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Here's a life tip.
Stop listening to your own stupid opinions.
Reject your own unsolicited opinions of how other people choose to live. Relax, God's in charge.
I guarantee if you adopt this new frame of mind your outlook and life will turn around.
It can't not do.
Every country on this earth that leaves itself in the hands of God, or acts like its ok God is in charge, is a disaster.
OP - this poster is just encouraging you to give up and use a comforter - the saccharine pleasures of religious pretense. Its ok if you can kid yourself enough to fully believe it. If you can't do that, you're going to have to grow up instead.
If you are clinically depressed, your location wont change your brain chemistry. professional treatment can possibly help people with the disease of mental illness.
If you are not clinically depressed, blaming where you live, your family, or whatever for your unhappiness are convenient excuses for cowardice. making a choice to change our circumstances takes bravery.
The tribal feeling, of cohering with the place where one resides, is a powerful aspect of identity. Wise people can manage to endure, and maybe even thrive, despite annoyances and external pressures. But is this good quality of life? I mean, we move around, chasing career-success, sometimes to unpalatable and alien places. But ought we to settle there permanently? And if we are there for several years, it is entirely natural to be skeptical of the place, to feel jarringly foreign and unaccepted, even after having bought a house and visited the local voting-precinct for many years running.
There are several issues here. The first is how one relates to one’s neighbors. If I moved to a village in Africa, I’d not fit in – even if the place were lush, serene, welcoming and safe. Sure, it would be a stimulating anthropological exercise, for a while – but I’d view it as an observer, not a participant. I’d be out of place, and suffer a diminution in quality of life, lacking topics of conversation with neighbors. But what about a smallish American town? Could I find like-minded people, forming a small community that bucks the norm, a circle of friends? Maybe. If so, that obviates the issue here. If not, not.
The second issue is more abstract – the prestige of the place itself… especially if one was born and raised in a prestigious place, and now finds oneself in the provinces. It feels like exile, punishment, atoning for some transgression or poor judgment. And it’s not about loss of access to ethnic restaurants or fancy parties or world-class museums. That’s touristy-stuff, that could be done via occasional visits, and perhaps thereby even done more frequently, than by the locals. Neither is it mere homesickness. No, the key point is that the new locale reflects upon oneself, and that reflection feels unsavory, banal, retrograde.
The third issue is a combination of the above. NYC real-estate is booming. Ours is not. Sure, cost of living is higher, taxes are higher. But salaries are also higher, and that means a better Social Security record for retirement. They have opportunities… maybe one is from an immigrant community, and in the big city, there are people who speak one’s language, with whom one could practice and not grow rusty. Here, in the Heartland village, there is no such opportunity.
Sure, it’s silly to entirely depend for one’s emotional sustenance on the locale where one lives. But it’s just as silly to entirely disavow it.
Charlotte, a coastal boomtown? I agree with "boomtown", but not with "coastal". It's at least a 4-hr drive to get to the beach. I lived in Charlotte for 14 years.
OP - if you derive a sense of self-worth from where you live, you probably have deep psychological issues.
Your environment can and does have a profound impact on your mental health.
I'm from a Rust Belt town in northeast Tennessee. We have more in common with Rust Belt Ohio and West Virginia than we do with modern, booming metros like Nashville or Charlotte.
I spent from 2014-2016 in the most affluent suburb of Indianapolis. Everything seems much newer and better maintained than here. The people living in that community are by and large educated professionals. The schools are good. The job market is healthy. People live healthier lifestyles. It is much easier to be positive and upbeat when the community you live in is on the right track.
Contrast that to living back here in Appalachia. Drug abuse is rampant. Crime is high in many communities - many small towns have crime rates above and beyond many major cities. The economy hasn't really recovered from the recession. Homes and businesses aren't as well-maintained. Properties get run down and no one cares. Vacant and boarded-up buildings are commonplace. Outside of a couple of cities, the schools suck. The job market for professionals remains poor.
Yes, we have natural beauty in spades here, but that doesn't mean a hill of beans if you're making $10/hr, or your property is frequently getting burglarized or stolen by druggies. If you have an 8-5, your outdoor activity is basically confined to weekends and summer evenings. A cubicle here is a cubicle anywhere.
Outside of Johnson City, there is just so much pessimism around here in the community. People are used to such poor results that they don't demand better. Expectations are low. People seem defeated before they even try - they feel helpless and hopeless. The best and brightest of the younger adults (think <40) have left for greener pastures, and what's left behind is largely an underclass.
I think the OP is WAY too hard on Oklahoma City. While it may not be as large as Charlotte, I can't imagine that it's exactly nowhere and that there are no redeeming aspects to it. Even where I am, there are areas that are not like what I described, though they are few and far between, we're still a small metro, and very isolated.
The best thing he can do is cut expenses to the bone and do what he needs to do to clear up the financial issues that are preventing him from moving, or find a higher-paying job elsewhere. If OKC doesn't work, it doesn't work. He is not that far in the hole comparatively speaking from previous, recent threads I've read.
If you are clinically depressed, your location wont change your brain chemistry. professional treatment can possibly help people with the disease of mental illness.
If you are not clinically depressed, blaming where you live, your family, or whatever for your unhappiness are convenient excuses for cowardice. making a choice to change our circumstances takes bravery.
Every depression isn't chemical. There is situational depression. Medication can make the person feel better, but the real key is putting in the effort to change their actual life situation.
Every depression isn't chemical. There is situational depression. Medication can make the person feel better, but the real key is putting in the effort to change their actual life situation.
Absolutely.
I went to Charlotte a couple weeks ago. Just the hustle and bustle and newness of it all perked me compared to what I see everyday here in Appalachia.
The second issue is more abstract – the prestige of the place itself… especially if one was born and raised in a prestigious place, and now finds oneself in the provinces. It feels like exile, punishment, atoning for some transgression or poor judgment. And it’s not about loss of access to ethnic restaurants or fancy parties or world-class museums. That’s touristy-stuff, that could be done via occasional visits, and perhaps thereby even done more frequently, than by the locals. Neither is it mere homesickness. No, the key point is that the new locale reflects upon oneself, and that reflection feels unsavory, banal, retrograde.
Bingo. It just clicked when you put it this way and these are all things I've thought about.
After graduating college I moved off to the "big city" which in my case was Charlotte NC to start my life. Now I know a lot of people don't see Charlotte as a prestigious place but by my standards it is and might as well be NYC compared to Oklahoma City. After three years of manipulation by my beyond homophobic family, they convinced me to move to OKC and also to do conversion therapy. The recession was going on back then and I didn't have a very good job in Charlotte. My parents are injecting themselves in my life in ways I just couldn't thrive. I reach the point where packing up and moving to OKC, something I would have never even entertained a year earlier, became an option and that is what I did. Living in OKC feels like exile as you say. Add to that the fact that the dominant culture of OKC is the exact thing I wish I could get away from (uptight religious fundamentalism). It feels like failure. Five years have now gone by and I feel I have nothing to show for them except a few gray hairs appearing and an expensive car that I didn't want and don't really like yet still owe nearly $13k on. I stopped living when I left Charlotte.
Here's a life tip.
Stop listening to your own stupid opinions.
Reject your own unsolicited opinions of how other people choose to live.
Relax, God's in charge.
I guarantee if you adopt this new frame of mind your outlook and life will turn around.
It can't not do.
And if OP doesn't believe in "God"?
Just seems like an odd outlook to suggest someone adopt without knowing that about them. I don't see anything religious from the poster.
Bingo. It just clicked when you put it this way and these are all things I've thought about.
After graduating college I moved off to the "big city" which in my case was Charlotte NC to start my life. Now I know a lot of people don't see Charlotte as a prestigious place but by my standards it is and might as well be NYC compared to Oklahoma City. After three years of manipulation by my beyond homophobic family, they convinced me to move to OKC and also to do conversion therapy. The recession was going on back then and I didn't have a very good job in Charlotte. My parents are injecting themselves in my life in ways I just couldn't thrive. I reach the point where packing up and moving to OKC, something I would have never even entertained a year earlier, became an option and that is what I did. Living in OKC feels like exile as you say. Add to that the fact that the dominant culture of OKC is the exact thing I wish I could get away from (uptight religious fundamentalism). It feels like failure. Five years have now gone by and I feel I have nothing to show for them except a few gray hairs appearing and an expensive car that I didn't want and don't really like yet still owe nearly $13k on. I stopped living when I left Charlotte.
are you seriously saying a car loan is the reason you are stuck in OKC? in the past five years a second, part-time job earning only $50 a week, $2600 a year, could have paid off your car loan by now, couldn't it?
you are over 30. time to grow up and quit blaming your parents, OP.
I've never lived there but one of the best parties I've ever been to was in OKC.
I was there for 3 nights, the first 2 I did what everybody else wanted to do; go to country western nightclubs.
the 3rd night I told them to go on without me & I drove around until I found this dive biker bar ... with 1 bike out front. Went inside, asked for an ice water with lemon & tipped the bartender $10 for it.
Both she & the 1 biker inside were looking at me like I was nuts but I put some quarters on a table & started to play myself at pool. After about a half hour, that biker approached me & asked: "You want to go to a party at my brother's house?"
I mean, I guess he could have been a serial killer but what were my options? So, I start following him down the mostly deserted streets ( OKC does appear to roll em up at 10 pm) & right into this dark warehouse district.
And I'm thinking ... "either your brother lives in a warehouse, or you are a serial killer" & he pulls up to a huge 1 story warehouse with no windows surrounded by a 15 ft high electric fence with razor wire on the top. The only thing missing was a sniper tower; it was pretty grim. But at least I wasn't bored anymore.
When he deactivates all the alarms & unlocks all the security doors; I walked into a massive casino-resort style hall with 4 separate bars, 3 lounges with overstuffed sofas, red carpets & shiny real wood rails & banisters ... & one stunning redhead woman behind one bar named Rosie. He told me "My brothers are on their way; they should be here any moment now ..."
And a moment later the whole building started to shake with the rumble of about 200 motorcycles pulling up at once.
Trust me; OKC knows how to throw a party ... but you're not going to find it safe at home being depressed.
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And if OP doesn't believe in "God"? 
