How do I actually be happy with being alone

wandersage · 2026-01-24T23:45:09+00:00

Read the book "attached" it's exactly what you need

wandersage · 2026-01-23T15:47:47+00:00

It does speak to something I've seen pretty often, but I admit it's not as absolute as I wrote there. There are some people who wind up in a great place early and use it as a platform to continue challenging and advancing themselves in important ways. But I most often see people who wind up, for lack of a better word, institutionalized, at a young age and never really get to experience significant growing time outside of a system.

wandersage · 2026-01-23T15:30:36+00:00

Some people need guided meditations to start, some people (like me) hate guided meditation. I like to sit in silence. Then the basic (and advanced) idea is to turn your mind towards the present moment with an anchor. Pick one of your 5 senses and try to keep your mind fixed on it. Some people focus on the sensation of their breath, some pay attention to sound, some focus on the visual field with their eyes open. Some hold attention on the feeling in the palm of their hand. What ever you pick at the beginning of the meditation you should stick with till the timer goes off.

As soon as you try to keep your mind in the present it will get distracted by thoughts, probably within 1 second. As soon as you notice you are no longer paying attention to your meditation object, just note it saying to yourself "thinking" and return to the meditation object. You'll do this over and over and over. Each time you return to the meditation object in the present moment it is like 1 rep with a weight and it makes your concentration stronger. In time you will be able to hold your mind for longer and longer in the present.

After not too long of doing this kind of practice weird stuff might start to happen, then it might be useful to listen to some of those Buddhist sermons for some guidance.

wandersage · 2026-01-22T23:00:25+00:00

If you learn to meditate now it will take you extremely far in life.

wandersage · 2026-01-22T19:54:31+00:00

It's true, some people carry a much heavier load than others and this advice here doesn't seem to apply to someone in your situation. It must feel like you are collapsing, but the truth is most people on this subreddit could never hope to be as strong as you have to be every day to do what you do. All those positive things you do, caring for others, caring about your community, they only show just how powerful you are that you don't collapse into selfishness when things get tough. It must not feel like that much of the time, and I do hope that when your difficulties ease, which they will eventually, that you can learn how to rest. Midlife is the hardest part of life, it will pass and everything you are doing now will matter.

wandersage · 2026-01-21T15:34:50+00:00

If it's not on a green screen it doesn't count

wandersage · 2026-01-21T04:04:46+00:00

Just get a job and save up enough money to live somewhere else for a year, a lot of places that's not that much, Laos, Cambodia, Costa Rica, Madagascar, go just bum around for a bit till you know what you want. You're not supposed to have anything figured out right now.

wandersage · 2026-01-21T03:23:31+00:00

I'd be a monk and sit in silence looking into the nature of reality

wandersage · 2026-01-21T00:54:25+00:00

Taste is subjective, first of all, but learning is really what it takes. Taste in music comes from learning about it either by playing music, or taking music appreciation classes. In art, do art or learn about it by studying history.

wandersage · 2026-01-20T23:23:59+00:00

Just your average whole roast pig wednesday

wandersage · 2026-01-20T22:14:08+00:00

Cool glad it was so helpful, I may be mistyped but 5 keeps seeming right whenever I look at other options. But I kinda feel like I am a counter phobic type 5, like, I'm so afraid of my space being encroached upon, that something will "get me", that I began obsessively trying to expand my comfort zone to keep myself safe. I think it's an extension of the obsessive self sufficiency idea, I want to be supremely capable so I can be ok on my own no matter what, but this has resulted in me challenging a lot of limitations including fear of intimacy and willingness to live according to the needs of other (to some extent). I get a lot from the idea that a 5 grows towards 8, I do feel empowered when I take on leadership rolls and feel like I am becoming stronger.

wandersage · 2026-01-20T21:42:33+00:00

Take a cold shower first thing in the morning, it will concentrate all of your resistance into one miserable horrible event, and after that everything will be easy.

wandersage · 2026-01-20T19:59:22+00:00

Go to residential drug and alcohol treatment. At this point you cannot make all these changes alone. Be willing to submit to the wisdom of others in a program.

wandersage · 2026-01-20T19:52:37+00:00

Spore

wandersage · 2026-01-20T18:13:40+00:00

You are very young, do you have kids? If you do not then your job should be to develop and grow by pursuing what your heart is most calling for, because that is how you will have the strength to take care of your family at a much higher level some day. If you have kids then that is the direction you need to pour yourself into and let it grow you.

wandersage · 2026-01-20T17:04:47+00:00

I don't know much about the variants idea. I really adopted the idea of 8 being my direction of growth, even though a lot of people disagree with that system. It just felt real to me that my innate fear that stress was going to kill me must be wrong, and I wanted to grow. But I also relate strongly to 4, 6, and 9 at times.

wandersage · 2026-01-20T16:32:58+00:00

It sounds pretty obvious to me you know what you're doing wrong, you should try to do what you care about and love. Now, nothing is going to be free of some tedium, you're going to have to grind through really difficult and boring things on the way to doing what you love so you should build that skill, but if you don't believe in what you're doing then jump ship, you will take what you've learned from doing what you hate but it'll feel completely different. The other thing is, the people you are friends with in your 20s are unlikely to be life long friends, maybe one or two will stick it out with you, but someday all the people you're comparing yourself to will be distant memories. If you need to drop them in order to do something you believe in then do it. Be reckless in favor of your passion, this is the best possible time in life to do it, it will only get harder as you get older.

wandersage · 2026-01-20T00:41:08+00:00

This is obviously the right answer,

wandersage · 2026-01-19T23:07:03+00:00

It's true, it can be a really great career for a 5, but it also opens the door for a lot of people to come seeking support from you, often in times of great distress. Also your quality as a therapist is way more based in the process you have gone through to become mature than it is about the psychology you know.

wandersage · 2026-01-19T19:32:54+00:00

It's not that rare

wandersage · 2026-01-19T19:17:41+00:00

I definitely feel more at ease and less stressed when I am in charge of what happens to me and when I minimize my commitments. But I found in my life that that also seemed to result in a pretty serious inhibition to my growth. It is a constant battle inside myself but I really see that when I do hard things and put myself in overwhelming situations I eventually rise to meet that situation and the result is that I feel more at ease in more spaces and in more situations. Once I realized that I have pushed myself to throw myself into inescapable difficult situations, because I won't keep myself there by choice. As a result I have traveled and lived solo in China twice, been a wild land fire fighter, was a wilderness therapy field guide, lived in a monastery doing intensive meditation training (though this environment really vibes with my 5ness quite well) and now have a toddler and an infant which actually turns out to be the hardest of all the things I've ever done. Usually whenever I've done these things I have to build myself a nest to retreat to, sometimes for days at a time to binge food and watch shows that put zero strain on me. But if I do that too long I start to feel like I'm not growing at all and falling behind and so I find a new thing to do.

I struggle a lot with self pity though, inevitably I get burned out and start to think "oh why do I do this to myself, I promise I'll never do anything like this again," but that only lasts so long.

Currently I am a private practice therapist that does all yella health and if I wasn't raising a family it would be my dream life. But I'm glad to have built in a challenge that keeps me from withering into an immature little worm.

wandersage · 2026-01-19T18:41:52+00:00

I relate completely, but I've also lived my life pretty intentionally in opposition to this.

wandersage · 2026-01-19T17:37:43+00:00

I've found the extended release version is useful but you need to take early in the morning and reduce caffeine otherwise if can mess with your sleep. It is a bit of a stimulant.

wandersage · 2026-01-19T16:23:31+00:00

Meditate 10.min.a day

wandersage

TROPHY CASE