I love this story! It really strikes something deep inside of me... Warning: I haven’t neither read all of the sequences nor do i have any experience in writing. Since this is the first thing i ever write on lesswrong it may not meet the high standards of this board, so feel free to downvote/ignore this (but please don’t delete it unless i really violated community rules somehow).
I am currently trying to work my way out of a depressive episode. Basically i am stuck in a loop of:
trying to do X,
getting overwhelmed by feelings i can’t even describe,
resorting to play some ancient flashgames i found on steam until i feel better, then
repeat.
Physical activity, healthy eating, vitamins, sunlight, a mix of stimulants and antidepressants and professional counseling all seem to help a bit but not enough to get me out of that funk. I live with friends and have parents that support me financially (which i hate to be reliant upon).
I identify with Susan in this episode since gaming basically does the same thing for me. I get hooked on games so intensly that i enter a state of mind where the feeling of hunger, thirst or sleepiness hardly registers and i certainly don’t act upon it except it gets so intense that it interferes with the game. Gaming for me is a time machine i use to skip the times when my emotions would otherwise hurt me. When i stop the game i hardly remember anything from the time i spent in that state, except that i just spent half a day pushing bits around and got nothing done.
Just like Susan i try to erase things from my life.
Just like her i am stuck in a bad loop.
Just like her i realize that.
Other than her i didn’t make the conscious decision to be here.
Other than her i try to get out.
Other than her i have limited time left in my life.
So what would be the way out? This story made clear to me that suffering is a part of life. Susan is stuck because she doesn’t realize that. But am I? I am acutely aware that life is pain. I tried to do stuff that makes me get out of that loop (see listing above) but I feel like i am.… doing it wrong somehow? What am i missing?
Thank you very much for reading the story. I am very glad you enjoyed it and that it connected with you. Also, Welcome to lesswrong.
I am sorry you have these problems—being stuck in a bad loop. It sounds very hard. I am afraid that when it comes to finding a way out I am just a random person on the internet, so any advice you have already got from friends, family or the counselors is likely to be as good or (more likely) better than anything I say.
That said, a thing that helps me is when I “try to do X” I find it helps to intentionally set the bar low. eg. “I will wash at least one of those dishes”. This gives me little excuse not to at least do the one. Sometimes once I have started I keep going and do more, but their is no pressure. The sense of forward momentum in games (leveling up or similar) makes them addictive for me. If you feel the same then maybe trying to get that same sense of momentum in real life tasks would help. (eg. trying one of those app games that scores you for walking around—at least if you got addicted to that you would get some sun, air and exercise). It sounds like you have already tried huge exertions of effort directly against this problem, I have zero knowledge, but maybe (like with a riptide) a trick might be to not to push directly against but to move sideways—an example would be that you feel that “doing x” will require a huge expenditure of energy/motivation, so do “y” instead, where y is some other useful thing.
Best of luck with everything. I hope you get it all sorted out soon. I am sure it won’t always feel like “life is pain”.
I love this story! It really strikes something deep inside of me...
Warning: I haven’t neither read all of the sequences nor do i have any experience in writing. Since this is the first thing i ever write on lesswrong it may not meet the high standards of this board, so feel free to downvote/ignore this (but please don’t delete it unless i really violated community rules somehow).
I am currently trying to work my way out of a depressive episode. Basically i am stuck in a loop of:
trying to do X,
getting overwhelmed by feelings i can’t even describe,
resorting to play some ancient flashgames i found on steam until i feel better, then
repeat.
Physical activity, healthy eating, vitamins, sunlight, a mix of stimulants and antidepressants and professional counseling all seem to help a bit but not enough to get me out of that funk. I live with friends and have parents that support me financially (which i hate to be reliant upon).
I identify with Susan in this episode since gaming basically does the same thing for me. I get hooked on games so intensly that i enter a state of mind where the feeling of hunger, thirst or sleepiness hardly registers and i certainly don’t act upon it except it gets so intense that it interferes with the game. Gaming for me is a time machine i use to skip the times when my emotions would otherwise hurt me. When i stop the game i hardly remember anything from the time i spent in that state, except that i just spent half a day pushing bits around and got nothing done.
Just like Susan i try to erase things from my life.
Just like her i am stuck in a bad loop.
Just like her i realize that.
Other than her i didn’t make the conscious decision to be here.
Other than her i try to get out.
Other than her i have limited time left in my life.
So what would be the way out? This story made clear to me that suffering is a part of life. Susan is stuck because she doesn’t realize that. But am I? I am acutely aware that life is pain. I tried to do stuff that makes me get out of that loop (see listing above) but I feel like i am.… doing it wrong somehow? What am i missing?
Thank you very much for reading the story. I am very glad you enjoyed it and that it connected with you. Also, Welcome to lesswrong.
I am sorry you have these problems—being stuck in a bad loop. It sounds very hard. I am afraid that when it comes to finding a way out I am just a random person on the internet, so any advice you have already got from friends, family or the counselors is likely to be as good or (more likely) better than anything I say.
That said, a thing that helps me is when I “try to do X” I find it helps to intentionally set the bar low. eg. “I will wash at least one of those dishes”. This gives me little excuse not to at least do the one. Sometimes once I have started I keep going and do more, but their is no pressure. The sense of forward momentum in games (leveling up or similar) makes them addictive for me. If you feel the same then maybe trying to get that same sense of momentum in real life tasks would help. (eg. trying one of those app games that scores you for walking around—at least if you got addicted to that you would get some sun, air and exercise). It sounds like you have already tried huge exertions of effort directly against this problem, I have zero knowledge, but maybe (like with a riptide) a trick might be to not to push directly against but to move sideways—an example would be that you feel that “doing x” will require a huge expenditure of energy/motivation, so do “y” instead, where y is some other useful thing.
Best of luck with everything. I hope you get it all sorted out soon. I am sure it won’t always feel like “life is pain”.