And in this 'survive by imitation (so jump through these hoops, or else!)' society (henceforth STI), I tend to be out of even the out-group; my seeking to understand in-group behaviour itself seems to be enough for any STI to put me into the out-group, and I have never learned to just 'fake it' (and since I can't read minds, that is probably an impossible task). And when I explain to my clients the solution for a relatively simple problem (so they won't have to call me next time), I get looked at like I'm from another planet, but my message through doing that is simple: 'Anyone can do this, so save your money for real problems'... but when things get tight, I've learned to do that less (but always feel bad about it).
My underlining integrity also saddles me with an inability to compete with others in the market: I still fondly remember the day where some 'gung-ho' new employee in one of my client companies would rather call someone else (less aware?) than face up to their fucking up a system I built for said client company... not only did I eventually have to witness that sort of manipulation, but I had to witness the lie-filled play-acting of 'the other guy'... and had to watch my clients falling for it (because, as they new nothing about 'how' it worked (only that it did, then didn't), how could they tell the difference). And from then on the gung-ho grudge-holder tried tapping every ensuing problem on me (but it was really a chain reaction based in their fuck-up)... I have no weapons against that sort of dishonesty, so I ended up just dropping them from my client list (which is what gung-ho wanted anyway).
But by doing that, I'm short-changing myself in another way: the brain needs 'reward' situations for motivation, and normally taking home a paycheck should be one of those, but through my added level of thought (understanding), I tend to cancel that, or 'sabotage' it, as some may say... but once one spreads their net of awareness about what effect they have on others around them in an even wider area, there's no going back.
So, even though today my survival-experience has given me abilities far above that any education could provide, I find myself unable to be 'taken seriously' because of my 'not jumping through the same hoops, the same way, as everyone'... and I say that because I even thought to seek refuge in supposedly-high-minded, rational academia (where I initially felt very fearful and small), but that presupposition turned out to be illusion, too.
So, at present I'm in a very, very, very reward-less world. Not only that, but I'm also blocked from exiting that dilemma by... 'powers' beyond my control (a single person taking advantage of their legal status (and mine being dependant on theirs) to make me pay their work-less, ignorant (expensive!) space-filling ways). I was already in a depression before this new supposedly 'new start' apartment (and my ex-drug-pusher-more-than-anything-psychiatrist thought that I've always been depressed; I'm supposedly unable to even process 'reward' (meaning that I have no experience with it), meaning that the drugs they prescribed would never work, either (they didn't), yet they continued to prescribe them (€192 every two weeks, on average)... this makes no rational sense, but I digress).
I used to depend on alcohol to 'boot' me out of a depressive state, or to make me numb enough to ignore those reward-killing 'details', but even that stopped working once I found a better understanding of what it does to the brain (and that I learned while doing research about why the antidepressants were fucking me up so much) and saw it for the 'fake reward' it is. And there, too, there's no going back (side note: so why do alcoholism 'support' programs never include the critical thought (lessons) required to overcome/re-program our 'default' reactions and instincts?). All the same, I would sometimes resort to my 'knock out remedy' when the depressive bout was particularily bad, but even that stopped working to the point where drinking itself seemed... a sad and pointless exercise. I can drink socially again, but I can't really say that I like it anymore... in any case, it's not what it was before. I feel about alcohol today as I always felt about weed before: one (rational) part of my brain being concerned about another part not functioning 'correctly'... not a positive experience, and it's like watching myself twice (in everything I think and say while 'influenced'), in a way.
So, today I have neither alcohol or antidepressants to 'help me though' depression, and my understanding of my state seems to be just another obstacle; ignorance could be bliss, but only in an ignorance-exploiting world (like today's). My only remedy is to make my own rewards, and that solution seems, for me, to cut myself off from the world entirely, and do some sort of humanities-service task that will remain in human memory. I would also like to develop my AI research (and I think I'm on to something there, but convincing someone to finance non-tech-educated me, good luck) and RDF development (my at-once utterly simple and horribly complex 'fact engine'), but I just can't support myself that way.
At this point I find solace in working with both my mind and my hands (and this apartment was that at one point - I did get a new kitchen-countertop technique invention out of it), but what I really need is to invest myself into something that I've evidently not yet had in my life: something for me.
