I've been trying to figure out my identity for years by now and every step I take in doing so only uncovers that I completely and utterly lack one.There's no desires, no beliefs, no sociability, no preferences, no sexuality, no gender, no sense of self. All I am is just a collection of happenstances, and the meek attempt at reducing harm towards others.I recognize the person in the mirror, but he's just as much a stranger to me as everybody else is. The world feels stagnant, disjointed, and nothing that ever happens actually feels like it has any substance.There's still hope that I'm just missing something which will make the world make sense, but it all just feels like a deluded pipedream. I hope at least that some people can relate to this, and are able to feel seen and commiserate.
>>41497468sucks doesnt it? to realise that there was never anything to uncover, you were never going to figure it out and become the "real person" buried underneath, there is no real person there. just the emptiness you had since childhood, and now after years of wasted time chasing after a fantasy you are left with less than nothing, faced with the reality of being forgotten having never experienced a real life. becoming old and being nothing for decades or suicide are the only choices.
>>41497468Just do the best for yourself and those around you, it's all we can do. That and never troon, that's the main thing, be yourself.
>>41497468Identity is a relation. You are not your reflection, the reflection is a reflected (flipped) image of your body. You are not your identity, the identity is a relation between you and some object chosen to represent you. A lack of an identity is in itself an identity, or a relation between you and what you identify by identity (gender, sexuality etc.)
>>41497570this hurts to read but this is the trvth about repressing and trooning after your formative years - there is no “girl” version of yourself deep inside that you finally are able to let out. there never was. that person doesn’t exist because they never had a chance to. only the void that their personality would have filled remains. transitioning is about filling that void with a real personality now that you’re actually, fully alive and have the chance to.
>>41497570It really does suck. It all just feels so dreary to have spent so much time and put in so much effort, all in the hopes that it will one day all be worth it, and that I'd come to actually feel alive, but no matter what, I always return back to square one. I really want to believe that I've at least learned something from all of this, but I can't help but feel like it was all for naught.There will never come a day where I won't feel utterly hollow and despondent. It's hard for me to even believe that other people actually feel differently, but their attitudes and actions speak tell me otherwise. Maybe all of this is just my fault. Maybe I just don't have what it takes to be human. Damned from the beginning. Or maybe this is just a culmination of thousands of small mistakes.
>>41497468Are you me?
>>41497468Wow literally me and why i opened this board just now
>>41497468Try dancing.https://youtu.be/9Xz4NV0zsbY
>>41497961No. I'm sorry you have to deal with this as well, and hope life has been at least a bit kind to you
>>41497468this reads like your dopamine stores are 0 and you are depressed, searching for an identity is fruitless because you can't form an ego without fixing your utter black pill despair, a person in pain acts differently than a person who feels good, both in the physical and metaphor sense, psychedelics worked for me
>>41497657wow incredible wiseposting hoursgonna go use this to understand things about stuff, thanks anon
>>41497657This by itself is barely helpful. I know I've had multiple similar "epiphanies" about how transient and reflective of our environments our identities are, but that still won't help me find fulfillment nor meaning. I was never able to find any object which would represent my self because I never felt like I had a self to begin with. And lacking an identity, lacking something you can find yourself in is not liberating in the slightest
>>41498083If you already know it you would apply it and if you can't apply it then you don't know it
>>41498098What are referring to with "it"? I quite obviously don't know "it", because I have no clue how to even apply "it" and actually improve my bleak life. I've tried so much to find an "it" through countless means, but only ever felt as if I'm just slowly decaying with every step I take
>>41498125Why are you replying to me specifically?
>>41498135What you replied caught my interest I guess. Do you expect a specific answer?
>>41497683if only transitionig could ahve helpedbut it too is a fake act of nothingnessa copedoing it not bey some virtue of accepting reality but to cope with emptinessthere was never anything.and there is nothing after itbecause doing it was emptymy transition is a failure because its not real, it is but an empty cope, in reality im nothing but what i always was, not some hidden real me.and what i am is emptyit hurts
>>41498154I wasn't trying to solve your problem I was just responding to specific things in your post that you assume are problems, like seeing your reflection and not seeing yourself, that's only rational. Being repulsed by many contemporary identity categories, that is also rational. As for a sense of self, I would look at what sets off visceral reactions in you and use that as a guide. If you don't have something like that you may be actually a deficiency of some kind or just not been exposed to enough varied experience to know.
>>41498005I'm certainly depressed, and I've been like this for as long as I can really remember. Even in the best periods of my life, there was still a gnawing emptiness eating away at me at every moment. Nothing I've ever tried has every improved it, only distracted me from it at most. I've also tried psychedelics, both shrooms and acid, but they haven't helped me either. The dosages weren't all too high though, and I do intend to try them again, in hopes it'll make just lead to ego death
>>41498205I guess I can see how feeling a certain estrangement to one's own reflection or from many identity categories can be considered rational, but that doesn't change the fact that said estrangement is an overbearing burden in my life. I feel like I'm carrying a corpse and navigating social situation as a faceless entity just feels uncanny. I've also tried my best to expose myself to as many varied experiences as a I could, and it would be a lie to say that some of them didn't actually feel worth my time, but all in all it has always felt draining to simply exist, no matter the momentary enjoyment. That doesn't really leave me with many other options but to keep trying without abandon, so I guess I'll just keep trudging forward aimlessly. Thanks for the advice though
>>41497683How would transitioning fill that void, if the void is my single defining trait? Attempting to fill the void with another personality will just be performative, and I really doubt that anything would ever feel authentic. There never was a "girl", so why would there be one now?
>>41498299It is a burden and most of it we can't control. Can't change the categories in social situations so I avoid them. I do enough to sustain a career and leave everything else to others. That is the route I prefer. Some people like to be really engaged and sociable but that comes with its own set of problems like being exposed to too much of other's issues and losing touch with yourself that way. No matter what you have to compromise and deal with it. Can life ever truly be an effortless joyful ride, or is that just a marketable image some people learned to buy and sell while pushing off the problems on others? Whenever things get unbearable you have to get selfish and assertive in one way or another and that's where you'd find it.
>>41498183Same goes for me. Tried transitioning, but deep down I always knew it was just a cope, so I detransed before the effects became too apparent. I guess that means I was never trans to begin with, but it still deeply hurts to know that not even this helped in the slightest. I just wanted to have an identity
"I" love everyone in this threadEven if my heart is black and hollowThere is no self, it is a recursive construction: "you" only exist to other people as a continent object-construction to facilitate social relations, and that is then recursively applied by ones consciousness apparatus to oneself to allow one to exist in a social environment.This is not a useful truth. If you feel this way its probably because you are extremely isolated and introspective; a deadly combination.Theres nothing to say, but be the self that your constituent personalities and mechanisms are most content in and try to have fun
