Help What are you even supposed to do when you don't enjoy anything anymore

[mydeadflowers]

Sorry in advance for the whining.

I want nothing more than to enjoy my own interests again. I want to make friends or to try something new again, but having spent the past year and a half trying to regain the love I've had for things like drawing, playing games and reading/watching new stuff, or even talking to friends, I worry I'm losing the motivation to actually try. I spend most of my time either going to school, studying, or working at my retail job, and whenever I do get free time I feel so withdrawn and fatigued that I would much rather sleep. Right now I have the time to actually do something that would entertain me previously, but it feels like I have to force myself to engage with the interests I've previously held dear to me. Learning new skills such as language acquisition or trying out different artistic mediums doesn't feel rewarding in the slightest even when I do show signs of growth. My depressive tendencies and anxiety have resulted in me becoming distant from friends as I feel far too guilty to even talk to them when I feel so withdrawn 90% of the time. Having developed a cannabis and alcohol addiction just so I don't hurt myself due to being an incredibly emotional person has probably completely fried my brain and DEFINITELY contributes to my lack of pleasure, yet having tried to quit within the past few weeks has made me realize that I've become far more depressive, irritable, and manic than I was prior to developing these habits.

All I want to know is how literally anyone here copes with a complete lack of pleasure within their surroundings, or how to develop habits that'll set me on the right track. I miss feeling happy and I need SOMETHING to motivate me to continue sticking through the drudgery of school and work.

 

[citrusrope]

Gonna comment on your post because I want to know too... the apathy towards things I used to enjoy is growing everyday and it's scaring me.

 

[Seven Threads]

Hey there, dead flowers. I hear you loud and clear. That kind of lack of enthusiasm for, well, anything at all, is very difficult and debilitating to deal with. I'm sure you can probably understand what I mean when I say that sometimes, you can get so numb it hurts. And breaking out of it can seem basically impossible, especially when it feels like all you want to do is lay down and sleep whenever you get the chance.

And honestly? That's the first part. The biggest favor you could probably do for yourself right now is to understand that this is going to happen. You're going to fight back, you're going to try and reach out, do things, engage. And the vast majority of the time, you're going to lose, curl up into a ball, and just do whatever you can think of to feel less awful. This is going to happen. A lot. And one of the biggest things that helps is understanding that, and being kind to yourself about it. You are very literally fighting your own brain, and your brain packs a wallop. It is far less productive to beat yourself up about it than it is to acknowledge that you didn't make it today, but you'll try again.

Okay. Second thing. A lot of the time (not always, but quite often), we go numb because we're trying to avoid feeling something bad. Maybe it's guilt or social anxiety. Maybe it's a genuinely shitty or stressful situation. Maybe there's something in your life that you just can't deal with right now. A lot of the time, our brains will shut down our emotional responses just in general in order to protect us from some kind of bad feeling we're not prepared to handle. But of course, as you've observed, when this goes on for a long time, we just feel worse overall, and some of the bad stuff gets through anyway. It's an adaptive response that evolved to protect us, but evolution hasn't kept up with a society in which a lot of our stressors or sources of anxiety are omnipresent and can't be escaped from.

Sometimes, in order to break out of that, the only real way forward is to confront one of those things that your instincts are trying to desperately avoid by shutting you down. And to that end, I actually have a suggestion. I am, unfortunately, intimately familiar with guilt based social isolation. When you withdraw from someone to a certain extent, the guilt attached to that can be incredibly overwhelming, because it feels like you have to provide some kind of meaningful explanation or justification for your absence before you can even attempt to reconnect. It's a surprisingly common experience, and one I've gone through many times myself, mostly with my brother and my mom. But I can also say that, having pushed through it (or in some cases been forced to push through it by then reaching out to me), the relief that comes from just biting the bullet (poor choice of words I know) and getting back in touch despite the guilt and the anxiety is overwhelming, and it's one of the few things I've found that can reliably break through that stifling numbness of anhedonia. So do it. And don't give yourself too much time to think about it either so you can talk yourself out of it. Make a decision about who is important to you that you're currently self-isolating from, and reach out to them. Right now. Tonight. If they're the kind of person who's worth being close to you in the first place, they should hopefully give you some sort of response back that can break through the awful numbness and disinterest you're feeling right now. And even if they don't, at least it's one fear out of the way.

 

[mydeadflowers]

Hey there, dead flowers. I hear you loud and clear. That kind of lack of enthusiasm for, well, anything at all, is very difficult and debilitating to deal with. I'm sure you can probably understand what I mean when I say that sometimes, you can get so numb it hurts. And breaking out of it can seem basically impossible, especially when it feels like all you want to do is lay down and sleep whenever you get the chance.

And honestly? That's the first part. The biggest favor you could probably do for yourself right now is to understand that this is going to happen. You're going to fight back, you're going to try and reach out, do things, engage. And the vast majority of the time, you're going to lose, curl up into a ball, and just do whatever you can think of to feel less awful. This is going to happen. A lot. And one of the biggest things that helps is understanding that, and being kind to yourself about it. You are very literally fighting your own brain, and your brain packs a wallop. It is far less productive to beat yourself up about it than it is to acknowledge that you didn't make it today, but you'll try again.

Okay. Second thing. A lot of the time (not always, but quite often), we go numb because we're trying to avoid feeling something bad. Maybe it's guilt or social anxiety. Maybe it's a genuinely shitty or stressful situation. Maybe there's something in your life that you just can't deal with right now. A lot of the time, our brains will shut down our emotional responses just in general in order to protect us from some kind of bad feeling we're not prepared to handle. But of course, as you've observed, when this goes on for a long time, we just feel worse overall, and some of the bad stuff gets through anyway. It's an adaptive response that evolved to protect us, but evolution hasn't kept up with a society in which a lot of our stressors or sources of anxiety are omnipresent and can't be escaped from.

Sometimes, in order to break out of that, the only real way forward is to confront one of those things that your instincts are trying to desperately avoid by shutting you down. And to that end, I actually have a suggestion. I am, unfortunately, intimately familiar with guilt based social isolation. When you withdraw from someone to a certain extent, the guilt attached to that can be incredibly overwhelming, because it feels like you have to provide some kind of meaningful explanation or justification for your absence before you can even attempt to reconnect. It's a surprisingly common experience, and one I've gone through many times myself, mostly with my brother and my mom. But I can also say that, having pushed through it (or in some cases been forced to push through it by then reaching out to me), the relief that comes from just biting the bullet (poor choice of words I know) and getting back in touch despite the guilt and the anxiety is overwhelming, and it's one of the few things I've found that can reliably break through that stifling numbness of anhedonia. So do it. And don't give yourself too much time to think about it either so you can talk yourself out of it. Make a decision about who is important to you that you're currently self-isolating from, and reach out to them. Right now. Tonight. If they're the kind of person who's worth being close to you in the first place, they should hopefully give you some sort of response back that can break through the awful numbness and disinterest you're feeling right now. And even if they don't, at least it's one fear out of the way.

I keep on trying to rationalize how I should approach people since I tend to feel as though I need a valid reason to do so, otherwise I'd be wasting their time. A close friend of mine who is currently in recovery as well has told me that, unironically, one of the most effective ways to work towards a better position in life is to just fake it 'til I make it. And I suppose that could be forcing myself to reach out to or hang out with others despite feeling either guilty or nothing at all. Having done just that after my initial post with a close friend has, at the very least, left me feeling numb as opposed to outright shitty. Honestly, I think the problem is just the fact that I have incredibly low energy levels, which makes it feel as though it's almost painful having to force myself to socialize whenever I'm in a withdrawn state.

Regardless, I don't want to use that as an excuse to disregard your advice. It might be best for me to accept that the best course of action right now is to resign myself to fatigue for the night and head to sleep so I can think of what kinds of things I'm avoiding and why I'm avoiding them once I wake up. Thank you for taking the time to write all of this, I wish I was able to say more but my head's pretty empty at the moment. I hope we both wake up feeling better tomorrow.

 

[Seven Threads]

I keep on trying to rationalize how I should approach people since I tend to feel as though I need a valid reason to do so, otherwise I'd be wasting their time. A close friend of mine who is currently in recovery as well has told me that, unironically, one of the most effective ways to work towards a better position in life is to just fake it 'til I make it. And I suppose that could be forcing myself to reach out to or hang out with others despite feeling either guilty or nothing at all. Having done just that after my initial post with a close friend has, at the very least, left me feeling numb as opposed to outright shitty. Honestly, I think the problem is just the fact that I have incredibly low energy levels, which makes it feel as though it's almost painful having to force myself to socialize whenever I'm in a withdrawn state.

Regardless, I don't want to use that as an excuse to disregard your advice. It might be best for me to accept that the best course of action right now is to resign myself to fatigue for the night and head to sleep so I can think of what kinds of things I'm avoiding and why I'm avoiding them once I wake up. Thank you for taking the time to write all of this, I wish I was able to say more but my head's pretty empty at the moment. I hope we both wake up feeling better tomorrow.

I wish you all the best. Get some rest tonight, and figure out where you're at and what you're capable of tomorrow. And also, and this is important: touch base. Come back to us here tomorrow and let us know how you're doing. If nothing else, some kind of consistent community engagement is probably the best medicine you could give yourself at the moment. We're here for ya.