If you’re on social media, leave it. It’s a drain on your mental wellness.

It might sound stupid, but sometimes (at least for me) I find joy in bringing others joy. I do my best to compliment strangers around me when I notice that they’ve done something special to make themselves look nice or if I really like a piece of clothing. I go out of my way to bring/send treats to my coworkers or friends when they have a special day coming up. It’s a reminder to them (and to myself) that the world is what we make of it, so why not do what we can to make it better? Joy is not a zero-sum game - something that takes me an iota of effort to do can bring huge returns in happiness of others.

Start with the little things you can change. Environmental noise, can you get headphones or earplugs? Social media making you feel down, curate your feed, change sites, or even take a breather. Change up a routine, try a different food, or a hobby. Whatever is in your power, a novel experience might be an idea. Decorate/personalize your space. Add some lights, tapestries, whatever you like. These are some ideas I’ve tried personally and enjoyed a few of.

First, comparing yourself to others is a recipe for unhappiness. I guarantee unhappiness and ennui is part of every day American life as well. I’m living it. I don’t know why I get out of bed each day other than to provide for my family, and I’ve been out of work for 5 months. Feels like waiting around to die, honestly. Maybe you think being in America would solve your problems, but it just presents a different set.

Second, accept the things you can’t change. If you can’t fix something, let go of worrying about it. Easier said than done and beware of telling yourself you can’t change something when you can, but if there is something you can’t fix, let it be. I know you said you’ve gotten that advice already. It’s easy to hear but hard to accept.

Third, set yourself some achievable goals. If it’s exercise or reading a book or painting a picture. Especially if it’s a step toward fixing one of those things that’s big, but not impossible to change. I’ve seen people build houses with their own hands over several years - one piece at a time. I have a friend who is mid-40’s and getting her 4-year degree. One class per semester. She’s on class three now. Eventually she will get there. I’ve set some goals to improve my physical health. It’s a long fucking road. I lost 60 lbs. about 8 years ago. Gained it all back. Now it’s time to tackle it again.

Fourth, make yourself look for good things. It’s a beautiful sunny evening here after days of rain. I didn’t achieve much today, but I can appreciate the warmth on my skin and the blue and white sky. My wife is out of the house taking a crafting class with a friend and I’m happy for her because that doesn’t happen often. I have some interviews this week and maybe one will be the right fit. Whatever the good things are in your life, find them and spend a little time just appreciating them.

Good luck, my friend.

World’s on fire, grab some marshmallows and a stick.

World wants to make you miserable, be happy out of sheer spite.

Listen to more ska: yeah we’re going to hell, but I have a trumpet.

I also have every reason to be unhappy and resentful. My life hack is to be ANGRY. I am determined to piss off all those who have wronged me by succeeding in life despite them. I went from homeless to 6 figures on pure spite and refuse to help anyone who fucked me over.

Well, I wake up happy every day because I don’t really think anyone ‘deserves’ anything, including physical existence. So I am happy to be physically embodied, so happy nothing hurts most days and that I can move freely and breathe freely. I just kind of think anything above constant agony is above the baseline of existence.

I do think you can deserve things like pay for work, you can earn things. But even so, so many people get so much for nothing, and so many others get nothing for giving so much.

I will wish for your success beyond your expectations.

I recommend talk therapy. I think a majority of people could benefit from it, though a smaller ratio of people genuinely need it. I need it. It helps me maintain a sense of balance. I slowly unravel without it. Sounds like it might be helpful for you.

A word of advice in this area: you might need to meet with multiple people before you find the right fit. If it feels off with a person, don’t be afraid to shop around to find someone with whom you feel more comfortable. I’ve had a roughly 50% success rate finding the right fit in decades of therapy. One change was when I moved, one was when a therapist retired. I’ve had three that were right so far. And I’ve had three that were clearly not the right fit. Good luck!

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lose a leg to get there

and go bankrupt or die from it when you arrive

There’s a lot of good advice here, but do you have the means to access therapy? It is invaluable to have an ongoing relationship with a professional who can listen, understand, and help you find your way through the problems that make you feel this way.

Focusing on things that makes me sad actually helps me. Before I go to sleep I usually have a meditative dialogue with myself about the things that made me upset during the day, and try to deconstruct the feelings surrounding the “object” of my pain. Sometimes I also just vent to myself, and tell myself that it will be alright.

I think there’s a few things in your response that trigger alarm bells.

First of all, it sounds like your environment is awful. Can you try to change things just a bit? Step by step? Identify what exactly it is (if it’s family, try to get some distance to them (try to not hang around them if you can, etc.), if it’s friends, try to go out and do your own thing for a bit and maybe try to approach new ppl, if it’s school, talk to someone you trust and maybe figure out a solution where you can get some help there.

In general if you can, maybe therapy could help. If it’s a permanent thing, and that’s what it sounds like, a therapist can help you find solutions to deal with it.

What’s kind of odd to me is that you say it’s the little things that contribute a lot. Now having a bad day is not odd, but if it’s one of the reasons you have a bad life rn, that’s odd. I would look into why this still affects you in that magnitude. This something else you could talk with a therapist about.

I know that if you have good mental health usually these small things shouldn’t throw you off, they are just a bit annoying. That’s basically how usually ppl deal with it.

Now mind you I’m def not judging, I let small things get to me as well, but I’m in therapy for related issues and that’s why I know I will improve.

And the thing with social media: basically, there’s infinite good things and infinite bad things on social media. But the response to bad things is much stronger than it is too good things, that’s why social media has a bias to display bad things (news, etc). So either limiting social media usage can be good, or you can try to curb news and stuff to get less of a skewed view. I did the same - I completely removed my reddit account (which tends to have a more pessimistic user base) and on Lemmy I started unfollowing a lot of news communities. It’s just more healthy for me to see more neutral and positive things.

So yeah I hope I could help you. And always remember, as long as you believe it will get better, it will. Your brain has an amazing ability to reinforce positive thinking patterns if you concentrate on them and this in turn makes you behave more positively towards others and therefore can actively help you on your conquest to change your environment. Wish I could link you studies on this rn but I can only give you the good ole trust me bro guarantee.

Good luck on making a change, I believe if you do you can be a big positive influence for others :)

This sound a bit like depression, but I am no medical professional.

Imagine all the input you get every day both positive and negative. When we are depressed we do a worse job at filtering out the negative.

If this is how you feel all (or most) of the time for a prolonged period, I would consider talking to your doctor. Antidepressants can help a lot. They can take weeks to months to be effective, but they work.

If you are sceptical about medication, it does not hurt to read about it and how they work.

Anyways, I hope things improve for you!

Listen to Jordan Peterson.

I recommend starting with his course called Maps of Meaning which I believe is still available on youtube.