Hopeless

Hi there,

My advice is to be less self-focused and more God focused and see how your life can change. Anytime you start focusing on you in a negative way, turn that around and give it to God. Spend more time reading His Word, less time on TV. More time in prayer, less time viewing inappropriate context. Fill your brain with everything Jesus and I promise your life will be transformed. Christ is our physician Matthew 9:12 Psalms 147:3



Here’s a few sermons to watch in place of the other content….

Have you talked to a therapist about your anxiety? Anxiety and depression are conditions that therapists are trained to diagnose and treat.

You need to talk to God. He will be your friend read Bible. You’ve just gotten lost and unresolved issues building up- too much anxiety. See, you need friend. That’s what Jesus for to us. You are not untouchable. I’ll try to be your friend… PM

Apjrlmcd said:

So I'm 33 male and I'm feeling hopeless, I've been on auto destructive road for some time, I'have problems with anxiety, depression watching prn(I stopped for few years but in the middle ofthis Corona nonsense i fell again)
I resigned from my last job, four months ago, decided to drive uber for this summer and after that see what to do, I m living in a rented place, I have some money that I earned but it's going away with time.
I don't know how to cook, I'm eating a lot of ordered food.
I only had two girlfriends mainly because of my struggle with inappropriate content, and my feeling of not being good enough, so I dodn't even try. Because I always thought if I'm not happy not even close with myself how can I look for a girlfriend. First I should be decent enough man for my standards.
The irony I believe is that I'm
I guess normal looking
I'm 6.0 height in pretty good athletic shape(mostly genes, someone else with my way of life would be twenty kg fatter)
I was always great at sports...
I got pretty good result on some iq test that I solved when I was having anxiety and panic attacks problem, the doctor said I was above average.
So I guess smart enough
And I have job skills in telecomunications/electro stuff, also on PC. So I'm not on zero level
Also I lost my connection to God, I stopped praying and going to church, also wlused to go to confession every week or two but now I can't remember when I went
Usually I knew a way to get back to God, but now I'm paralyzed with anxiety, it's getting worse and worse and I don't know what to do

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God is in control .... even though there are terrible things going on in this world and in our lives. Why is often beyond our total understanding. Try not to focus on the negative .... life will not always be as it is now .... focus on what is to come .... a sinless world .... WOW .... can't wait.

1 Peter 5:7​

7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.

May the Lord bring peace to your mind ... in Jesus name .... amen.
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1 Peter 5&version=NIV

Have you considered talking to a pastor or going to a Christian counselor to help you? I will keep you in my prayers. God loves you and he cares about you. Always know you can talk to God and read his word.

Apjrlmcd said:

Usually I knew a way to get back to God, but now I'm paralyzed with anxiety, it's getting worse and worse and I don't know what to do

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You seem like you in the midst of a break from the world, which makes sense when your overwhelmed with anxiety and depression. I've been there.

So let's unpack it a bit more. So you've said you feel your feeling chronically unworthy, especially of a relationship and struggling with a inappropriate content addiction. You don't have the energy to learn cooking, but you like food and would like it to be a skill one day; otherwise, your lost in terms of a life vocation and really just doing whatever pays the basic bills. You long for a relationship with God, but feel disconnected.

Hopefully that sums it up well. That sounds to me like your someone who values intimate relationships above other areas of life but who's life experiences has left them feeling isolated. In psychology speak, likely due to unaddressed 'attachment issues'. This inability to make progress in this key area in the 15 or so years since leaving your childhood is essentially now a wound, which is radiating out pain to the point and interfering with other less valued areas which would be easier for you to take action on: self-care, doing a vocation, education, friends, religious etc etc

In short, the trick will be completing goals in those less valued areas as that will alleviate some of the existential pain associated with your depression well chipping away at the root of your anguish, your unaddressed attachment issues, which are leading you into dysfunctional relationship dynamics and isolation fuelling a constant feeling of longing and anxiety.

Practical steps.

Living
1) Get a low commitment job as a cook to facilitate learning your desired skill by environment
2) You sound catholic. Do you think you can find a daily mass to attend? Or even more ideally, an adoration chapel?
There you can create a daily practice of prayer:
"I am full, help me become empty making room for your Spirit.
I am sorrowful, let me clear my ears that I might hear the joy of your angels.
I am full of thoughts, opinions, judgments, emotions, anger, pride...I need not be.
Your Will be done oh Lord! I have done it my way and only found anguish.
Your will be done, and I know I can again know joy.
I am ready, let me be your actor"

You are currently grieving and must let go of this something your holding to very tightly, but which no longer servers you.

3) You've said you 'have job skills in telecomunications/electro stuff' which to me mean you likely will have a real vocation in that sector. You need to develop a specialty. Maybe Programming, IT, Marketing, AI, Gaming, dev ops, security....but it's time to learn one area to mastery. No mastery no sense of accomplishment. You have no energy for it due to your depression, so the only way is small steps and a daily habit. Maybe start with an A+ cert...it the 10,000 hour problem. You don't have a preclivity so be it. Put in 10,000 hours of practice your a player period.

Addiction
4) read and implement in your own way the '12 steps' as applied to your vice, we all have addictions.
5) Stop the cycle, don't abstain/binge or guilt/praise, count. "I've done x today, I hope to do 0 tomorrow"....judgment will not free you. Accept your limitations, pray for strength and do better. Our will power can work against us in addiction, when life threatening there may be no choice by abstinence, but whenever it is with something toxic we juice as meaningful. That willpower makes it climbing Everest, when in fact the truth is it a few simple different daily choices. The problem then is how much will power we're using for a simple problem. If we can instead calm ourselves, one day it really will be just making another choice and you'll barely remember why it was so important once.

Root Issue
6) Start simple: Why did this dynamic arise? OR How can you change? OR What are your questions about your condition?

Apjrlmcd said:

I feel like I'm unworthy of God forgiveness, because he kinda saved me from this watching prn, anxiety, depression life, and I feel that slowly with time I got back in, and it's my fault

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God isn't a once and done kind of savior. If he were we'd all be dead generations ago.

Apjrlmcd said:

I don't like to cook,
I actually feel good when driving, and in my country you could earn a lot during the summer that way, but it's not something that I want to do my whole life, so my plan was to learn programming during three-four months in winter and work rest of the year, and do that until I find some job in IT...
I also oversleep a lot, and it adds to all these problems making me feel even worse
You made some good points in your post, tnx for replying

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Well I am a senior in the IT industry. So feel free to ask about getting started with any goals in that area. But do try and pick somthing physical to become a hobby. Not having a hobby weights on a person.

Oversleeping is apart of living through depression. So not suprising. You need more sleep, your essential expending 900x the mental energy require to do anything even basic.

Apjrlmcd said:

I had a bad relationship with my father basically my whole life, it's little better last few years

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Symptoms of unresolved feelings of being alienated by a father figure can go a few ways:

1. One way is to frame past interactions with your father as dealing with a 'broken hero' that is to say “he would have connected to me if…” in which case we generally fictionalize our conceptions of masculinity/hero/mentors and seek to be like some masculine hero in stories or tv -- successfully or unsuccessfully.
2. Others, just feel deep resentment. This lead us to 'feminize' ourselves not necessarily outwardly, but basically we aspire to be a 'white knight' or 'good guy' to terrible results:: You don't like rough edges. Things need to be orderly. People are too much. Good boys follow the rules. Etc etc. (good guy syndrome:: girls ‘befriend’ you, but never seek to date you )
3. Others find themselves either seeking male approval or attacking it pushing most older males in your life away and lowing their social status
4. Others mirror those same alienated father traits that had them feeling disconnected. This means they come off dislikable in most social settings and get very isolated as they make people feel alienated.

Any of those sound familiar? As any one or combination would have to be unpacked differently.

In all scenarios in intimate relationships someone who hasn’t dealt with their feelings of having an alienating father
comes in with 'huge' expectations on the woman they want to date as a side effect of their internal dialogue about themselves and a bad sense of when to assert or compromise.

Unaddressed it also leads to many divorces…as more often then not, it gets partially resolved, allowing an unhealthy relationship which is often more appealing than being alone.

In general, if a high quality women picks up any red flags they run fast. If this keeps happening quite early on in getting to know you then it often creates a rejection complex and shyness that further complicates one’s ability to date. Women with less caution may stick around or still pursue, but will feed on the inevitable outburst of aggressive well being comforted by the overly nice over corrections leading to codependant relationships followed by isolation.

Apjrlmcd said:

I started with some python tutorials, and plan as I dove deeper in that to choose something that I like and go in that direction, but I would do that if everything was normal I and if was not so low on energy...

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Have a project in mind? And of course, with depression/anxiety time can seem quite precious. It’s why habit formation is so important. To get something done it almost has to be by accident. Will power is too limited to make significant progress.

Apjrlmcd said:

So I'm 33 male and I'm feeling hopeless, I've been on auto destructive road for some time, I'have problems with anxiety, depression watching prn(I stopped for few years but in the middle ofthis Corona nonsense i fell again)
I resigned from my last job, four months ago, decided to drive uber for this summer and after that see what to do, I m living in a rented place, I have some money that I earned but it's going away with time.
I don't know how to cook, I'm eating a lot of ordered food.
I only had two girlfriends mainly because of my struggle with inappropriate content, and my feeling of not being good enough, so I dodn't even try. Because I always thought if I'm not happy not even close with myself how can I look for a girlfriend. First I should be decent enough man for my standards.
The irony I believe is that I'm
I guess normal looking
I'm 6.0 height in pretty good athletic shape(mostly genes, someone else with my way of life would be twenty kg fatter)
I was always great at sports...
I got pretty good result on some iq test that I solved when I was having anxiety and panic attacks problem, the doctor said I was above average.
So I guess smart enough
And I have job skills in telecomunications/electro stuff, also on PC. So I'm not on zero level
Also I lost my connection to God, I stopped praying and going to church, also wlused to go to confession every week or two but now I can't remember when I went
Usually I knew a way to get back to God, but now I'm paralyzed with anxiety, it's getting worse and worse and I don't know what to do

Click to expand...

Number one thing is to shake off that sin that so easily besets you. Not just you but many struggle with it... that is inappropriate content.
inappropriate content will cause you to break fellowship with God (But not necessarily your relationship with Him).
You are not alone in this Apjrmcd. It is one of the most common pits that believers will fall into these days.
I find a couple principles help me regarding any sort of temptation.
First we discussed, how that this is common to man. Even Jesus was tempted in every way.
Look at 1 Corinthians 10

1 Corinthians 10:13 KJV
13. There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.

Important truth from this verse:
1. This temptation is common to man.
2. God will never allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able.
3. God is faithful in that He provides a way of escape for every temptation.
These are true about inappropriate content also. God is there, and He is providing a way of escape. When you are tempted, look for that escape!

This is true about all temptations. Anger, hate, fear, doubt, lying... whatever. He is there with an escape route.

Another principle is that God loves us and even when we do fail, He is faithful to forgive.

1 John 1:9 KJV
9. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Notice that word "faithful" again. God is taking responsibility for this. He is faithful He will do it. He wants you to be successful.

Of course He does not want us to sin. Two verses later John points this out.

1 John 2:1-2 KJV
1. My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous:
2. And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.

So stand on that. He does not lie and He certainly knows what He is talking about.
Lean on Him. Let Him be your savior. He is right there.
You have been given everything you need to be successful. You can do this, just as millions of others have.
Peace

Apjrlmcd said:

As for project unfortunately I'm not on that level yet

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Yeah, it almost always seems that way especially when starting up but really before people start regularly telling you otherwise. Without exception everyone new abandons a good number of projects before they get that first one they actually complete. Even then your overwhelmed at the idea you could do more, but you almost always do. It's probably the constant learning(multiple layers), making mistakes(you will spend more time debugging than writing) and needing to lookup basic things you've done before but forget. We all do this at all levels, it's the life of a technology professional.

Some deal with that anxiety by doing tutorial after tutorial. Some buy the books/course and don’t read or work on them. Other just feel their ‘imposter syndrome’ despite jobs and a huge list of accomplishments. I was talking to a guy the otherday, a guy who has been doing killer websites for 20 years just because he was asked to work on a new framework to bring those skills to an App he’s feeling he’s under-qualified. The dude does circles around others in his position.

I highly recommend though coming up with a simple app idea, game whatever —> open vscode/pycharm in one window, chatGPT in another. And ask questions/clarification to chatGPT(https://chat.openai.com) till you get something half working.

Real improvement over how I learned, which took years and tons of learning key concepts way to late and by accident. Even if it takes you years, it’s still worth it -- so fun and creative. Just hate to see you living though that same anxiety stage.

i guess i didnt know that or anything about women, but with with my last girlfriend I kinda through that relationship found out about it, so I totally see man and women and their relationships in totally different way now, but realizing it I withdrew into myself, thinking I won't enter relationships until I'm man I want to be in my eyes...

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Oh yes, I remember needing to go though that. It’s what Robert Bly/Men’s Movement labelled katabasis. Not recommending the men's movement, just deals with the same stuff. It’s a rough period. Lot’s of emotions to work through.

I personally needed to find my humorous side in that time. During I thought I was developing into more of a leader, romantic , stoic warrior or monk or something cool. I was kind of right certainly got more of all those traits. It took me a long while, plenty of distractions and a lot of anxiety/pain to find the common thread of resisting humour which was blocking me from taking the actions that I always wanted but never seem to able to actually get my act together on.

One can't really be themselves till them can laugh at the tragic irony. Got to see beauty everywhere to feel joy anytime. What are we going to think positive though about all these ugly things? Just platitudes to mask our disgust? Seeing humour in them though well then it's just another chance to laugh and enjoy the moment.

Apjrlmcd said:

So I'm 33 male and I'm feeling hopeless, I've been on auto destructive road for some time, I'have problems with anxiety, depression watching prn(I stopped for few years but in the middle ofthis Corona nonsense i fell again)
I resigned from my last job, four months ago, decided to drive uber for this summer and after that see what to do, I m living in a rented place, I have some money that I earned but it's going away with time.
I don't know how to cook, I'm eating a lot of ordered food.
I only had two girlfriends mainly because of my struggle with inappropriate content, and my feeling of not being good enough, so I dodn't even try. Because I always thought if I'm not happy not even close with myself how can I look for a girlfriend. First I should be decent enough man for my standards.
The irony I believe is that I'm
I guess normal looking
I'm 6.0 height in pretty good athletic shape(mostly genes, someone else with my way of life would be twenty kg fatter)
I was always great at sports...
I got pretty good result on some iq test that I solved when I was having anxiety and panic attacks problem, the doctor said I was above average.
So I guess smart enough
And I have job skills in telecomunications/electro stuff, also on PC. So I'm not on zero level
Also I lost my connection to God, I stopped praying and going to church, also wlused to go to confession every week or two but now I can't remember when I went
Usually I knew a way to get back to God, but now I'm paralyzed with anxiety, it's getting worse and worse and I don't know what to do

Click to expand...

Brother, I understand.
I have depression myself. Things get dark.
I will pray for you today and ask the Lord to keep you in my thoughts and prayers.
I would like to note that there are positives in your post. Primarily that you understand in your heart of hearts some things that you need to get back to. You understand in your heart that God is the refuge to which you need to fly. Call out to Jesus. He is there and available, waiting for all His sheep to call out to Him.

"Father in heaven, glorious is Your name. You have full understanding in all matters. You are our creator, both of men and women.
You understand what men need, because You created us. Please bless Apjrlmcd with a greater understanding of who are you and what You are really like. Be his light and his refuge. Use this time of pain to bring him to Yourself. May the Lord be glorified and may the name of Jesus be lifted up. Blessed is the name of the Lord. In Jesus' name, the name You love. Amen."

Here is a sermon by Dr. Sinclair Ferguson that is a great encouragement to me.
I hope it can be a light in your dark times.

- many blessings

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxbLKzZZpjo​

Apjrlmcd said:

As for programming I read from lot of people I guess the same thing you are saying, so I guess I ll do that

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Feel free to DM if you have any questions or thoughts. I love to see people get into technology.

As for that other part, do you recommend the book?

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No, with low energy I would recommend something more practical. What do you think your biggest goal would be over the next year?