I've had enough of society, is isolation a bad idea?

Post Reply New Topic

Isolation has been a friend at times and an enemy at others. Around the holidays it is the enemy due to my tendency to throw a pity party with my name the only one on the invitation list. Family (provided dysfunction is manageable) is important this time of year. Even though I live 2500 miles away from mine, I still stay in touch.

Aside from my partner, I've given up on friends due to my past track record. My socializing is either in a work setting or recreation setting. I just got back from skiing some awesome powder this morning and had a ball socializing with people on the chair lift. My suggestion is to find something you like to do and situations will arise in which you can comfortably hit it off with others. Belonging to an outdoor recreation club allows me to choose activities that usually only have a few people participating in any one activity which for me is manageable.

Large social environments I just don't do anymore because of the exhausting nature of them. Getting back to your question as to whether its ok to isolate, that should be based on what your inner voice says. I've always needed isolation time to make sense out of my world. I never was dx'ed early, so the only way I could manage my thoughts was to put them down on paper and do journaling. I've since burned many journals but they helped at the time to sort out the chaos which was the usual state of my thoughts. Only then could I sort the crud from the authentic voice inside that usually leads me in the direction I need to be going.

Hope that helped give you a few more options.... Good luck!
Phil

I've been practically house-bound for the last three years, partly due to the same reasons you mentioned.

Bad idea on my part. I've pretty much lost most of the social skills I had developed up until then. Now that I want some sort of purposful existance, I'm having to start all over again. More anxiety, more pressure, more exhaustion and more stress.

A certain degree of isolation is fine if you're an asocial person, but in my experience very little is extremely detramental unless you intend to commit to being a hermit indefinetly.