Self-worth and friends

[h_jc]

hey guys, I am new here but would like to talk about a couple of things. Personally I don't really want to talk to my family about anything because they will probably be all pitiful and send me to a therapist or smth. Anyway, I have noticed that after a personal failure I am always really distracted and down. For example; after I lose a tennis match at school (tennis is my favourite hobby), I cannot focus on studying later. Or if I get a bad mark, I feel worthless for a day or so after and get sucked into a hole of feeling inadequate and comparing myself to others. Is this normal? How can I help it because it can be really distracting, especially when I need to study or something and I just cannot focus because I feel so down. Secondly, I have a pretty good friend group at school. They are all super nice people but most of them seem a lot closer to each other than to me, and I just feel like they are drifting away. I want to have deeper relationships with them so that I can discuss things like this but I feel like my relationships with my friends at school is kinda just stuck at the stage where we are joking around and nothing really further than that. How can I get to that next stage? I don't want all of my relationships to be so shallow that when I leave school they all just ditch me and then I'll have no friends

[white knight]

Hi, welcome

An interesting topic, thankyou for posting.

Your friend just muck around, you seek more meaningful relationships. I suggest that you are in some ways more mature and serious than them. It's ok to keep those friends and draw more mature people into your world as well. There is no need to think you are replacing them, just adding more suitable ones. You might consider finding these people in your library at lunch breaks or other locations where older students hang out. Even go away and read/study would be better and just mingle with your joking friends for shorter periods.

Feeling disenchanted after a failure- Whether its sport or an exam, this feeling is carried through your for a lifetime and everyone reacts differently eg some dont care or arent effected by losing... they more on because they can be rational about it meaning they dont allow that emotion to effect them. This is a natural process for everyone and for you your emotional makeup includes a feeling of guilt or hurt. There could be a number of reasons

• Guilt- that you blame yourself for not performing
• Lack of motivation, like you focus on the failure rather than the process to improve so you'll have a better chance of winning next time
• That you could be over sensitive- that isnt a bad thing at all. It means you care. Up to 20% of all people suffer HSP- Highly Sensitive Person.   https://forums.beyondblue.org.au/t5/depression/highly-sensitive-people-hsp/m-p/480957
• Strive to perfection- If you strive for perfection you'll be your own worst enemy. We cannot be perfect, we can however be human which is imperfect. This includes acknowledging the some people have natural talent eg you might enjoy tennis but that doesnt download to having any chance of being good enough to be a major star. Doing your best is always good enough
• Choose friends wisely- being sensitive and dwelling on failure means staying clear of people that add to that feeling like nasty ones or those that ridicule you. If that happens by all means question them as to why they do that and try to move on from them.

I hope I've help clarify some of what you feel. Reply anytime

TonyWK