I'm starting to feel like I'm taking up too much of everyone's time. After all this is a polyamory discussion forum, and there are pending questions from people who have a variable number of partners rather than being permanently flatlined at zero.
At no point did I feel like you were wasting my time, at all, whatsoever. If I had, I simply would have clicked my way out of the thread.
My husband Gralson has low self-esteem. He often makes disparaging remarks about himself. I respond by acting insulted that he believes I think so little of myself that I would marry a loser.
So now I'm going to act insulted that you believe I think so little of myself that I would waste my time on reading and responding to your post if I didn't actually believe you were worth the effort.
I've carefully read what everyone has had to say, and I still just don't believe there is any way out of the trap I'm in.
That sounds like a self-fulfilling prophecy. Whatever your current situation, I can pretty much guarantee that if you truly believe you were doomed to be single forever, then you are, in fact, doomed to be single forever. However, changing your attitude is all that's required to turn that boat around.
I used to think that whole "You become happy by choosing to become happy" thing was crap. Then I chose to become happy. Lo and behold, it was I who had been full of crap. It really does work. Well, barring clinical, neurochemically-induced depression. But there are drugs for that.
I don't think I'm depressed, but let's say I might be wrong about that. If I am depressed, then inflicting myself on someone else wouldn't be ethical, and as such getting into a new relationship would be wrong.
Why not let the someone else be the judge of that? It's not even something I would disclose particularly early upon meeting someone, since they'll figure it out for themselves soon enough.
But if I'm not depressed, and therefore my judgment is sound.
I just finished one of the "I, Robot" short stories, wherein the robot, upon waking, decides he could not possibly have been created by humans, as he is clearly superior to them, and, he assumes, no being could possibly create another being superior to itself.
As Asimov points out, the problem with reason is that you can prove absolutely anything you want, if you start with the right assumptions. So throw out your assumptions and just go out there with confidence that you'll meet good people.
The world is so much wider than that! There are so many other ways of relating to other people, so many other ways to find friendship, companionship, or even just non-alone-ness! It's all a matter of what you expect or demand of the world and of others.
This. If you go out looking for a life partner, you may very well be correct that almost everyone is already either partnered or has chosen not to become so. I'm not saying you are right, just assuming for the sake of argument. So then stop trying to meet life partners, and just try to meet friends, casual relationships.
I know that personally, one of my turn-offs is excessive expectation. If I feel like they're expecting me to be their new life partner, it usually means they have a bunch of other expectations that I won't want to live up to. It's all back to that "expecting me to fill the void" thing. No, thanks.
One thing I will say about older people is that they're more likely to know what they want. All the people who are willing to get together with just about anyone, just so they won't have to be alone, have probably already gotten together with other anyones. So again, change your attitude. Look at it as though most of the desperate people are out of the way, and the only people who are left are genuine people who only want to live life and be happy. Then become, yourself, someone who only wants to live life and be happy, and I'm betting you'll meet up with some of them in due time. And if you don't, you'll probably be too busy living life and being happy to notice.
to a woman who is age appropriate.
