(August 27, 2017 at 5:52 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: If I may speak plainly, one thing I have seen in your posting is what strikes me as a stilted perspective of yourself -- in modern parlance, low self-esteem. I can't say I understand it, because when I read your posts here I see someone who is witty, wise, sometimes acerbic but always on-point, sharp as a tack. I don't know that I have many or any useful ideas how to address what I see as a problem, but I do know that when I've felt down on myself like that, it radiates outwards to others, and gives them perhaps a certain sense of reticence. But if that is indeed an issue, and if you might find a way to address it, it seems to me that your possibilities might open up a little.
Confidence, and insecurity, are both contagious; and often they are both self-reinforcing. People cotton to the former and avoid the latter, which each strengthens the respective feelings you're feeling.
This, all of it. Extremely well put.
I have first hand experience of this. Paradoxically, both in friendship and in love, you have to work on yourself first and be whole, instead of devoting yourself to searching for someone. Whatever issues you have with yourself will manifest in the relationship, and however you view yourself is the air you give off to new people.
I'm not very good at words. But I wish you all the best, Stim. FWIW. It hurts to read this.