A lot of you here talk about baggage, red flags, damaged goods. In general, I agree with most of you in that the wisest thing to do is to stay tf away from these people, men and women. Nevertheless, these people still exist, and some of them are actively trying to improve themselves. And although a person can never be fully fixed, they can certainly be a bit better.

If you're on this subreddit at all, you're probably broken in some way, big or small. So how can we make the best of what we have?

To illustrate the point, I'm going to use myself as an example, so please indulge this ramble because I think it's something that many of you here will relate to, too.

I've spent most of my life shut-in and terminally online throughout my teenage years and early adulthood. I find it difficult to relate to most people, but have an affinity for people like myself. I feel out of sync with my culture/time/place, like an alien.

Is this you?

I don't resent or blame anyone. I've had periods where I've conquered traumas and anxieties, forced myself to be social. I'm charming and charismatic, I can 'mask' pretty well, most people I meet want to see me again, I can get laid when I want to. And even though I can't relate to people, I still enjoy and appreciate them in a transient way.

Is this still you?

I enjoy my vampiric, terminally-online habits a lot, they feel comforting and safe. I like internet subcultures and talking to the people in them about niche interests, but I still can't fully relate to them. A lot of them blame society for their own inability to integrate into it properly, a lot of them have nihilistic "fuck it" attitudes towards life because they feel hopeless that things could get better, and the cauldron of mental illness that is an internet-pilled group of friends means there's constant fallouts, emotional crises, and low-level toxicity that makes my sensitive lil' soul say "Danger, danger, hostile environment, can't bond with these people!"

Every woman I've been with (who've I've genuinely appreciated wholly, beyond just looks and infatuation) has had a similar life story to me. But I think for the most part they prefer 'normal' guys and don't want to be with someone neurotic like them, understandably so.

When I mask my neuroticism and pass it off as eccentricity, people love to know me, but I feel distant from them. And when I let it show a little, they want to get distant from me.

Is this still you?

What do you think are some potential solutions for people like this? How can they integrate and endear themselves to a world where they're ghosts if they mask, and aliens if they're authentic.