Recently, I have been thinking that writing about my feelings would be a good idea for improving the way in which I can coordinate my emotions. I believe that I have few, select people in my life that would listen to my problems and want the best for me. However, I don’t want to burden them too much .I want to be someone that is known for exuding positivity instead of negative ones, even if that is more reflective as to how I am feeling at any given time. I don't want to become an emotional burden to the people I love.
Most importantly, I don't want them to leave me.
I have felt this for a long time most likely, but I am disposable to the majority of my friends. In that, I am convenient to spend time around, but am not so important that my absence would change much or anything at all. My friends have romantic partners, or family members that they consider their closest, and will always default to those connections over the ones I have been able to establish with anyone in my life.
At this time, I don’t have a partner - and I really don’t even consider the connections I have with my family to be very close. They hardly talk to me, and when they do, it's usually out of some sort of obligation, or need. I have many friends, but most of them will lose contact once they move, or life situations change, because the only thing fueling our friendship are conveniences.
I have done this thought experiment in my head so many times, and I always come to the same conclusion - if I were to disappear in the near future - whether that be death or just some sort of MIA scenario - nobody’s life would really be affected much at all. The people around me will be sad, most definitely, but there would be no real tangible consequences outside of temporary emotional impact. I live alone, and nobody truly relies on me - neither physically nor emotionally.
This is a consequence that I can likely really only blame myself for. There’s something about my demeanor that makes it hard for other people to feel like they can connect with me - most likely. Maybe my mannerisms are odd, or I seem really distant, or I look intimidating or repulsing in some way. Regardless, people feel like they should only keep up with me at a distance that is far enough so that I can be replaced by anyone else they should become neighbors with, or meet at the bar, or play the same games with, etc.
I want to be better at empathy. I want to care about the people I meet more than just passive messages every few months about some mundane topic. I want to feel the pull to become more involved in someone’s life if they need me. I want to better pick up on the subtleties or tone that suggests the needs of someone, and I want to proactively make myself an enjoyable person to involve oneself with.
I’m not really sure how to fully accomplish this yet, but I want to at least be more mindful about these things than I am now.
I easily become socially disinterested, and disinteresting. Recently, when I meet people, I hardly try to get to know them at all. I ask them where they are from, what they studied in university, or some mundane bullshit like that. And once the conversation reaches any depth below surface pleasantries, I fuck off. Whether because I don’t actually care about this person or whether I'm just afraid to engage with them for much longer than that, I'm not really sure. For me, when I'm in the middle of conversing, I hardly ever consider the dialogue to this level of analysis that I am here, and thus how I communicate with them likely flounders because I lack this amount of self-awareness.
This is where it starts, though, most likely.
There are tons of issues I have about myself that I want to fix somehow, that I’m sure will run across my mind and be put into writing at a later point. But for now the strongest feeling I harbor is just the strange static I feel towards forming meaningful relationships with people. This is the most painful emotion haunting me right now.