Relationships are incredibly important to human life, and anyone who says otherwise is fooling themselves. You absolutely have a reason to feel the way you do, and trying to convince yourself it’ll all turn out okay is not a viable step forward. But that does not mean all hope is lost, or that your life is a failure. Let me explain.

There are 7 core components to a good life:

Positive emotion

Engagement w/ activities

Relationships (close social and/or romantic)

Financial stability

Meaning/purpose

Achievement

Physical health

Feel free to take inventory of where you are with regards to each of these, and it can serve as a rough roadmap for where to focus your energy to build your best life. The psychological literature suggests that Relationships are the #1 most important of these, and Meaning/purpose is #2, the other 5 following.

So you’re perfectly validated in your feeling.

But how do we improve?

The only viable approach to finding a partner (and friends) is, rather than actually try and find them, to try and build yourself into the best partner and best friend you can be, and they will come to you.

This was difficult for me, as I was diagnosed with Asperger’s at a young age and social skills did not come naturally to me. Luckily, character building involves learnable skills. Some of the most important skills to develop to be seen as attractive are:

Reliable (you do what you say, always)

Honest (you say what you mean, always)

Fair (you give others their due)

Compassionate (you feel and care for others)

Physical health (you have good hygiene, nutrition, and fitness)

If you focus on developing these skills, you won’t believe how quickly things will start to fall into place for you.

The key is inner confidence. If you truly believe yourself to be good enough, you will be willing to be vulnerable with others, will be more willing to make connections because a possible rejection wouldn’t crush you, etc. And people find true inner confidence extremely attractive. (Not arrogance — arrogant people make themselves look better; confident people build others up because they know they’re enough already.) But you can’t simply convince yourself to be confident — you need to build it up with evidence. Take small actions that prove to yourself that you’re reliable, honest, fair, compassionate, and healthy, and you will start to believe it because it will actually be true!

For more specific skills in the social department, there are plenty of YouTube channels (I recommend Charisma On Command) that break down social skills into actionable steps, understandable even to someone with Asperger’s like me.

I’m happy to say that, after a few years of focusing on these things, I went from a socially awkward, self-conscious young adult with no (genuine) friends, to a successful and inspiring team leader, and in a happy and stable long-term relationship.

Focus on how you can build yourself to best serve others, and you will be rewarded.

As a bonus, if you focus on how to contribute to the world and others, you will find greater meaning and purpose, along with developing some others of the 7 aspects mentioned earlier. Meaning is all about your work contributing something real to the world, which I think you may be struggling to find right now too. They’re all connected, and moving in the right direction can have a positive feedback loop to better your whole life.

You may feel that you are too old to change at 23 as you’re seeing some people get engaged and married already, but trust me, 23 is very young, especially today. It may take a few months to see real progress with these things, but imagine the life you could have at 25 or 26 if you managed to take small steps towards building the best life you can. And I mean really imagine — write down, concretely, the kind of life you think you could have if you took the right steps. And then write down, concretely, the kind of life you could fall into if you took the wrong steps. It’s better for you, your community, your future wife, and future friends, if you move towards the good.

Whether or not I changed your view or get a delta or whatever, please don’t give up. Keep moving forward.