vestigial part 3

lack of patience

in college, i was a really good student. i had many friends, and overall, i felt really happy during my time there. however, i felt very frustrated with one thing: not being able to find a girlfriend. for a very long time, i asked myself, *what is wrong with me, why can i not find someone?* i found myself failing over and over again, going on dates that went nowhere. it just felt really hopeless. and me, being the common denominator, blamed myself relentlessly. my self esteem went to absolute shit.

somewhere along the line of self loathing, i realized that maybe it was just really hard to form a deep connection with someone else. after all, if this were the case, it would also justify why i wasn't able to easily find a girlfriend. my self worth was no longer based on whether i could find a girlfriend or not, it was based on whether i thought i was a good person or not, which to me meant, as long as i lived my life along my values, made others around me happy, i thought it was fair to say that i was a good person, and that i would eventually find someone. it just takes time. funnily enough, it took me right to the last week before graduation to find someone i really clicked with.

when i first came to seattle, i remember settling into my corporate housing and feeling an odd feeling of loneliness. i mean, it made sense, this was a totally new city and although i had a couple of friends in the area for the summer, they soon left one by one to go back to school. soon enough, i was left by myself. not having a solid direction at work also made things difficult for me, and i became really frustrated with not being able to find a social circle here. i tried several things, starting pottery classes, signing up for a rock climbing gym and a hiking club, attending meetup.com events, volunteering at the park, meeting friends of friends, but nothing ever really clicked. it felt like things weren't going my way.

another thing i would do a lot was to read articles about the "seattle freeze," and how the pacific northwest was infamous for having a very reserved and introverted culture. and i suppose it felt somewhat reassuring to be able to blame some phenomenon, just to remove some pressure off myself. in a way, it's good to recognize that seattle isn't as easy to break into as a place like new york or san francisco. however, i think it becomes dangerous when it becomes a crutch and a way to give more strength to the voice in my head that's screaming "this place is a shithole. i wanna leave right now." because at the end of the day, that's not really gonna do anything. and besides, i should be doing these activities because *i* want to, not for the sake of meeting people.

i think another reason for this lack of patience stems from the age of "now". with the rise of the internet, where i can look up anything and talk to anyone i want in a matter of seconds, i've forgotten how to actually wait for things to mature. and unlike the technology that always comes equipped with instantaneous feedback, or at least, a helpful progress bar that tell me an estimated completion time, most things in life don't have this rigidity or simple way of showing how much longer we have to wait. things like finding friends don't really have a set timeline. sometimes, i get lucky with a meetup i go to, and i make several friends instantly. but most times, the dinner conversations will fall flat, the awkward silences drag on, and i leave empty handed, doubting myself whether it's even worth it to try anymore.

when these situations inevitably arise, it's important for me to remember that, just like in college when i was going on dates that didn't go anywhere, sometimes the connection just doesn't click, but that doesn't mean there's something wrong with me or for that matter, them. attending meetup events and socializing is less so about achieving a concrete result at each individual event, it's more so about increasing my surface area to potentially meet someone i do enjoy spending time with. the trend is more important than the singular data points. and i think, having my weekly goal of doing at least one social event is helping a lot already. it can feel as if i'm banging my head against the wall and not progressing, but progress isn't always linear. just like the video games i used to download as a kid: the progress bar would freeze at points as it buffered, it wasn't always a consistent, steady stream.