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(Foreward: I apologize for making another thread, but I decided to redo my old post since it was too long)
22 yo here diagnosed with major depression several years ago. I've been unemployed since I was 17, and have spent an average of 6-12hrs in my room a day since I was 14 or 15, using games/internet as a way to escape. Nearly 2 years ago I decided to stop being miserable, and I sold my WoW account/uninstalled all my games and picked up Japanese/guitar, and have been relatively depression free since then. I hit a major bout of depression last month, though, and am just now getting over that and recommitting to my old, structured, daily schedule. I'm currently in search of a mentor/role model/anchor/someone who has their s*** together (since no one around me does), and I'm wondering if there's any sites/ways to go about finding someone like this. As a secondary consideration, I'd also appreciate it if I could get some comments/advice on the stuff mentioned above and below.
In general there's 2 issues I face; consistency and anxiety pertaining to being social & getting a job. Starting with consistency, over the last 2 years I find I often (every other 3-5 days on average) ditch my structured schedule in favor of browsing/online gaming. I think the causes of this (as well as my recent 1 month bout) are:
a) the attempted removal of browsing/gaming from my life left the needs those things were sating unfulfilled--I attempted to replace these things with immersing in Jap media, and while fun, it wasn't *as* fun, and probably didn't fulfull whatever needs gaming/browsing fulfilled.
b) perfectionism/weaknesses that normal people are susceptible too. I have a slightly niche problem that if part of my schedule gets thrown off, I have a bad habit of not wanting to do the rest of my schedule, and then escaping to browsing/online gaming. I also have the normal problems of life to contend with as well; I might not be in the mood to do schedule, or the Japanese media I have just isn't that engaging, or I'm in a bad mood, etc, and escape to games/internet.
c) procrastination, but not the Neil Fiore kind. I think in a way, I've associated pain/regret/anxiety with scheduled tasks because of the lack of progress I've made (this is a huge thing with me; I really hate the progress I've made so far/where I'm at), and I've also associated boredom with it as mentioned above.
I think revisiting Neil Fiore's 'The Now Habit' along with shortening my timeboxes so they're even shorter (alongside adding small breaks where I reward myself with music) will help. I've also reintroduced gaming/browsing, but have parental controls set so I can only do it at a certain time of day (there's a lot that can be said here specifically, but isn't necessary for this post). I know consistency is a real problem, and I need to get it under control; the longest streak over 2 years without a missed day of studying Japanese was 60 days, 22 days for guitar practice, 22 days for waking up on time, and 8 days for getting all of my routine, daily/recurring tasks like Jap study/wake up on time/guitar done. There's no way in hell I can get a job like this, that's for sure.
On the matter of anxiety with being social and getting a job, there's not much to be said. Socializing makes me anxious because I'm bad at feigning interest, take things the wrong way/personally and seethe silently, don't have much going on in my life atm to talk about, not the slightest bit funny or good at retelling stories, and I'm awkward. Being bad at socializing (particularly my awkwardness/bad at feigning things) feeds into my anxiety over jobs where you need to do a face to face interview just for entry, and then the duties/interactions of the job itself. My confidence in my ability to be consistent also feeds into job anxiety, and never mind normal fears people have over failure, or feeling trapped in a low income job/not having time.
As an aside, I've tried therapy/meds before, and wasn't impressed. I'll be revisiting therapy for added support, but I feel depression (as well as these other problems) aren't the cause, but instead the symptoms of my lifestyle. I won't be using meds as such.
Thanks in advance
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