i stopped trying. almost didn’t notice lockdown

Being accepted is the bare minimum. It might feel good in the beginning, but means very little if nurtured connection doesn’t follow.

There’s a part of me that wants to say the “find your people” type of thing, but I also kinda think it’s BS because I associate it with liberal individualism and the false notion that we can all be whoever and still find people we’ll hit it off with. Some people have shit like oppositional defiant disorder and so are going to have a hard time meshing well with anyone. On the flip side, some people fawn and can seem really good at being accepted on a shallow level but struggle to connect authentically due to them burying their real self out of fear.

If nobody is accepting you, it’s worth asking why. Trying to work out, for example, if it’s because the problem is more them or more you (and getting takes from people you trust if possible to help with perspective, so it isn’t just your own assessment). But you can also flip it in the other direction: What kind of people would you want to accept and why? What about them makes them somebody worth being around, in your mind.

Being liked by many and known by no one might look cool on the surface, but it’s far more lonely than being liked by few and known by few. This isn’t to say you should aim to be unpopular, but popularity is not in itself fulfilling human connection.

I used to (and sometimes relapse) struggle a lot with always wanting to be liked by everyone. Like, to a really bad extent. A huge bunch of reasons for it, too, and just as many if not more reasons as to why that effort didn’t work out (and instead got me very disliked).

To speak anecdotally… As I’ve gotten older (and I mean legitimately older, not just “internet older”), I’ve had to accept the bitter truth that I can’t just ask to sit at every one else’s table all the time. I didn’t ask for my existence to be approved by other people. Instead, I’ve had to adopt the mindset of setting up my own table and being strict about who I allow to sit with me. It gets easier as you get older, not to assume too much here. Just… IDK a lot of the time this kind of worry stems from people who are younger.

You are you (and that’s the most awesome thing you can be regardless and including of everything that entails), and people are going to have to take it or leave it. The trash takes itself out at that point. The important thing is not letting this be an excuse to not look inwards and try to heal what can be healed. Many have used this logic to instead eternally cope rather than working with what they have going on.

As a person with autism I just got used to it. Just be authentic and stop caring about rejection. As you get better at that paradoxically more people will be willing to accept you because not caring whether people like you or not is the essence of being “cool”.

If people do not want to be your friend, that is their lose, not yours.

I accepted myself. Then got to know myself. Not just on a superficial level, the good, bad, and ugly. I thought about who I want to be, and started working on that. And more doors opened.