life experience.
That said, I wouldn't put too much stock into anyone's description of what their whole brain is doing. Why would we know? I find it's sometimes best to just pause, stop trying to steer, and wait for my brain to come up with something, no pressure. Just whatever comes up in response to a question or puzzle in the next X seconds (pick a small amount of time and commit to not act at all until it passes seems best).
From various sources I've read over the years has always suggested to me that what one can think is constrained by what one can say (e.g. Pirahã). If you truly don't do any language conversion at all when not actually speaking to other humans that would mean my pseudo theory is completely invalid.
Personally, all my thought process is certainly not "inner monologue" based (and note this isn't something I "hear"). In fact, from what I can tell the "inner monologue" is the slowest form but it's also the most concrete. The faster forms of thinking slip away quickly, like a dream [1].
[1] This was described in an article some time back. A deaf sign language teacher met a man who was in his 20's and had no language at all. She gradually taught him sign language but after he become proficient and she tried to question him on his thoughts before he had language he resisted describing it. Then later he actually couldn't remember anymore. He claimed it all went away (over 20 years of living!) like a dream.
So even though, for example, we all seem to understand English, it's quite likely that different peoples' understanding of the various aspects of the language can arise through architecturally distinct brain regions. As you say, there is a veneer of similarity that hides how differently different people actually experience the world.
"Generalizing from one example" - http://lesswrong.com/lw/dr/generalizing_from_one_example/
and watch Temple Gradin's TED talk "The World Needs All Kinds of Minds"- http://blog.ted.com/2010/02/24/the_world_needs/
It's counterintuitive and devilish, but the most enticing material for identity-building seems to be one's suffering. It took me many years to learn about that, and boy was that process slow.
until eventually they don't have to. I don't think they ever managed to quit doing it for the OP.
I want to be alone
I want to make money
Now your childhood is over, and you know it is now time for you to create. But mere creation is not enough to make money. You need to create things that people want to buy. That means solving their problems, addressing their pain. And that means being social.
And, since money is vital for your very survival, you must be social to some extent. To rail against this fact is to rail against the need to eat, or to breath. Society is literally that vital to your existence. The fact that it is painful for you is bad luck. Just like asthmatics have it pretty hard when breathing itself can be painful. And just like an asthmatic, you need to figure out how to manage your condition so that you can breath again.
Don't worry about just "getting back to normal". Something tells me that you will remain a unique, talented individual even when you start socializing again.
But beyond short bursts of contact (which can often be automated via computer systems), I'm not sure I agree with your premise. I work as a software developer and farmer, and beyond sending an occasional email there is little need to be in contact with anyone in either profession. The former doesn't even require me to leave the house, ever.
I don't consider myself anti-social. I still enjoy social events outside of the workplace. But I see that it could be very easy to essentially disappear, while still making a decent income. They do not seem to be related concepts at all.
My concern for Ken is that his essay describes him as so isolated that he's well below that threshold, and in danger of self-harm through negligence. I don't want that to happen.
I would add that, non-trivially, Ken has expressed a desire to "set the world on fire!" which, in general, has social requirements well above the minimum. (Indeed, the only way to really impact the world in isolation would be to, say, take up a science hobby while working for the Swiss patent office.)
"you've been integrated into society your whole life"
Not really, no - this way you would have to say that wild foxes that eat garbage from backyards or birds that nest on buildings are integrated into society.
"But mere creation is not enough to make money."
That's true in a sense that you need other people to give you money to have money. Obviously self-created money is useless.
But mere creation is not useless if it does not produce money. One can create without even a shred of hope that his creation will give him money. And one can be very happy about it. I once knew a person who lived in the middle of the forest and was making mosaics; he tolerated guests (to some extent) but never went out to town or did anything social by his own will. And was really happy there, until he died.
"since money is vital for your very survival [...] To rail against this fact is to rail against the need to eat, or to breath."
That's absolutely not true. You can live a decent life without using money at all, or using money very sparingly. There is that one man who was "dumpster diving" and living years and years on a budged around 50$ iirc yearly. I forgot his name but he has a website and many articles detailing how exactly he pulled it off. He he is now retired and I once saw his comment here, on Hacker News...
...and I just spent half an hour to find him, because I forgot his name and really, really wanted to show you his writings. I'm feeling a bit stupid for forgetting the name, but I remember what he said clearly.
Anyway, here is the site: http://www.ranprieur.com/ and here is an essay that directly contradicts your statement: http://www.ranprieur.com/essays/dropout.html
Oh, also: we really don't need society to be breathing, you know...
"Don't worry about just "getting back to normal"."
That's right, don't worry about it. One can always go Ran Pieur's route and never. Well, I know he was socializing, but I imagine he could have such meaningful social interactions exactly because he "dropped out" from society...
Anyway, you seem to say here that people need to socialize in a way you know as "normal" to be able to live. They do not. They can choose to be outside of social norms and expectations and still live meaningful, happy life - it's rude to forget about them.
Second, thanks for the links. They are very good. However, I'm not sure if he's saying what you think he's saying. Throughout the second page is the tacit acknowledgment that you have to work and make money in order to live. His "most radical advice" is to not find a job that you love, but rather one that supports you with the least stress - which, by the way, I have no problem with.
Indeed, he even links to this wonderful essay, which expresses my point far more eloquently and with more erudition:
http://incharacter.org/archives/self-reliance/old-mac-donald...
Uh!? For years and years I've been writing books (real, printed, published books) and articles. I was probably the most antisocial person in all my friends group and I was also the one making the more money.
I could disappear for months from civilization. My only trip outside would be to go to the grocery store and going to the garage doing the maintenance of my spiffy sport car (bought cash with the money I got from writing). The rest of the time I was writing, during night time. Sleep 6 to 7 hours and wake up at 1 or 2 pm. Take the car for a spin, alone. Rinse and repeat. No social life. No girlfriend. Just work (and the money that goes with it).
Making money and being social are two totally different things.
Especially moreso in that always-on, Internet connected, society were brilliant people can work from home if they want to: there are more and more domains where you can work from home and be as much anti-social as you want.
I know a single mom who runs her entire business from home, updating her websites, receiving her stuff and repackaging them. And she's making a killing money-wise.
A company I was contracting for was shelling big $$$ to south america to two genius programmers: we didn't have a freakin' clue as to wether this guys were socials or not. Doesn't matter.
It's nearly your entire comment which doesn't compute: making money and being social are two completely orthogonal concepts.
Now don't get me wrong: I'm not saying you should be anti-social just for the sake of it or be anti-social and make lots of $$$ just to make a point. Since I've opened a FB account (I barely ever go to the movie but a friend I hadn't seen in ten years convinced me to go see the movie and I kinda liked it, so I opened a FB account, go figure ; )
And now I've got a girlfriend since two years and life is better I'd say. Yet I make much less money than when I was that anti-social books and articles writer.
I wish the author of that entry good luck and, like you (but for different reasons) I think he should try to socialize to some at least some extent.
I don't think antisocial means what you think it means.
There's a common misconception that circumcision, for Christians, is a religious ritual or a religious requirement.
In fact, it's just the opposite. Many Christian denominations (e.g. Catholicism) specifically DISALLOW circumcision, if it's done for religious reasons.
On the other hand, many christian denominations (e.g. esp pentecostals) circumcise precisely for religious reasons.
The simple fact is that while it might not be a religious ritual for some christians, it is for others christians.
Oh, look at that, christians not being consistent from one type to another. What a surprise.
FTFY.
Several points bothered me in this story, as it was a combination of honest observations and immature conclusions.
1) Life takes time, you need to be at peace with being young and not having all the solutions.
2) The author seems to suffer from observing the image of Silicon Valley success without actually experiencing it.
Most people fail, most projects go unfinished, most beyond that never make enough money to sustain a company.
A successful product is the evolutionary result of 10,000 products before it that failed, went unfinished, or were unprofitable. Even the best of the Valley didn't sit down, bang out some brilliant code, slap a business strategy on top, then cash a billion dollar check. They worked long and hard through repeated failures, with sometimes B and C squad talent, slowly carving away at the block of ideas until a product appeared. Then after that, they spend months or years compiling a business strategy and altering the product to become palatable to enough customers to gain a profit.
It takes a team of imperfect people and a lot of time to make even a passable product. Even finishing a unprofitable product is an massive achievement in itself.
It worries me at the end that the author again seems to come to a single conclusion that he believes will bring both success and happiness. That may never come, or it may be that the author never makes a lot of money or never is the best in the field.
This was the most painful part of growing up for me -- accepting that you live in a sea of talented individuals, and you are in no way, the most talented among them. You learn to reach out, form a team, and that great things come from hard work and diligence as much or more so than from natural talent.
Err, don't you mean "you need to be at peace with not having all the solutions"? :)
What we call success is possibly persistence mixed with applied failure science, a method in which the practitioner modifies his techniques continually based on previous failures. She is an explorer who does not stop because she meets an ocean north, instead she tries to go west or if she gots balls, she builds a ship, but ultimately she is determined to find what she seeks.
I´ve been feeling this way for this last year since I begun my project. Probably I will fail, but even then I have am far ahead from I thought I would be able to be.
I used to keep a diary, where 13 years ago my entries were long monologues similar to this. There was a clear correlation between amount of personal and emotional human contact I had in a day and the length of the diary entries where I tried to reminisce going mushroom picking with my grandmother a decade earlier.
The world today seems too constantly distracting for that sort of thing.
> They form relationships with other people only if they believe they will not be rejected. Loss and rejection are so painful that these people will choose to be lonely rather than risk trying to connect with others.
All the resources for the socially isolated tend to be directed at;
1. Those that are depressed or insane. As I mentioned (albeit in a very hyperbolic manner) people tend to assume you're depressed and the only help I have ever been offered was to help cure my non-existent depression. I think it's because most people cant imagine cutting themselves off from the world. They'd only do it if they had a serious mental breakdown, so they assume we must have had one.
or
2. Autistic people that are severely socially disabled.
I'm neither depressed nor severely social disabled. I imagine most shut-ins aren't.
The judgment and inaccurate labeling that comes with seeking help severely deters people like us from seeking it. The very reason I withdrew from society is because I couldn't take the labeling and social judgment.
I'd encourage you to read up on Hikikomori. Japan has a culture that causes a great deal more shut-ins than we do and there is a significant body of work on the phenomenon. Shutting Out the Sun http://www.amazon.com/Shutting-Out-Sun-Generation-Departures... is a pretty good book. There is a good introductory article here http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/15/magazine/15japanese.html?p...
Simply reading about others like me was enough to give me the courage to share with a few online friends and from there I got the courage to publish my story. There are lots of people like us, you're not alone. Feel free to email me anytime "k@20252.me". We can chat about whatever.
It might be insightful to you, that you made a substantial Singular vs Plural mistake there. There's more than one society / culture, more than one way of life, more than one mode of socialization... Its a big planet, now go find the rest of it. Much like your story related numerous different places to physically live without getting the point there are numerous different cultures/societies to live in. As a much older dude than you, I found several (sub)cultures I like and happily socialize in. Lifestyle and culture of the masses, some parts are OK, some, maybe most, no. Reason, analyze, freely pick and choose, that is a feature, not a bug. Take reasoning engine, enter inadequate information, test and get confusing output, assume problem is the reasoning engine, not so. Its a big planet, there's more out there than just extroverted dominant media culture or nothingness. How to figure out the right way to live, that is the true education.
Are they really targeting "lonely" people? I thought their model was more about getting people who wanted to do that sort of thing out and doing it without the planning. If they're trying to target people who prefer staying in and playing board games, their homepage does a terrible job selling that.
> Our mission is to end loneliness.
This is oft reported elsewhere in describing Grouper: https://www.google.com/search?q=grouper+mission+end+loneline...
It made me think it was just a site for meeting people, not necessarily dating. But it is exactly that: a group dating site. I was confused by its non-datey name, and their "sex in the bathroom" article which seemed incongruous with ending loneliness. You can fuck strangers while being utterly alone, and I think most people experienced with healthy relationships would agree that dating/sleeping around out of loneliness is an unhealthy way of getting out of it.
Find professional help (NOW) to starting approaching it and dealing with it.
Find professional help (NOW) to help manage your mental disorder (depression) which carries an enormous and present risk of self-harm.
Get whatever the fuck is wrong with your foot fixed, and start walking out the door on the regular.
You appear to be bright, talented, and a capable writer. Resume applying those gifts to the people around you instead of yourself. You are the best person in your own life, now be the best person in other people's lives.
This kind of abusive behavior is the root of many suicidal (and homicidal) tragedies.
In fact it would probably be much more expensive here.
The main choices probably are a family member picking up groceries for you, or a small market which still can deliver groceries, I know mine stopped offering delivery around 5 years ago because the community size grew so much.
1) Ordering online from supermarkets. 2) Ordering from restaurants.
Of course poor Aunt Sharon doesn't understand. And no, the onus isn't on you to make her understand. Unless you want her to...in which case, it may take some effort on your part to frame your emotions to her experience.
Even then you may only meet part way. Which you'll have to accept, but not as a failure.
I didn't get any sense that the author was expecting others to divine the solution to his problems; I think he was just irritated because they were besieging him with "concern" without actually helping any.
I think it's sad when expressions of love and concern are rebuffed with a dismissive, "But you don't understand."
An expression of love and concern like "Hey, it seems like you're going through a rough time, I hope things work out for you, let me know if there's anything I can do to help" is one thing. That should be met with thanks, yes.
An "expression of love and concern" like "I think you should do X" or "Have you tried Y?" is quite another. It is not really aimed at helping or comforting the person who is having a rough time; it is aimed at easing the emotions of the person who thinks they are being comforting. That is the sort of thing that might (and should) get met with "But you don't understand".
Of course poor Aunt Sharon doesn't understand.
Indeed. And therefore she should not presume to tell the person she doesn't understand how they should "fix" things. The issue isn't really that she doesn't understand; it's that she doesn't even know that she doesn't understand.
it may take some effort on your part to frame your emotions to her experience.
This is true, but Aunt Sharon has to be willing to meet you halfway. Many Aunt Sharons are not.
"Me and 'X' have been talking and we think you should do 'Y'"
Great, now I have groups of people talking about me.
Just my $0.02.
"Publishing this was hard but it felt like my only option. For years I have not been living my life, I have been delaying it. Five years ago I paused my life and now it's time to choose between play or stop. I'm pressing play. The world pushed me and instead of pushing back I hid, now I'm pushing back. I'm determined to be myself no matter the consequences.
I know that facing what I am and facing the world is really going to hurt, but I now know that I can survive it. I know that eventually all pain fades away and you're left with only scars. I know that no matter how shitty my emotions tell me things are, that it's not actually that bad. I'll come out the other side no matter what. I'm going to step once more into the fray, come whatever may.
[...]
For now, I'm going to;
Get Out.
Live.
Grow.
Change.
Fight The Urge To Fade."
I was homeschooled and while it's true that homeschoolers tend to have cooperatives, and join social clubs, you're still more isolated than children in more traditional situations. To this day I'm more socially awkward than most of people I know and I wonder if the homeschooling didn't have something to do with it.
I found it surprising and even counterintuitive, but empirical data suggests that on average home-schooled students are still better socialized than students of public schools. Here's one article: it was published in a Catholic journal, but it seems to be heavily cited by secular social scientists and sufficient in its methodology ( http://www.firstthings.com/article/2009/02/001-is-private-sc... )
I'd add that there's also more to socialization than not being socially awkward: someone can be socially awkward, but start a family, be active in their community, and contribute to society through work, entrepreneurship, or academic pursuits.
I feel more socially awkward and that I have to fake it, but I think in reality I do quite well. Sometimes I wonder if what I'm experiencing is the fact that I have a low-tolerance for sophomoric, highschool-like drama and BS, because I never had to experience it :)
Humans, whether you like it or not, have evolved to be a social species. Even if one wishes to withdraw, they can only do this in practice with the tacit permission of the society they live in, at least unless they're prepared to give up all worldly conveniences and just go live in a cave somewhere. I also find that interesting, though I'm not sure what to make of it.
-------------
Edit: Seems reply below is right, I misread the article. He actually calls out his lifestyle as specifically "unhealthy".
>...my unhealthy mental state...
Now that's an interesting hypothesis. I have seen a study on how insufficient parental attention increases the risk of suicide in teenagers but not this.
Edit: searching for "overprotection and suicide" ("overprotection" is the best keyword I could come up with; I did the search without the quotes) yields little.
(http://cebmh.warne.ox.ac.uk/csr/)
You might remember the reports a few years ago about cortisol levels in children at nurseries, compared to children at home? People said that cortisol was a stress hormone, and thus it's bad to be in the brains of children, and thus putting children in nursery is bad because it causes cortisol to be released. But other interpretations are that children need to learn to regulate their emotions, and that lack of cortisol means over-protection and lack of a chance to learn how to regulate emotion.
Sorry about the lousy links, it's the best I can do at the moment.
(http://www.parentingscience.com/daycare-centers.html)
(http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18633-mom-and-dad-stop...)
The University of Oxford is indeed the ancient and well-known university informally called Oxford University.
But after reading up to "I guess I'm kinda different.", I couldn't stand it and had to use Developer Tools to change the background color and font color. Still feeling some discomfort in my eyes and it feels like the text is burned in front of me.
A for effort.
So not having found your role in life at 23 is not uncommon these days.
Yes, online interactions are different, but a modern-day "hermit" with access to the internet can't really be viewed as such.
Also, I may get downvoted for "armchair psychology", but I did notice elements of what seemed like thought disorder in the post. It's also diagnosed often in autism spectrum, not just with schizophrenia. I do think diagnoses generally mean very little, and "personality disorders" generally bother me because it seems like broadly defined, you could slap that on anyone - which is also the case with thought disorder. It's not like everyone who goes off on a tangent is "crazy"! But I've interacted with enough non neuroptypical type people (myself being one of them) that I did notice a similarity to others.
Unspoken comments, reading between the lines, motivations behind bringing up a topic, moods, wit, having to respond to aggression immediately, saving face...
Its on a different level.
----
In the case of HN, personally I feel its more polite not to mention it and see if someone with real experience echoes the same.
The reason armchair psychology should get downvoted is the same reason idea-guys get downvoted when they talk about something they don't know much about.
Although I have to admit, I've seen my experience on HN change. Earlier someone would chime in with real information, now I see similar arm chair diagnoses (on subjects = all) crop up.
What am I reading.
Circumcision, like other hazing rituals, is simultaneously pointlessly arbitrary and unnecessarily barbaric.
Someone that you have to commit to. Someone that'll be there long enough to see all your bullshit and hypocrisies and call you out on them.
If you're alone, it's easy to commit to doing something only to later "forget" about the commitment when it is no longer convenient for you. A partner that you've made a commitment to won't forget it so easily.
The same goes for business. Maybe that's why startups often have strong co-founders.
For me, when I'm living with someone, in several months I become a complete hermit. Probably because all my rudimentary needs for socialization are fulfilled.
In reality the author is just alike everyone else, with fears and emotions which caused him to shut himself in and rationalize it with some meditative jargon.
The water, the need for routine, the unabilty to fully play chess when in a social context, the need to simulate social interactions - the "funny" thing is that if that diagnosis is right, he is not faking by faking it, it's simply him.
The not so funny thing is that if that diagnosis were right, many comments in this thread like "we all feel like we are not normal" mask that condition, and lead to unhelpful advice.
I'm not suggesting it is a cry for help (though it certainly could be), but it certainly is an attempt to connect with others.
I must admit I haven't read the full story. I found it too lengthy.
You mentioned that your last close friend was when you were 12 and that you were in a distance high school. Do be sure that you realize that middle school was as bad as it gets in regards to social pressure to be normal. This is a different world now. Immediately out of college around your age (22?), nerds like us become pretty cool because we have interesting jobs and make a lot of money. To some extent, almost all programmers have a few social idiosyncrasies and for the most part we share these in common. So what that means for you is that those idiosyncrasies which previously got you bullied are now the same that people associate with success.
While I realize that for you it might be the only way, I think your plan in the 're-life' section is a bit misguided. Learning to be social is a fundamentally different thing from learning a new skill. There is no sense in focusing down and trying to find the core problems because social behaviors generally exist below our stream of consciousness (somewhat related: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Introspection_illusion). If you approach this in a way that you would learn a new programming language, you will also quickly find that the difference is that learning to socialize is NOT interesting or fun in an academic sense and you will quickly lose motivation. Instead, since you seem to have a lot of varied interests, I would start with a Meetup. There should be hacker or entrepreneurial groups holding meetings near you (unless of course you still live in Idaho!) The important thing is to go out and try to do things you are interested in with other people no matter how painful or awkward at first. Social behaviors will eventually be picked up subconsciously.
Measuring your progress is always a good way to motivate yourself and stay on track. But I would avoid measuring "all the human things" and instead focus on metrics like, "how many people did I say hi to today" or "how long was I outside of my room".
To make this easier for yourself (and therefore increase your chances for success), you might not want to change your name to K-2052 just yet. I think it is great move and I agree with your logic but put it to the side until you are a bit further along on your quest. Then, you will have the ability to rock the name.
And suggestions on where to move? Being in a big city is important more than anything else. I live in San Francisco and a great thing about this city is that weirdness is embraced more than anywhere else I have ever spent time. You might also think about moving to a abroad if you know any foreign languages. People will tend interpret social differences as cultural differences and you will be get a bit more wiggle-room with your weird behaviors while you come out of your shell.
I would venture to say that most of us here (myself included) feel empathy towards parts of your story so just know that you are not as different as you think you are!
What stood out to me is your comment about moving...I myself have picked up a lot of unhealthy behaviors and habits by being trapped in a city where people are distant and flaky. I've forgotten that not everyone is like that. I myself have thought that my only other options are SF or moving abroad, so it's interesting to hear someone else voice that.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welcome_to_the_N.H.K. You're probably familiar with this animated series.
One thing that helped me a lot was doing some Vipassana meditation. Acknowledging that everything as an end. All the pleasures, all the pain. If you wait long enough you'll fell better.
Other important point is Nutrition. It makes a WHOLE LOT of difference on your mental habits. And after some time it will make you a new person.
I suggest you watch the movies "Food Matters" and "Fork over Knives". They're great movies (with some flaws) that can be a kind of "wake up call".
As someone that was on the same boat I wish you all the peace and happiness in the world.
I can relate to this. As I spend time withdrawn from society (including cybercultures like reddit), my views distance from everyone else's, and it becomes harder to relate to people.
I appreciate Hacker News because people here tend to be unusually receptive to independent thought.
You've made it to the point where you know you have to make a change, which is awesome. I hope you can also get to the point where you can stop being so self-conscious about being different and just live your life. Unclench a little. I'm almost 35 and I'm just now starting to enjoy people in a real way, having done a program of "Fake it til you make it" for years. You're entering real adulthood now and you'll make adult friends, you'll move on and get some perspective on things. Take it from me, it seems like an impossibly long time now but in 5 years you'll look back on this story in a very different way.
Would it be a loss for you if you told your story to a professional counselor? I think you should. It's only a small step to take and there are no obligations what so ever.
You're a prisoner of your own life and it doesn't have to be like this. You already took a first step by publishing this story, now take that second step!
I think this is something that comes with age for almost everyone that perceives themselves as different. People in their younger years attempt to change how they are in order to make everyone like them. Later on in life, they realize that this is pointless and they're better off just being themselves and shedding the people who can't deal with that.
Don't pay too much attention to all of the people in this thread criticizing you or offering advice that doesn't fit. The two worst things about the internet are that it's simply more difficult to empathize with other people, and that there are fewer / zero consequences for rudeness.
One thing caught my attention:
> I have never known my Dad. My mom left him when I was four. They were both drug users and to escape the drug usage my mom left him. I have only blurry memories of him. None of my memories of him are positive.
Having had similar experiences, from my perspective this is the root cause of your troubles. It's kind of unbelievable how deep the rabbit hole can go in terms of how this affects your life. I just want you to keep that in mind.
Take care and good luck. You'll figure it out.
> Play keep away with a normal persons hat and you're just taking their hat. Play keep away with an Autistic persons hat and it's possible that it's his best friend named "Charlie". It's highly unlikely that Charlie enjoys flying at highspeeds through the air into greasy hands. You're not playing keep away with a hat, you are tossing around and abusing his best friend. It takes a damaged monster to play keep away with someone's dog or their younger sibling, but most will think nothing of playing keep away with the weird kids hat.
My four-year old daughter isn't autistic, but this morning we were running to her daycare. My wife had her blankie and was out-running my daughter. All of a sudden my daughter stopped and started bawling, when five seconds earlier she was loving the chase. I'm thinking that maybe the above paragraph doesn't just apply to autistic people, it applies to anybody who forms a bond with an inanimate object.
Nothing wrong with introversion, IMO. Lots of people have done it throughout centuries. It can be harmful, and props to OP for recognizing the problem and choosing to move forward.
Obviously it was the thing I loved at that moment, the riches allured to me and my friends didn't "Get" the amounts I would be playing for anyway. They also didn't "get it" why it sucked so hard to end up 11/1500 in a big tournament. (Hey you still won right?).
You're right when you see relationships don't work when you always have a communication problem.
Usually though, the problem is not that people don't understand you - (sidenote: i know there are just stupid people who don't, or don't want to. You don't need them anyway). The problem is you won't let people understand you, because you are ignorant, arrogant and self-righteous. No offence but, if you were such a genius you wouldn't be working on Ruby projects (no pun.) People probably would understand you, and you would probably have better socializing experiences if you tried.
Seems you sucked at this stuff when you were a kid, and now when you've grown up enough to be able to understand yourself and put everything into words, you still decide its the best route to go.
Well die lonely then if you like it. It's not for me.
"Before long I'm committed to a shit ton of things and I am so stressed out that I cant focus long enough to fake my way through life. Inevitably I implode and disappoint everyone I had commitments to."
First, there's a ton of positivity in your writing, because you're recognizing that overcommitment is really bringing you and (even better) you're taking responsibility for correcting this.
This part concerned me a bit:
"I'm taking all the skills I have learned from learning and applying them to my psyche. I'm going to re-build and re-form my emotional centers from the ground up. I'm going to take my unhealthy mental state and refactor it into a functional vibrant self. I'm re-life-ing"
This is very ambitious!
Not all ambitious goals are a path to overcommitment, but are you being very careful that this ambitious goal won't wind up being yet another overcommitment (leading to yet more pain) on your part?
Perhaps you could set up meaningful milestones along the way? For example, you could count the number of times you stick to a 4-day or 5-day work week each month. Even if the "reward" is just a big green checkmark on the wall calendar, that can be really gratifying.
Best wishes!
"Life is the series of choices we remember making. When something goes wrong it's easy to see it is as not a choice. There was too much stress. Your dog ate it. Your clients were assholes ... I now realize that to fix myself, I'm going to have to be myself; and to be myself, I'm going to face myself."
You know, the ones who'd prefer not to play outside with the other kids?
Whilst at uni I worked part time in various capacities as a tutor or educational assistant. One school in particular was very accommodating to students with different needs. And not just the kids who couldnt read, but the kids who wanted to read all day.
I think you'd have something to contribute in that space.
You already know what happens if you don't fade.
You fight every second of every minute of every hour of every day until one day you die. It'll be exhausting and possibly not worth it.
Maybe fading will be some totally cool experience? Of course no one else would ever know, but screw em.
Going to try to make some when spring comes, but it's too cold to really bother right now. Being a recluse isn't so bad.
Makes me wonder if this happens with a lot of serif faces in light on dark color schemes and if there's some way to fix it.
Also, not sure if the OP is reading, but while the alternating dark/light text on a grey background is an interesting idea, it just doesn't work. The dark on dark text is hard to read, the emphasis is too strong and comes off as heavy-handed, and the overall effect on the experience of reading is negative in my subjective evaluation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizoid_personality_disorder
I know it's not about labels, but sometimes knowing a word for it can help you find others' stories, which can help you go easier on yourself for being different from what you perceive is "normal".
Edit to add: Get your B12 levels checked. Low B12 can lead to schizoid-type behaviour. Also possibly folate levels.
Second, there seems to be unlucky amount of not your kind of people around you. I have managed to find people, who seem "default" on the surface, because they have to, but the praise different. Almost any kind, there is no "you are too weird". And it helps, its awesome.
On a side note, I didn't realize HN was becoming more and more Reddit-like every day. This is probably the first submission I've seen that reads almost like an AMA...perhaps it is a sign of things to come.
OP: chess, checkers - me: school olympics, chemistry, math, physics
OP: tour trauma, when asking tour guide a question, everybody laughed - me: tour trauma when tour guide played naughty joke on my mom and everybody laughed
OP: abusive dad, divorced early - me: no dad, left at birth (fortunately awesome grandpa that taught me Ohm's law, how to drill, solder and lots of other stuff)
OP and me: interest in psychology (for me ended with learning what Freud was saying, I have no business in branch of science where name of such clueless bent puppy is remembered)
OP: crappy kindergarten experience, me: spent few hours in kindergarten, don't remember anything but I never went back there, I cried too much when they tried to drag me there
Fortunately, I had (still have) great, stable mother, I had close friends (full honesty with them, nearly kind of mind melt) until I was 17 or so (OP had some till 12).
I'm 34. My true self kind of melded with my fake self. They switch in seconds. When I'm interacting with acquaintances I still fake it. Often I fake amusement because I want to come off as cheerful, but I'm rarely truly amused. Pretty often I fake quite well which makes me proud. But I don't have to fake with few people that are close to me. I just have to restrain myself from exposing full me in some cases, but I guess most people do that even (especially?) with their loved ones.
I went different way than OP, I was madly in love two times as a teenager, now I have de-facto wife. She's awesome. After 8 years or so of the relationship, from time to time I feel that I love her and I feel the urge to tell her that. Not sure if that's unusual but I think it's a good sign.
But I know I chose one path. And sometimes I long for the other, for being a shut-in. I hate going out. I hate meeting people who are not my closes friends. I don't eagrely await meeting even my closest friends. Social interaction exhausts me. I used my relationship to shed off almost all of my friends. Still I think living among people takes at least 80% of my energy. I have only 20% left for doing the stuff I actually care about.
As they say, grass is always greener on the other side. I'd probably be same looser with too high IQ and too little motivation if I were a shut-in. But one can dream.
Of everything you wrote, this line was the most relatable to my own experiences:
"If you don't like who I am then you can go fuck yourself."
Once I adopted this mindset, all things became possible.
Good Luck!
I suspect some spectrum issues are involved but he is still no less of a person.
Isn't that for others to judge? It's not like one person can judge himself to be or not be the above.
I was born with a slight genetic defect, meaning that by the age of five my hearing was entirely gone. Luckily enough for me, multiple operations have led to getting most of my hearing back, and of course I'm extremely thankful for that. Not meaning to spill out my life here, but I simply want to point out that being a shut-in was in a way forced on me, and I learnt a lot from it. I turned the most traumatic experience of my life into the best thing that's ever happened to me. Very much like you I'm pretty weird in a lot of respects, and as I believe you're trying to achieve, I've turned most of my weirdness into strengths. I can read body language naturally, so I use it to identify stress and discomfort in other people, often before they even realize it. I empathize very strongly, generally without people needing to tell me what's happening. I can become "deaf at will", i.e. shut the world around me entirely and concentrate even in the noisiest places. I see rhythm and patterns in everything, even in social interactions. And so on.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that the source of your weirdness is very much the same as the source of your greatness. Having the tools is one thing, and it's now a matter of using them properly. It also turns out socializing is very much an elaborate way to showcase your weirdness to your peers, and often realize someone will share some of it with you (a lot like some people have done in this thread).
Two things that have made my life considerably better in every respect:
Don't lie, to others but also to yourself. I have done the same thing you have, pretending, a lot! Pretending to be happy when I wasn't, pretending that I cared when I didn't and vice-versa, making up stories that I actually started believing in myself to justify everything... So I made the simple decision to not lie, ever. I can't even begin to explain properly the freedom of mind it's brought me, and how much simpler and cleaner it's made my relationships and my life in general. It also means that after a while, you'll also never get offended by things. When you don't lie, it's nearly impossible for somebody to undermine you.
Simplify your life. I used to have a fancy place, owned tons of fancy stuff, have very strong opinions about everything that I thought other people were too stupid not to agree with, etc. You start believing that you actually need the crap you buy, then you get attached and worry about said crap. It is, in my honest opinion, a waste of physical and emotional time and effort. Nobody gains from it, least of all you. I've done away with pretty much all of it and am really happy for it. I have more room in my head and in my life for genuine worries (of which there are now very few) and I appreciate the simple things a lot more; the things that most people of all backgrounds can connect with.
This is my 2 cents, but as a fellow weirdo and programmer who's gone through depression and a bunch of other unpleasant things, I thought I'd share how I've become the happiest I've ever been.
(My apologies for the long comment)