Cheering for others

[trenton]

I have been struggling with self-actualization and life purpose for a few years now. During this time I have also been struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts which have been there for over a decade. I have placed a lot of pressure on myself to become someone great, but I always felt lost anyway.

One of the consequences of being lost is that I am working as a bag boy at a grocery store. Working at this job makes me feel like I am a failure in life. I often have suicidal thoughts while working. I fight them to the best of my abilities. I finally got them to shut up for a day.

Recently, I started thinking about the success of other people. For example, my co-worker was a victim of predatory loaning. She owed over 60 thousand dollars from a college that was shut down over the scandal. I told her about Biden's student loan forgiveness program. She looked into it and it eventually worked. This turned her entire life around. She was promoted to a better position and she is very happy now.

I'm starting to view the success of other people as just as important as my own. I hope this takes pressure off of me. I don't need to single handedly uplift humanity for the sake of feeling a sense of purpose. Success is difficult and often seems out of reach. Although I don't personally benefit from the success of others,their achievements are no less important than my own life purpose.

I think this new mindset should be helpful.

[HMD]

Have you thought about therapy or psychedelics? 

[trenton]

2 minutes ago, HMD said:

Have you thought about therapy or psychedelics? 

I have been doing therapy with partial success.

I once did a cannabis based gummy that helped.

My family is closed to psychedelics, but I know they are effective. I don't have access to psychedelics at this time.

[MAHA Maggie]

12 hours ago, trenton said:

I have been struggling with self-actualization and life purpose for a few years now. During this time I have also been struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts which have been there for over a decade. I have placed a lot of pressure on myself to become someone great, but I always felt lost anyway.

One of the consequences of being lost is that I am working as a bag boy at a grocery store. Working at this job makes me feel like I am a failure in life. I often have suicidal thoughts while working. I fight them to the best of my abilities. I finally got them to shut up for a day.

Recently, I started thinking about the success of other people. For example, my co-worker was a victim of predatory loaning. She owed over 60 thousand dollars from a college that was shut down over the scandal. I told her about Biden's student loan forgiveness program. She looked into it and it eventually worked. This turned her entire life around. She was promoted to a better position and she is very happy now.

I'm starting to view the success of other people as just as important as my own. I hope this takes pressure off of me. I don't need to single handedly uplift humanity for the sake of feeling a sense of purpose. Success is difficult and often seems out of reach. Although I don't personally benefit from the success of others,their achievements are no less important than my own life purpose.

I think this new mindset should be helpful.

The questions seems to be more, what is important TO YOU and interresting to do FOR YOU. You might be nerdy about a hobby that gives you a lot of joy and depth in your life. That is enough. Having money or fame or a carreer for it's own sake seems superficial and won't fullfill you. --- So what are you passionate about?

[trenton]

2 hours ago, MAHA Maggie said:

The questions seems to be more, what is important TO YOU and interresting to do FOR YOU. You might be nerdy about a hobby that gives you a lot of joy and depth in your life. That is enough. Having money or fame or a carreer for it's own sake seems superficial and won't fullfill you. --- So what are you passionate about?

@MAHA Maggie I used to be more passionate about chess. I'm trying to get back into it. There are a few problems with this. It is hard to make it as a chess player. I currently make some money as a chess instructor, but not enough to replace my other job.

After I went to college I ended up feeling more lost. I tried the life purpose course. Some of my values are open mindedness, objectivity, inner peace, learning, and others. A few other paths I could go down are psychology, philosophy, politics, or math because I'm gifted in math. I see beauty in having well thought out positions and using them to help others.

[HMD]

@trenton How about your daily routine? Like, how does your normal day goes? Do you have any practices incorporated into a routine? Also, do you exercise and take care of your diet? 

Edited October 22, 2023 by HMD

[An young being]

16 hours ago, trenton said:

I have been struggling with self-actualization and life purpose for a few years now.

If you feel you are short on money and will be suffering without enough of it, you have to concentrate on making enough money to meet your needs rather than finding a job that entirely fits your passion, atleast for the time being. In such case, you have to find a balance between how much money the job provides for survival and how much you are passionate about it. You can be passionate about multiple things in life and it's not necessary you have to allocate the most of your time to the thing which you have the highest passion. What you are doing right now is good. You are passionate about chess and you are allocating some time to it every week. Try to do the same for other things you are passionate about by allocating some time for other passions in your free time. It can be as simple as helping people at your workplace.( which you already seem to do).

16 hours ago, trenton said:

One of the consequences of being lost is that I am working as a bag boy at a grocery store. Working at this job makes me feel like I am a failure in life. I often have suicidal thoughts while working. I fight them to the best of my abilities. I finally got them to shut up for a day.

This problem of feeling inferior arises due to comparison. You are comparing with people at a higher strata in your society. But for the universe as a whole, it doesn't matter how far you are in the ladder or how much you contribute to the society or  what others think of you. Remember that Earth is a tiny dot in the universe and for God, it doesn't matter whether that tiny earth gets bigger or smaller. What Elon Musk does to change the world is just like adding a drop of water in the ocean. For God, Gandhi and you are one and the same. God can make all the human beings in earth attain the highest possibility of development in a second, but God doesn't do that. God wants to experience life as you, and experiencing life is the universal life purpose. All other purposes that human makes ultimately serves that purpose. It doesn't matter how you live your life, what only matters is how unique your life is. No matter what you do, your life is already unique. You are the only one who are experiencing the unique life you are living and striving to live. It doesn't have to be great or better. It can even be the worst possible life in the world.

If your mind still wishes to compare, compare your life with the millions of beggars on the world. Compare with the homeless people and the people who are unemployed. According to your definition of life purpose, they don't have any life purpose at all, yet they live a unique life as others in  God's perspective. And they wish to live too.

If you still wish to become a better person in the society, which is also a unique experience and loved by God, it's important to improve life in steps. There's nothing wrong in having great ambitions, but make sure your desires are within your reach and not far fetched. All the levels of comparison are made within your mind, so setting an achievable and shorter goal like getting a better salary or getting a small promotion will give you the same happiness as, for example, Elon Musk establishing another billion dollar company, when comparative  success is removed out of the equation. Instead of creating bigger goals, develop your humane characters such as compassion, gratitude, love etc. They will affect your happiness more than the other factors. What your post is about is ( seeing others success as yours) is also one of the characters falling in the humane category.

Edited October 22, 2023 by An young being

[trenton]

40 minutes ago, HMD said:

@trenton How about your daily routine? Like, how does your normal day goes? Do you have any practices incorporated into a routine? Also, do you exercise and take care of your diet? 

The least productive part of my day is after work. I have an active job with a lot of movement. My legs hurt at the end of the day. I lay down in bed for most of the rest of the day. I have improved my diet by adding more fruits and vegetables to my lunch at work and eating salads. I still have a bunch of junk food mixed in with that though.

I sometimes blame my lack of fulfillment on my laziness.

[trenton]

@An young being I have compared my life to people who have it worse than me. I think no human deserves to suffer like that and I would not want that upon anyone. This should fall into the humane category that you were describing.

[SeaMonster]

I think the key is become comfortable with uncertainty in life.  Even if NOW you're not living your dream, you have to have hope that things can change even if you currently can't envision HOW they would change.  In other words, you have to keep yourself OPEN to opportunities to make your life better.  

[An young being]

1 hour ago, trenton said:

@An young being I have compared my life to people who have it worse than me. I think no human deserves to suffer like that and I would not want that upon anyone. This should fall into the humane category that you were describing.

Yep! And you have to be compassionate towards yourself as well. And be grateful that you are in a better position than them.

Edited October 22, 2023 by An young being