How Can I Help Myself?

Disclaimer: Sorry if this is kind of depressing. After writing this, I realize there's a great deal of self pity weaved into it. I'm usually pretty hard on myself and don't believe in self pity or being soft. But right now I feel like I should give myself a break. Why? Because it hurts and I need to say it. Because it's there and I want to confront it. And because I just don't understand.

I've spent my life trying to convince myself I'm awesome. It's just not true. I can't ignore the facts.

When I walk down the street, people give me these terrible looks. It's like they just want me to disappear. I feel like people would kill me if it was legal just so I wouldn't have to be in their presence. I feel like people think I'm subhuman and don't really even deserve a life to live.

A couple weeks ago, I was walking about twenty feet behind a group of about six or seven people. I didn't even notice them until a girl in the group kept looking back at me every couple seconds. After about half a minute of this, the whole group just stopped in the middle of the goddamn sidewalk and waited for me to pass. As I parted to red sea, they were giving me the stink eye as I passed. One guy actually said 'keep moving' when I got close. I don't know why. I wasn't smiling, but it wasn't like I had an evil aggressive look on my face. I was actually kind of lost in my my own thoughts at the moment. Plus, it's a big city and there are people walking all over the place. There were at least a dozen homeless people I passed on that walk and I'm the guy you're worried about? It just makes me want cry and give up living.

There's this idea in psychology called the halo effect. It basically states that if you're attractive, people also associate other completely independent positive traits with you (honesty, trustworthiness, kindness...etc) and if you're ugly, people automatically associate similarly negative traits with you.

I'm not saying it's all my looks, but when it's strangers, what else could it be? Maybe I have a dirty aura or something.

I've tried everything I can think of too. I have puts countless hours into online dating for years and I haven't gotten a single date out of it. Maybe it's my personality? It could be, I'm not denying that; but even on tinder with the best pictures I can take I haven't gotten a single hit except for one spammer wanting my credit card. I live in a city with literally millions of girls within my dating age range. I haven't had a real date in a decade. I've tried so hard. I could write a 300 page book on everything I've tried. I mean everything. From hypnotizing myself, to medication, from trying to form connections to having a i don't give a fuck attitude, from speed dating to neuro linguistic programming. I've studied psychology and taken dale carnegie classes. I've read and practiced every self help book, ebook, pdf, and forum post I cant find. I go out of my way to talk to and be nice to everyone I meet. I introduce myself to probably 30 new girls and guys in a week. I've only had sex with one person my entire life (high school sweetheart). That was a decade ago.

I'm ashamed to admit I even tried, but I can't even get laid on Craigslist. Whether I post a photo, or reply to an ad and exchange photos. I'm instantly ignored.

One of the reasons I think it's the way I look is because guys are far more receptive to me than girls. At least girls my age. Women over 40 tend to be nice to me. Honestly it could be a lot of things. It doesn't really matter to me at this point. It's just senseless pain.

I've worked pretty hard on my body too. I have a decent amount of muscle and low body fat. Honestly working out is one of the few outlets I have.

Even people I know well limit their exposure like I'm some sort of harmful radioactive element. My close friends (high school, college, post grad) have faded out. We all live in different cities, but I've tried to keep in touch and they just don't want it. When I suggest to a woman to grab coffee/lunch/dinner etc, they are perfectly explicit that they either don't want that or have a boyfriend. The sad thing for me is that I'm honestly not interested in that with most of them. I need friends more than lovers right now anyway. I've had girls ditch me on blind dates after a few minutes (hey, I have to use the restroom. I'll be back in a second.)

Is it my personality? Could be, but I've worked at least as hard on my personality as I have on my body. It's probably a combination. I mean if I had a perfect personality I would be irresistible - clearly that's not the case, so of course it's both. But I have worked hard on being funny, witty, outgoing, friendly, and kind though. Sometimes to the point where I just feel like a pussy. Sometimes I just want to give up and say fuck you, just because my face looks like a burnt pug (someone actually said this to me) doesn't mean I don't have feelings as acute as yours. I know there's always room to improve and I really believe in continuously improving yourself. It's just I want to feel like I don't have to. I want to feel like who I am is enough for whatever I want to be. I just can't do that when people look at me and treat me the way they do.

You know how much it hurts when complete strangers don't just ignore you, they actively avoid you? I feel like the hunchback of notre dame or shrek or something. One of the guys I used to work with weighed nearly 400 lbs and didn't have this hard of a time. I always wondered what it would feel like to notice someone checking me out.

On bad days, I don't even want to leave my bed let alone my apartment. It's starting to hurt my job. I'm already on antidepressants, so I'm not sure what else I can do. The only things that keep me going are doing awesome things. I have a lot of cool hobbies that have made me an interesting person. I just wish someone would recognize this and like me instead of jab me (why do people do that, honestly?) I brew beer, play guitar, trumpet, sing in a frank sinatra wedding band, work on muscle cars, run, mountain bike, cook (legit chef quality), own my own business, read ridiculous amounts of books, make websites and iphone apps, sail, travel, make vfx intensive videos, speak multiple languages...etc I'm at least relatively interesting. At least to myself I am, but that's not enough for me when I can't share it with someone. Cheap Trick was right.

One of my old bosses was almost retired when we met and had never been married. He was kind of a jerk who had a hard time with interpersonal relationships, but it just scares the shit out of me that I'll end up like him. I'm not really an asshole, if anything I'm overly nice. I go out of my way to try to treat people with kindness, because I know how hard it can be to go through life alone. That's the truth.

I know I'm not a 10. I've seen enough people my age and gender to know I don't look the way I'm supposed to, but that doesn't mean that I'm not as acutely emotional and human as anyone else.

Short of plastic surgery (which I'm not going to get) I'm not sure what else I can do to make myself less repulsive.

Honestly it doesn't really matter, I just want to feel an emotional connection to someone.