I don't usually make social posts, but I've been wanting to for awhile.
I hope everybody's lives have been relatively steady lately, despite the turmoil that may be around. =)

I've recently turned 30 in the last few months and harshly been judging my life and the decisions I've made with myself. How I've purposely isolated and kept myself locked away for years because I've always assumed because bad people have mistreated me in my youth and a few bad actors online, that most people are like that. That I don't have what it takes to experience life or try new things because the few things I have managed to do in my time in this life hasn't amounted to much.

I've judged myself for years over how I've treated a few people before in my past, and felt it was okay to judge and punish myself for years because I've felt I knew I would never amount to much, because I'm just some weirdo who's existence is mostly exclusively digital. It's always been difficult to feel I've made a difference in myself or in the world because of how little I've physically experienced, and having grown up around people that always convinced me digital living isn't ever as legitimate as physically doing things.

I mostly just always thought I would just live out the only use I could feasibly see I had in this world, i.e. taking care of my mother, until she eventually passes. Aside from that, I never really allowed myself to think of my future because of how I've been aware I have upset people before in my younger days. I assumed that proved what few decisions I *have* made in my life, it's proven I'm not capable of or deserving of being able to continue to strive to find what makes me happy. Whether that be through friends, a home, new opportunities, etc.

There is a lot more personal details to this story for why I threw myself into this abysmal mental state.

I purposely kept myself locked down throughout my 20's, because I felt I never deserved a fair chance.

I've made friends these past 2 years that have been nothing but patient, compassionate, and insightful with me and put up with my defeatist view on life. I'm eternally grateful for this and has taught me a lot of these feelings and observations of myself:
It's not true.

There's truly only so much of life you can discern and parse through on your own. You really do need other people to keep going at times.

I've only recently met a fellow friend/fur IRL for the first time about a month or so ago. Truth be told, they'd been attempting to meet with me for the better part of a year. My exasperated sense of anxiety and fear kept me from actually committing to walking out and meeting them for literally months though. Bless their heart though, they still were somehow determined enough to want to see me in person despite how defeated I felt about interacting with other people in real life. They were determined to push through though. They persisted in wanting to befriend and talk with me, showed a desire for us to know each other, and

I was admittedly really terrified when I finally met them in person. I felt I would fail, I'd made a complete fool out of myself, I'd prove how unsuited I am for interacting with other people and holding meaningful connections with people, all these fatal ideas permeated my head for the first 10 minutes I was meeting them.

This slowly melted and ebbed away the longer our hangout time was though. It felt very lovely to have another person face to face with you, and they weren't judging you. They're not making generalizations, they're not there to criticize you, they're not holding a hard standard to you, they just want you to be yourself. It felt like one of the most fulfilling experiences I've had since leaving school.

I'll be honest too. I thought that "touch-starved" was a literal myth and that it was something people used as an exaggeration. When they embraced me goodbye, it felt like nothing I've quite experienced before. It really unlocked a deeper feeling in me when they sat and hugged me goodbye at my front door for awhile. It's kinda sad and perhaps a bit funny to admit, but ever since then I've realized how much I've been missing for a long while in my life. I didn't think a connection to another person could actually *feel* that way. So now here and there I find myself weeping when I think about that moment. I thought I would just go through my life never feeling something like that and it makes me feel like I'm worth something as a person. It's probably a bit ridiculous to extrapolate that much out of another person's acknowledgement of me. I suppose that just shows how little faith I've had in myself for a very long time.

I'm hoping to eventually see more, meet more, hopefully start trying to think of what the future really means to me, and what's truly right for me.
I haven't let myself think about what *I* want for a long time, because I've been too terrified of what everything I think being a mistake. That somebody else in my position would be able to do much more than I can, so why should I try?

I realize how wrong and objectively sad this way of living is. I'm choosing to want to change and not feel that way towards myself anymore. I see I've more or less been living in an empty grave for a long while and I just wanted to give a short, truncated version of the inner turmoil I've been stewing in for the better part of a decade.

Don't inhibit yourself. Don't limit yourself. Don't think that because you've made mistakes or mistreated somebody means you can't correct or change it. Life is always continuing and always changing. There's always somebody out there willing to give you a chance, as long as you can give it to yourself. Don't give up on yourself.

To anybody I've upset in the past, I'm sorry for my actions and personally apologize for anything I've done.
To anybody who read all this nutso scribble, thank you so much for the time.
To my friends, you mean everything to me.

Everybody, stay excellent to each other. =)