u/Extension_Ant2048

I'm a 16 almost-17-year-old male, and I'm really lost. I have been dealing with depression and anxiety for a while. Some days I feel like I'm moving forward with my life, and then other days I feel like I'm standing still while everyone seems to know where they are going.

I've also lost someone I deeply cared about. Whether it was the right person or not, the loss has affected me so much, and when it actually hit me, i realise I realised I wouldn't get over her for a while. It has been 2 months. Ever since then, I've spent a lot of time questioning myself and my future, even what really matters.

School is confusing. I feel I'm decently smart with solid grades, but I just have no ethic or drive for any future job. I have zero passion for any subject, and everyone knows what they are doing.

I'm not looking for motivation or empty encouragement, I'm looking for perspective. For anyone who has been through difficult times like this, especially a younger time in your life, I am begging for your advice.

*I wrote this thinking it was just to myself and my journal so forgive the writing style*

Every year that we go on these interstate trips for basketball it just gets worse, for some reason I just feel down and cannot seem to be happy. Yes there are times when I’m with temamate friends but as the years go by I have less and less, last year was fun but when you are by yourself it’s actually quite depressing.

Nervous for the games, parents brought you all the way to Melbourne and probably won’t perform. But that’s never my main reason, I always seem to be hung up about a girl. Last year was terrible and I have fixed a lot of my ways from checking every second and getting so attached so early it really was not good for my mental health at all.

the good thing about these carnivals I really value a lot of things more and differently, like my friends wanting to hear about what happened but as a write that I realise no one has ever done that, I don’t feel I’m lonely but these trips just seem to haunt me. I think the way to describe how I feel is “lost” I get this feeling sometimes but whenever I’m in Melbourne away on these trips when I’m by myself not including my parents I just can’t escape that feeling.

There will be times that I think otherwise when I think of life like ‘wow I’m alive’ and changing my perspective. This year to help this because I knew it was going to happen again I tried to find some new music and only found one and the thing I realised about myself there is that I hate change, and I have clearly not mastered my patience yet, I would give one artist and one album a try and then give up. I need music to wow me straight away which is why I have ‘TikTok knowledge,’ I don’t know why that sentence bothers me so much but It truly does. Like I feel attacked, there’s no reason to find ‘niche music’ like what you want to like. Which points to my next issue on the journey.

I care too much on what others think of me. I will always compare myself to others even when I don’t notice it first hand. I wonder what it truly is to be your own person, I seek attention to often which just relates trying to be someone I am not. I think I have to be elite at something or at least lie and say I’m good at something when I don’t need to be perfect for anybody.

I read this book on the way called ‘The Alchemist,’ It is a really eye-opening book about following your dreams, and the first thing I did after reading it was post on my private story to let everyone know I read and I shared my thoughts on a book, I feel I just want people to know I something productive and performative. This book truly taught me a lot and I’m sad I have finished it which is tendering the wounds on what I feel right now, at this time, this ‘empty’ feeling.

I say to myself about these things and say I will do better and yes maybe for a day or two but never forever like others can and should. I’m lazy in lots of things, school work ethic, cleaning and others and the way I feel about everything is just “if I have to” not I should do this because it would be beneficial,” Never in my life have I ever wanted to get out my comfort zone and fight towards something I really really want. But then again this could be something that gets better over time as I grow up.

Im 17 in a month and I feel times slipping away and I want to be a child again. Its feeling to serious and not worth it. ‘Teenage years are the best years’ well if that’s so, being stuck in my room every night questioning everything being super nostalgic on my teenage life even when I’m only 16 does not feel like my prime.

I will go to school with zero ethic to do anything, use AI for my assignments and lessons no matter if it’s easy or difficult just because I’m lazy. Or am I really the problem because I will see others do it and get away with it so what’s the point in my trying as hard as I can and getting a worse grade than someone way less intelligent. After using AI all day, I will worry about the girl and make up anything to feel normal, I hang with friends that I will like and dislike, switching every few days, then after school get driven home and do nothing eat and watch something, maybe play a game, have a shower go to sleep, one night a week ill have basketball training, spend the whole day worrying anxiously about it and get it over done with but still ruined 90% of my day. Other days I’ll walk home from school, when I do this alone I have music and think people are looking at me funny and laughing and judging me about my appearance or just anything I do, ill have depressing audios playing in my ears and get lollies or just something unhealthy eat it and drink whatever and repeat the same night schedule. Other nights I walk home from school are with one mate or multiple and we will all the time get junk food and waste hours apart from being with each other, most times we just there together, kind of like ‘we are here because we are friends, we gotta do this often to stay friends,’ and then go on with our nights around five a-clock.

With friends I’m no ones best friend I will say as well, I’m in between two different groups, both have their pro’s and cons and this just means I can hardly hang out with either, I’m always stuck by myself or with the few mates I’m close-ish with (the ones that walk home with me).

I’m a teenager who’s 17 in a month, experienced love once and lost it, has anxiety, depressed and I never get out of this loop in my life. Has only a few career ideas but zero passion for anything. I’m a very lost person.