Explain to me why BJJ is so wonderful, and how/where would I do them?
Brother, sometimes you got to fake it till you make it. Don’t think you’re above that. Sometimes you literally need to just put a smile on your face and get on with life to get to a point that smile is genuine. It’s not easy but most of us have had to put on a brave face when we’re low.
This is not to say you shouldn’t open up on your struggles with people.
Idk if you’ll listen but I’ll give you another suggestion.
I had a friend like you. He struggles with mental health and abuses drugs and alcohol. He’s probably an addict tbh but still somewhat functional because he’s actually brilliant which is the sad part. Our relationship became very 1 sided with him always dumping his issues on me. I don’t mind listening but that’s all I was to him at 1 point. He never asked how I’m doing or tried to add anything to the relationship. I also think his emotional maturity is stunted by numbing himself with alcohol and drugs.
What I’m getting at is, relationships are 2 sides. If you want to have some good ones you need to add to their life. You can’t bring negativity only and expect people to want to stick around. We all got our own shit to deal with.
Try to get out of yourself and contribute to others.
Or have we ever mentioned get a dog? It’s good for emotional support and taking care of someone or a dog takes you out of your own problems.
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Because BJJ like other legitimate martial arts are very hard mentally, emotionally, and physically. You get to push yourself in these areas in a controlled environment that’s safe in practice.
It makes the challenges in life more manageable if you’ve conquered yourself in these areas. You’ll build confidence in yourself if you can do this.
You don’t necessarily have to do martial arts but I’ve found many people find it extremely beneficial.
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Not saying you need to do that either. If someone asks you your opinion, tell them what it is. That’s fine. Same when it’s something important.
What I was referring to more is all the pointless complaining you tend to do. As an example, this is one of the first interactions I remember having with you on here:
Going into a thread about pineapple picking to complain that you don’t like pineapples and don’t want to pick them in the Taiwan summer. For trivial stuff like this, I think it would be beneficial to realize that (i) not everything is about you, (ii) it’s not necessary to always express every complaint you have, and (iii) sometimes it’s better to just stay silent.
The point being, when someone is like that and negative all the time, I’m just going to think “Jesus, this person is tedious” and not want to devote much time to them, and I think that’s a pretty common attitude. So better to avoid making people think that when possible, if you want to get on with others better.
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It isn’t wonderful. It probably sucks a lot of the time. You’re going to spend a lot of time failing at it.
And that’s the whole point. You can build confidence dealing with suck and failure in a controlled environment, where it doesn’t really matter, but where the positive rewards - the sense of achievement that comes from getting good at something - will erode the depression monster.
The fact that you don’t want to do it is precisely why you ought to do it.
EDIT: ha! I see @Andrew0409 just wrote almost exactly the same thing …
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Feels a bit like enlisting in the marines… it sucks but it would somehow “fix” you.
Sort of but not really. With a martial arts class you’re in control of the pace. In the Marines you either measure up or fail out. And again: nothing is going to ‘fix’ you. You’re on a journey here. You have 5000 different things you need to deal with. You can only handle a few at a time; or maybe one at a time, and it’s probably going to take you several years. Just try to avoid saying ‘it’s all too difficult, I’m not even going to try’.
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There’s plenty of other things that can get me sense of accomplishment that isn’t sports.
I’ve read about the octobass. Google it if you want to know what it is.
I think it would be nice if I could one day build one, as there are not many of these instruments that exists in the world, and only way to build it is to examine the few that does exist, or from historical sources.
I don’t think I’ll build one right this minute, but I feel like I could start by building a violin, then scaling it up over time, build a viola, a cello, a double bass, and then when I think I’ve got the techniques down, I can start procuring the materials needed to build the octobass. Of course I will have to find a location that can hold it, and it will have to be assembled and painted on site (it’s too large to practically transport whole). In fact if I ever do build one, I’ll design it so that it can be easily disassembled for transport… otherwise it won’t be able to be transported at all.
But if you think I should do BJJ maybe someone with a world gym membership can meet me there and teach me?
Vacations to Japan seems to have gotten cheap because the Yen keeps depreciating… so I might try for that.
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No doubt there is, but don’t confuse doing something with doing something useful. And don’t just sit around thinking “it would be nice if one day I could…”. You’re not going to make any progress just doing more of what you already do, or just daydreaming. You’re going to have to exit your comfort zone.
I don’t know which members here do BJJ, but even if they did, they don’t owe you free tuition. This is not the right way to ask for help - as @Andrew0409 said, if you want friendships and support, you need to start thinking about what you bring to the table, not what you can get out of other people. Your immediate task is to work on yourself - to become someone who does actually bring something positive to a relationship (of whatever kind). You’ll know you’re making progress when people start to offer you support without you needing to ask for it.
Nothing wrong with a holiday, but don’t use it as an excuse for procrastination. You have a mission to complete here.
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It’s hard to talk about depression
No one can understand what you are going through unless they are going through the same
It’s just impossible.
People think they can see u clearly, what u r doing wrong clearly, what u should be doing clearly,
But
In the end , still no one can really understand what u r going through. Only u can .
That’s why Friedrich Nietzsche said life is nothing but suffering . Happy people just give that suffering some value.
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I’m sure there are some videos out there.
You’re not really selling this whole “do bjj and you’ll be cured of depression” very well.
That’s not what Finley’s trying to do though. He’s basically encouraging you to get out of your comfort zone, get out there and socialise. Doesn’t have to be BJJ specifically. But also he’s not saying it’s an immediate fix. There’s no single fix for depression anyway. But you gotta start somewhere.
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I don’t do BJJ, but I do practice the martial art of taijiquan 太極拳, and someone I know has told me that it helped their mental health by providing social interaction, a supportive environment with everyone working towards the same goal, and a clear feeling of progress (in taijiquan you learn a number of forms in sequence, and later if you want you can push hands with others to test your skills). As I indicated earlier in the thread, there are free practice groups in the parks where you can start. In Taipei, 228 park or Daan park around 7 AM should probably have some groups practicing.
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I hate to get hot and sweaty too, but for an hour or two a day at night it is not a big deal. Take a shower when you get home. Or go to World Gym to shower afterwards.
Your problem seems to be that nobody likes you. Or, that you cannot make yourself basically likable so that even minor social interaction with you becomes a hardship to other people. (just listening to what you have said)
Well work on that. Maybe do not say so much. Count to 10 before you say something. Keep yourself clean and do not be a slob. Say different things. Stop saying “no” or “cannot” or “impossible” or “why”. Do not always be so disagreeable and a know-it-all. You get the idea.
And be social online more. I do not mean here, but on Discord or whatever. There is hundreds if not tens of thousands of free Discords you could join to talk about all kinds of topics. You probably hanker for real-world social interaction but online is better than nothing. And again, this forum is not the place.
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So just be a yes man, and everyone will instantly like me?
I’ve never found any therapist to be of any use, probably just better off going to a shrink for some drugs anyways.
My conclusion is society has no clue how to deal with depression, or it doesn’t want to. We want everyone to be agreeable, and if you can’t, well go die quietly somewhere.
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You really don’t make it easy for people trying to help you, TL…
Nobody has said that.
Not necessarily, but it’s considerably more likely to be successful than always saying no.
One word: stubborn
Again, TL, nobody is going to “deal with” this for you. They cannot, even if they wanted to. The only person who can fix this is you. You’ve had some absolutely excellent advice from several people in this group, and if you would only stop complaining and just do as they have suggested, you would see improvements.
I get the feeling you want this to be solved overnight. You’ve built up problems for yourself over an entire lifetime, and there is absolutely no way it’s all going to resolve itself just because you go to a BJJ class or whatever, and certainly not because you take a magic pill. You’re going to have to put in all those hours - years - of hard work that everybody else did in their teens and 20s.
No. Just no. Nobody has said or implied this. You’ve been advised many times to stop doing this sort of thing, not because people hate you or whatever but because they’re trying to help you. Try to bite your tongue when you get the urge to whine about things that aren’t true and you’ve made a huge step towards positive progress.
I’ll step out of this conversation now because you’ve had so much actionable advice from both me and others that it’s time for you to get out there and do it.
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