It changed the way I thought about everything. I had to reanalyze every belief I held and was far too busy doing that to be particularly sad.
More importantly though, it gave me hope. The general air of optimism and confidence and defiance made me feel proud to be a part of it. Before finding this place, the thing that bothered me most about life was that it was absolutely certain to end. After reading the Methods of Rationality, I realized that I didn’t have to go down without a fight so long as I had even a chance of winning.
Besides all that, Lesswrong gave me a sense of belonging. People here seem so similar to me, which is a pretty rare thing. Some of them seem atypical in almost exactly the way I’m atypical. Their quirks are basically my quirks. And the way they act, you’d get the idea that they think those things actually make them better people. It’s a pretty powerful emotion when you come across it for the first time.
That’s also how I felt about OB/LW in high school. But when I grew older and met smart, sensible non-high-schoolers, the “zomg OB is totally my tribe” effect became less strong, because I found people in the real world who were more similar to me. Anyway, you might be depressed because you’re in high school and you’re having a hard time finding people similar to you (or because high school is just a terrible place in general).
Why did LW originally make a difference to your suicidality?
It changed the way I thought about everything. I had to reanalyze every belief I held and was far too busy doing that to be particularly sad.
More importantly though, it gave me hope. The general air of optimism and confidence and defiance made me feel proud to be a part of it. Before finding this place, the thing that bothered me most about life was that it was absolutely certain to end. After reading the Methods of Rationality, I realized that I didn’t have to go down without a fight so long as I had even a chance of winning.
Besides all that, Lesswrong gave me a sense of belonging. People here seem so similar to me, which is a pretty rare thing. Some of them seem atypical in almost exactly the way I’m atypical. Their quirks are basically my quirks. And the way they act, you’d get the idea that they think those things actually make them better people. It’s a pretty powerful emotion when you come across it for the first time.
That’s also how I felt about OB/LW in high school. But when I grew older and met smart, sensible non-high-schoolers, the “zomg OB is totally my tribe” effect became less strong, because I found people in the real world who were more similar to me. Anyway, you might be depressed because you’re in high school and you’re having a hard time finding people similar to you (or because high school is just a terrible place in general).