At My Rope's End

[Richard]

Three months. Just three more months is what I have to tell myself every fucking day that I wake up. I feel like I'm in a whole new kind of prison: emotionally, socially, spatially, and psychologically.

My dad has proven himself to be the biggest setback my life has, and honestly, I just can't take living here anymore but I have no other options. Everyday I wake up to psychic vampirism, an obscene amount of depression (from two people), and worst of all: having power/leverage thrown in my face daily. My dad's preferred method of getting me to do anything is not by asking, it's by yelling, screaming, and bitching.

Then, he has the habit of shooting everyone and everything down to build himself up, and he builds himself up to others by flaunting what he has, complaining about trivial things, then boasting again. For me, he holds over my head everything that he's done for me, or everything that he does for me, throws my mistakes from my past in my face (which aren't many, but he builds them up to sizes of grandeur) and I feel miserable.

You guys all know me - I advocate happiness and firmly believe that how we feel is created by us, but things have just stacked up so fucking much that I literally cannot take it anymore. I've got no idea what I can do.

 

[Whizzy]

Long time no chat amigo! I was away on vacation for a bit but just got back!!

I had to deal with a similar situation before I went off to college with my dad so feel free to me about it. You're leaving in the fall right? It's just around the corner and will be here all to well. Parents can suck sometimes but use it as an excuse to go out and meet new...friends...or rather single ladies

 

[Rage]

I wrote a note to myself, a while back, regarding this same problem. Whenever I felt frustrated and at wit's end with my parents I would read it:

When feeling mad at parents (read this immediately)

Whenever you catch yourself feeling angry or resentful towards parents realize that

• it's an emotional response that is triggering within you and that you're the result of that
• they are among the ignorant masses of people and feeling mad at them for something they say or do is the equivalent of feeling mad at a child for breaking something

I don't say this out of spite or malice or any ill sentiment

Looking at myself very objectively and in the attempt to express myself as objectively as possible, I should keep in mind that my parents want what's best for me but are very limited and narrow-minded in regards to what they see or what they do

When I feel that emotion of bitterness or anger or resentment, I should feel it and then remember that I have to take responsibility for all that happens to me

If I feel myself becoming irked by my parents I should ask my self right then: what have I been doing and what have I done to display and prove myself objectively/unarguably as successful, competent, responsible, accomplished and creator of my own destiny?

What have I done to move out, work towards success and make a name for myself? If I haven't been doing enough I need to fix that by sitting down, assessing what needs to be done, and pulling myself together and doing it (splitting it into much smaller doable chunks if needed).

And then I can move on, move forward, work/live up to my fullest potential and create my own destiny.

 

[Chase]

Here's an alternate suggestion.

I had a business partner who was like this for a while. The guy'd always been a good friend before, so I didn't want to tear him down in return, but as a business partner he just became an emotional mess... a real nightmare to work with. Over the course of a few months I found myself dealing with an epic amount of emotionally draining situations, and a good deal of money that I and the third partner invested in the business ended up going straight to this guy's pockets and getting frittered away on pointless stuff.

So one day, I just flipped. I said, "Fuck it; I hate this petty bullshit, but so long as I'm trapped within this swirling vortex of insanity with this guy, I am going to stoop to his level and beat him at his own game."

From that day on, I vehemently opposed every argument the guy threw my way, or anyone else's. I totally shut off empathy for him since he had it shut off for me too. I'd counter everything he said, and take every argument he used against me and employ the same thing back on him ten fold.

Every time he started going into his, "Look at ALL I've done for you! I've done X and Y and Z..." I'd go into, "You're CRAZY! Look at what I'VE done for YOU! Where would you be had I not done A? What would you be doing right now if not for B?" and then he'd try going into, "I know, you've helped me a lot... but can you see that I [something he did]?" and I'd go right back to it, "Sure, but you never even would've been able to X if I hadn't C for you first..." etc.

Totally NOT my style at all, but since that was the only way he would communicate with me, I decided I was going to mirror it right back and let him see how it felt. And at no point was I going to drop it and say, "There, you see how that feels? That's why people don't like you doing that to them!" because he was never going to listen (I'd spent months breaking down what he was doing to him and trying to get him to see how his communication style was poisoning his relationships... he'd agree, and then just keep doing it). So I just bludgeoned him over the head with it until he stopped, every time he started doing it.

Every time he'd come out with some long-winded argument about how he was right and I or other people were wrong, I'd go, "Nope - you're wrong," and wouldn't even argue it with him (I'd spent countless hours trying to reason with him before and getting absolutely nowhere). When he'd ask if I was even willing to see his side of things, I'd say, "No," and then he'd play the victim and talk about how messed up it was because he was TOTALLY willing to see MY side of things (untrue; he just pretended to, and used it to segue into pushing his view / desires / etc.), and I'd just shrug and say, "Well I guess that's too bad and we'll have to agree to disagree. Or you can always just accept my viewpoint."

What you do is just oppose him at every turn. Never let him get a SINGLE win. Every win must go to you.

Once you start doing this, a funny thing happens:

All his efforts to drain energy from you and bring it into himself backfire, and every time he latches his suckers onto you you reverse the polarity and energy goes from him to you.

You start walking around feeling like a CHAMP, and he's even more frustrated and miserable.

That probably sounds pretty horrible when it's someone that you do, at some level, still care about, but think of it as tough love. That friend of mine went through a pretty bitter period getting tossed around like a rag doll by me, but a taste of one's own medicine does one good, and he came out on the other side of it a lot more self-aware, and seems to have put a damper on some of his worse character traits.

The aim is really this: to become that guy that he just doesn't want to mess with. You want to train him to see you as the guy who everything's good with so long as he's nice and respectful, but who just makes him feel really terrible and bad every time he tries to suck energy from him. After a while, he learns to leave you alone, but in the meantime, try and derive some pleasure from besting him. The ultimate aim (I don't know if this is possible, since I don't stay in contact with people who do this to me) is for him to know he can interact with you civilly and get civility, but if he's going to try his bullshit on you, he's going to lose and you'll walk away the champ while he walks away the chump every single time.

The cool thing is once you've learned this, you become UNSTOPPABLE at managing your emotions around all kinds of emotional people. Nowadays, anytime ANYONE tries to suck energy from me, I immediately cut them down and force them to knock it off. Most people do this at least a little bit (if not to the extremes of someone with an extreme personality disorder), so knowing how to shut it down and turn things civil again is immensely useful.

I'd take your last 3 months as your training ground for learning how to dish this out as good as you're getting it. Try it. You'll be amazed how satisfying it feels to pummel someone who's spent a long time pummeling you. He won't even expect it if he's used to you trying to resist a bit but ultimately yielding and giving him the win... you'll get to see that starry-eyed look in his eyes as he wonders, "Who's THIS, and where'd the OLD Richard go?" And, you get the very primal satisfaction that comes from setting social convention aside and just tearing into someone to beat him at his own game. Not good to discuss enjoying in polite society, but giving a bully his comeuppance can be a wonderful source of good feelings and pride.

TLDR; he's being a bitch. Be cool when he's cool, but instantly transform into a much bigger bitch to him every time he starts bitching to you, and he'll feel drained just being around you, while you'll get an immensely satisfying kick out of it.

Chase

 

[Richard]

Chase,

This was how I had planned to handle things after I left in Fall when my dad has no power over me (to speak of) but at the moment he has done more for me - he is the person who provided me with what I have today (though I still had to work hard to "earn" the right to have something be bought by him) but I hate having things thrown in my face in a giant guilt trip.

Even when things aren't directed towards me - it seriously pisses me off just hearing him speak to others, or about the future, the past, the present - his pessimism and self-defeating attitude really kill my vibe (sorry, listening to Kendrick Lamar at the moment ), and I just want to be able to call him out on his bullshit and break this figure eight loop between bitterness and anger he has but mentioning anything that will destroy his "ego" or taint his superficial "image" results in having everything thrown in my face, and him yelling to the point where I want to fucking hit him.

There are just things about my dad, and sister (which I've told you about in a couple emails) which really bother me, and I can't escape it or really even fight it for another couple months. I'm not one to run from my problems, but what do you do when the option to fight isn't there?

Well, let me rephrase - what do you do when the option to fight isn't there without being kicked out of the house, or alternate serious repercussions?

-Richard

 

[Drck]

I don't know how old you are (19?), there is obviously some problems between you and your dad, you simply don't fit into a "picture" he's got about his son. But you are doing the right things, you should be your own man.

You can also try to be more constructive, most people are still listening to reason. Acknowledge what he has done for you, acknowledge that you have screwed up here and there, and then be assertive and explain what you want from now on.

For example something like this: Look dad, I really appreciate that you have done for me A,B and C, and that you are doing for me X,Y,Z (here you are showing him your respect and appreciation, after all he is your dad). But what happened in the past happened in the past, and I am more mature now. I have different views on life, different things I would like to pursue, and I really want to do D,E,F... It would really be great if instead of yelling and screaming we could just simply discuss things. I would be happy to talk about any issues because after all you are my great dad (here you are showing him that you are more mature and you telling him that you want to be respected).

Note that there are many positive words. I'm not saying that you should be a faggot, but in the contents these positive words simply reflect constructive thinking and good communication. You have a FUTURE to live for, and no one - including your dad - will stop you. You simply let him know nicely what the fuck it is that you want....

 

[Franco]

Richard,

I kind of agree with Drck here. The best you can do is lay out what he's done for you, explain that you are grateful for those things, and then explain to him what you don't like. If he doesn't listen there really isn't much you can do except endure it until you move. Three months is not a long time at all when you think about it, and you'll be much more happy when you move out on your own (and trust me on this one).

Chase's words are excellent... for just about anyone who isn't a family member. When it comes to family, I can understand where these things are more difficult to control -- your parents are basically providing you with shelter, food, supplies, etc., so you can't really just "overpower" them because, in reality, they still have power over you.

I would just try to explain things the way that Drck mentioned, and if it doesn't work, just avoid being in the house as much as you can. Stay with friends (and bring a laptop or iPad) and keep yourself busy until you finally get to move out. Your whole world will be much better when you finally do. =)

- Franco

 

[Big Daddy]

Hey Richard,

I may be less experienced than you are with woman, but I'm older and also probably more experienced in feeling like shit than you. I actually felt like shiiit a couple times in my life, and one of the reasons, I thought, was because of where I lived, just like you.

I moved two times already. I hated where I lived, and thought that "college X is way better than my current college. People are smarter, girls are cute, everything is more cosmopolitan... I'll see if I can get a transference." And I did. And guess what? After the excitement of the first months wore off, I began feeling like shit once again because I got used to it.

The other city was indeed better, people were smarter, and girls were cute. But none of it mattered anymore once I got used to it (just like girls seem not to matter as much to you anymore)... lesson learned. If you project your happiness to be TOO far away, and phrase it like "after I done X, I'll be happier", you won't become happy. The fact that you'll have to endure three months may or may not reward you in the end.

Given that girls aren't high valuable for your life anymore, try to help people in different ways. You've got to find something that makes you happy right NOW. Maybe BJJ? It could be painting, singing or mountain biking. Or maybe building a startup. Maybe saving money and playing with stocks. Maybe writing a diary for people to see while you do all of this. It also could be that you find this thing in college, elsewhere. But you have to be looking for it, not expecting that suddenly the shit storm will pass once you do X.

Drexel wrote this in his blog:

This is a spiritual journey that will help you define yourself and figure out who you are.

It also isn’t going to make you happy, but hey–you get a shit ton of pussy on the way to figuring that out.

And while I still didn't walk the walk, I can say that's fairly true. Now you're free from being hostage to social situations and women in general, but there's pretty much something you're still hostage to. Find that and free yourself again.

Alternatively, you can ask yourself in the double-negative: what do you hate NOT doing?

(You may say that living with your dad is that "thing" you want to free yourself from, but it got to me something deeper. Got to be something that you're actually angry that you're not doing.)

TL;DR: it sucks hearing, but you got to shrug it off. There's really not anything you can do besides doing something that makes you happy and that keeps you away from your father.

 

[Richard]

I understand perfectly well what you're saying -

I may have mushroomed everything under the moniker "It's where I live" but when you peel back the layers behind that you'll see that it's why I'm unhappy because all of the things I like to do that make me happy are almost non-existent out here.

I really enjoy trying to new things, and adventuring - but there's nothing to do out here. I take Karate because it's the only martial arts place around here, there's like one gym, one library, one park, etc. and there's nothing "new" to do because I've done it all out here so nothing is exciting (except pool ).

The things that make me feel like shit, though, exist in abundance out here. Family and people in general have a very pessimistic outlook on life and it's infectious - like walking into a funeral after waking up learning you've won the lottery. I like in a "ghetto" basically so I don't have the options to mountain bike, or go frolfing, or go play frisbee, or do BJJ, and I already paint . All of my happiness and joy at the moment comes strictly from the internal pleasure I feel when doing tasks (like painting, playing pool, etc.) but that means that there's little to none when I'm not doing those things.

But, I have high levels of optimism and joy that seems to get sucked away by all the other pessimism present - think about the 300 Spartans who persisted and fought and fought but eventually lost...

I'm hostage to the lack of activities to do in my neighborhood then my dad and sister act as catalysts to that anger and unhappiness I feel at not being able to engage in almost any activities out here (unless you want to get shot, stabbed, or jumped).

Alternatively, everything that comprises what makes me happy exists in the new place I'm transferring to.

I'll guess I'll have to wait and see how I feel after 6 months.

 

[Big Daddy]

Yup, that seems like a good plan

I was going to edit my post to share a TED talk that I like, but you posted before. I'll share it anyways:

http://www.ted.com/talks/shawn_achor_th ... etter_work

I bought this guy's book after watching this talk, but I wouldn't recommend it. The talk is sufficient for you to get his point. He also focuses on work strategies, but hopefully you'll get the point on a personal level to all areas of your life.

Feel free to PM me during that 6 months (or after that) if you ever feel like chatting

 

[Whizzy]

This might seem random but have you tried fishing, being part of a team (sports, dnd, whatever), or just something to help get a larger community or relaxation around you?

 

[132]

Three months. Just three more months is what I have to tell myself every fucking day that I wake up. I feel like I'm in a whole new kind of prison: emotionally, socially, spatially, and psychologically.

My dad has proven himself to be the biggest setback my life has, and honestly, I just can't take living here anymore but I have no other options. Everyday I wake up to psychic vampirism, an obscene amount of depression (from two people), and worst of all: having power/leverage thrown in my face daily. My dad's preferred method of getting me to do anything is not by asking, it's by yelling, screaming, and bitching.

Then, he has the habit of shooting everyone and everything down to build himself up, and he builds himself up to others by flaunting what he has, complaining about trivial things, then boasting again. For me, he holds over my head everything that he's done for me, or everything that he does for me, throws my mistakes from my past in my face (which aren't many, but he builds them up to sizes of grandeur) and I feel miserable.

You guys all know me - I advocate happiness and firmly believe that how we feel is created by us, but things have just stacked up so fucking much that I literally cannot take it anymore. I've got no idea what I can do.

Man oh man do I know what you feel.

I remember when I was just about to move out of home. You basically described my father. It was hell living there. The constant complaining and depressing air about home. Every time I was near my parents - I'd get depressed. They constantly get reminded that it wasn't my house and I'd have to follow their rules and should respect them because they earn an average salary..

When I got to university, I was actually enrolled but did't attend - and instead was working on starting my company. I didn't fancy the idea of studying for years then working every day for the rest of my life and being told what to do.

And my parents were the biggest obstacle to my success - telling me to first study, then work for 5-10 years to learn how business is done and then maybe think about starting my own company. It would've been the worst thing to have listened to them.
Cause my ideas that made me rich are such that you must realize them asap. In the tech business is you wait a few months, someone else will come up with the same idea and you're done.

It still sucks that the iPhone 5S killed the project we were working on about smartphone finger print id..
This year we were working on another project that got killed by Microsoft releasing Surface.. Now even if we complete our product it won't do that well as it would've if we finished it 6 months ago..

So them telling me to wait on my ideas is the worst thing I could've done.

And just to pint out in my country an average salary is 550$ per month for full time job(that's just under 3$ an hour..)...... Can you imagine studying for 5 years and then working in your 40s-50s for 3$ an hour. And the choice was between working for 3$ or earning millions before turning 21..

The thing is that my own family didn't believe I could succeed. They didn't believe I could earn 500$ per month with my own business. Now my parents call me to ask for money to help them pay their loans..


My little brother is turning 16 in September and he can't wait to move out. I've actually been thinking about filing in court and taking him to live with me. Cause he's working on his websites/apps/ a new social media website. His goal is to earn 5-10 million before turning 18. And he can't work properly with them bitching about him needing to study and get better grades.. He's 15 and making more then the 2 of them combined and they keep telling him to study hard and work like them...




My advice is to touch it out the net 3 months, then cut as much contact as you can. And really you should start an online business so you can earn enough money that you won't need them.
Just a few ways that I started out with :
- writing an ebook about sth you know and creating a website and selling it
- creating apps for iphone and Android
- creating a youtube channel and uploading cool vids
- if you're really good you can start working on a big piece of software/website/social media/ invention then get angel investors
- or develop a product you can and put a campaign on kickstarter or indiegogo to get funded by people - basically you pitch your idea and people fund you so you can make that idea a reality.


Just a rough estimate - youtubers get between 2000$ and 7000$ for 1 million views
- apps get around 500-1000$ per day per 1 million downloads from ads
- there are projects on kickstarter and indiegogo that collect hundreds of thousand of dollars in just 1 month, a recent example is quickey, basically a key that doesn't open door but can open letters, cut rope, open bottles - it raised 222 000$ in funding to get created.


There are lots of other things you can do of course, but my advice is to start something - imagine being 20 and earning a full time salary from your laptop, having the freedom to do what you wan't and not having to depend on your parents for money

Good luck!

Ico

 

[Chase]

Richard-

Well, let me rephrase - what do you do when the option to fight isn't there without being kicked out of the house, or alternate serious repercussions?

Something I've been doing more recently that I'm finding quite effective is halting as soon as I find myself in an argument and saying, "Okay, it's obvious there's a breakdown in communication and that both of us are looking at things from different angles. So can you explain to me why this is so distressing to you and why it seems like a big deal, and then I can explain to you why it seems like NOT a big deal to me, and we can figure out where the difference is?"

The important thing here is that you have to get BOTH people off the "I must convince this other person" page. If your father's BPD, which it sounds like he may very well be, you may not be able to pull this off, because his greatest need is probably going to be getting your agreement rather than solving some problem.

I'm a little tired and struggling to come up with a good example of this right now. This is still relatively a recent thing for me and I don't have a very good way of explaining it yet. I tried to write out an example and it wasn't very clear so I just deleted it.

But basically, think about it like any kind of argument. When you argue that charity is the greatest good in the world, and I argue that charity is a waste of time, if we go no deeper than that, I will think you're a naïve sap, and you'll think I'm a cold-hearted psychopath. But if we talk more, and you share the fact that you grew up in a broken home with disappointing Christmases and nothing makes you feel better than helping out poor children during the holidays, and I share the fact that most charities I see are merely focused on treating the symptoms, when I'd like to work on big projects that treat the roots - doing things like improving infrastructure, improving communications, enhancing efficiency in the world economy so more and more people can break into it - then we both leave still retaining our very different preferences, but now with respect and understanding for what the other person is trying to do too.

Essentially, it's about getting both of you to an understanding of the other, WITHOUT trying to CONVINCE the other, which is where all the emotion draining in arguments comes from - it's one party trying to force the other party to adopt a stance contrary to his underlying value system. The party that yields experiences a significant willpower hit, because he's accepting to act contrary to his deepest impulses.

Anyway, I feel like I am breaking through into some important law of communication that is right there under the surface - arguments are about trying to convince and sway other people, whereas what you really should be doing one-on-one is pulling out why something is important to someone else and then figuring out if what's important to you can possibly line up with that or not, rather than trying to wedge them into the box you want them to fit into that they don't fit into at all - but that's about as well as I can explain it for right now.

This requires some freedom from ego - until recently, I used to think much as it seems most people think in arguments, that of course I am right and this other person is just being thick-skulled not being able to see it. What I realize now is that EVERYONE who is arguing is certain he is right, and convincing / persuading / browbeating is NOT the way to lasting resolution - it's only a Band-Aid that puts off the problems by temporarily pushing them down until they come bursting back forth much bigger and much worse for having been repressed (arguing/convincing/persuading/swaying's also good for rallying the troops and whipping up those already on your side, or wooing those who are indecisive, but for those who've already made up their minds that you are wrong and they are right it's not the correct way to interact with them at all).

In other words, if you can't fight fire with fire because you have too much to lose, then focus on doing your best to operate at the meta level, point out to your father what he is doing - "You're arguing with me, but it's clear you and I are coming from very different places and arguing this is getting us absolutely nowhere. So, we can either figure out how you see things and why you see them that way, and then how *I* see things and why *I* see them that way, or we can just forget about this as a big waste of time and go about our lives without all this pointless back-and-forth crap because no one's convincing anybody else."

Because it sounds like he's VERY emotional all the time and not very rational, he's probably not going to be able to break out of trying to convince you that he is right since he has a deep need for your validation of his correctness, so you probably won't be able to get him to accept that you and he have different views and that's fine, but you should at least be able to jar him out of being on the attack by pointing out what he's doing and demonstrating a higher level of awareness and emotional detachment from it than he possesses.

Chase

 

[Franco]

I agree with what Chase said above.

If you want to try to settle the battle with your father, you need to be the rational, calm, logical one and try to draw out his inner desires and where this is all coming from. Then lay down what it is you want; after that, you can discuss how you can help each other both achieve that.

Either way, if it doesn't work, you're very close to being able to live on your own. It will be a whole new life for you then. =)

- Franco

 

[Godsninja]

Thanks for referring me here Richard. I read your first post but am in the middle of something so am gonna post and come back. Everything is the exact same way for me, with the exception that he doesn't tell me what to do by yelling, it is by being passive, with a highly and extremely refined edge of aggressiveness if the conversation isn't played out exactly the same way he imagined it inside his head. Any how thanks, IBB