The Western Version of Hikikomori

It is happening all over the West now (I include Japan in this). In Japan they have a pandemic of males who will not leave their rooms and apartments.

It was reported even back in 2013 by the BBC,

www.bbc.co.uk...

As many as a million young people in Japan are thought to remain holed up in their homes - sometimes for decades at a time. Why?

Recently I saw it being reported again and the problem appears to have grown even bigger,

www.nationalgeographic.com...

Pictures Reveal the Isolated Lives of Japan’s Social Recluses A photographer explores the hidden world of the hikikomori, and the human bonds that draw them out.

In Japan they call it "Hikikomori". We have it in the West too. I think I am suffering from it and have been doing since 2005. Since I had a huge breakdown in 2005 I have become totally reclusive and have gone like Tron into the digital realm to escape the "criminal world" of corruption and exploitation. If you are a working class boy like me from a verry humble place with an honest heart but a problem upbringing (with all the scars) there is little hope of you ever escaping the "boots" of the corrupt in one way or another. When I had my breakdown it was because I could no longer control the passion of disgust and honesty I felt and I started having outbursts of inappropriate honesty. In a sense I am doing that here on this site because I am not able to disgusie the honesty of my expression and do not even want to as the world is censored enough.

I have a great life. I do go out walking all the time. I walk usually about six miles a day to the local supermarket and back and that is about it. I do all my other shopping online. I am living a digital life. All my extra money is going on digital related goods. I still learn (far more than I ever used to). I have become an "info sponge", weaving the world together to keep getting the bigger picture, so I am not guilty of not seeing the forest for the trees.

I have a very creative life with not much money, but enough to buy the digital software and basic hardware to operate the software I need. I am not one for fancy things. I buy quality that lasts for a long time. I live a budget life, always trying to minimize bills so I have more to put towards buying the amazing new tools for my creativity. I am very good in my chosen field with lots of experience now, but there is no way for me to make money in it as it is a very elitist market.

My interest is the only thing I live for. That makes it worth hanging around on the earth for and putting up with all the trash and bad experiences of this hard reality. I think my lifestyle is a reaction. It followed the final breaking point where I could not stand what was happening to me or the world any longer. Essentially I have taken the world emotional hostage. I have become a master of my game. It is my way of making it change. I am giving it a headache because it treated me bad and still does. I will keep giving it a headache too until it can evolve to a civilized enough state so I can fit in with it.

I used to get very bullied in every social situation, In work too. I am very unique and people quickly notice me. Whenever I am threatened my fight or flight instinct kicks in in ways that are very extreme now. That is because they got so damaged through life. It is a kind of PTSD. My extreme behaviour is one final attempt to demonstrate to my "captors" that they have got me flicking hairs like a tarantula because it is my only protection. After that it is either bite and fight or run away if I can. If I can run away I do run away.

I can no longer stand the challenges of public society. I can't fit into the PC straitjacket and put on the act. I am core honesty of purpose and emotion. I am ultra intense. I would do people's heads in if they had to be my colleague, be sure of it.

When I am socially challenged beyond my ability (by your standards I am very easily triggered by certain triggers) I "flick hairs". I am constantly in an anxious state. When I am by myself I have none of the pressure that triggers me. Through a screen I can handle anything because it can't hurt me. I can either choose to look and experience it or not. Essentially, you are my problem. Ironic, because you would think I am the problem. As much as I am your problem you are mine, please understand that.

I never parade my riches, but I have many. They are my secret pearls. They would not even appear as pearls to you. People will never know how rich I am or how beautiful the gentle reality I have created for myself is. In my home Jesus rules and it is a safe, gentle and intelligent place to live.

Out there it is murder, terrorism, rape, slaughter, exploitation, greed, and all manner of other rampaging demons of human disease. I wonder just who is right and who is wrong here?

My sister once gave me a birthday card of a tortoise with his little head poking out his shell and she said she was giving me a message with that. She was right. However, she does not know that inside my shell it is bliss. Out there it is a hell my eyes can no longer stand seeing. Out there people behave so aggressively that I get inappropriately upset very quickly.

This is very complex. Hitler thought people like me were better off gassed and society be rid of them. I am feeling so refined and civilized. I feel that I have achieved my aim of not hurting other people in this life and being true and gentle. It appears that it is socially inappropriate to be like me though. I hide because it is my only survival option in YOUR WORLD! It ain't my world.

My world is in here, listening to nice music and feeling as safe as you can on this earth with no bad vibes, arguments or aggressive abusing anything. Keep ye far hence from my fort, Satan! Lol!

I know also there are absolutely loads of us now, from the basements of the U.S to the bedsits and flats of London to the Tokyo apartments. I think the digital onslaught is manufacturing us, a dime a dozen. It is making way for the machines. How far the Creator will let it go I do not know, but obviously evolution is taking us down this road. We are the new human entities who don't want to have children any more because the world sucks and there are too many of us anyhow. We can live in our own minds and experience the world mentally and physically in a new way that is ever evolving and learn at a speed never before possible. We are going to have a huge learning curve of experience now in the world. The call of intelligence has come to us, just in time to possibly salvage something from the human dump we have made of this world.

The computer is predictable. It entices us because it is safe emotionally. It will never abuse us or play head games with us (unless we want it to). I am thinking evolution is finding that bit useful because all the head game stuff is very destructive to us psychically as me and the other hikikomori "sufferers" have proved by being so useless at operating in that old world. Should they call us hikikomori "sufferers"? It could just as easily be hikikomori "shamans", if the future and evolution decide it likes our way as the machines replace us doing all the horrible repetitive stuff that made us miserable having to work forty plus hours a week. Time to play, humanity? Do you want to play?

Well I am living the opposite life and I envy you, I can’t get internet at my house and it kills me, I wish I was living a digital life.

a reply to: bananashooter

It is coming for you. It is coming for the whole earth. Hang in there.

There are huge losses for me too. I have lost physcial affection and all the touchy feely stuff. Interesting that Jesus never had much time for the pleasures of the flesh and now that is not becoming as necessary for some of us because it asks of us what we can''t give without it being socially traumatic and beyond our ability. If being sociable is such an unpleasant experience then evolution is bound to "clock" that.

Know it that I have been through hell of loneliness and loss. Now though I like the gentle peace. It is like being a digital monk, lol!



Evolution is always painful, stretching out of an old skin into a new, new wine for new wineskins.

If you want it you shall have it. Many think it is a demon. I think it is neutral thing, our thinking will make it good or evil by our intentions and application.

Don't feel hard done by. I long for your world like Jack in his "Oblivion" world (check the "Oblivion" movie). I am just a case of action and reaction. I am a reaction, possible evolution if evolution likes us going this way. Lol, evolution is the "Winepress" of this earth and the force that sifts the wheat from the chaff.

a reply to: Malak777


Not only will psilocybin cubensis treat PTSD, it has the potential to open your eyes/heart/mind.
There are many sources that can help you, I would check out Erowid. If you sit on your computer absorbing information... absorb enough to arrive at a catalyst, it is out there.

originally posted by: chadderson
a reply to: Malak777


Not only will psilocybin cubensis treat PTSD, it has the potential to open your eyes/heart/mind.
There are many sources that can help you, I would check out Erowid.

Yes, but I don't want to be helped. I like it the way it is. Really I am a hopeless case, but in my own world I am a great success. My life is very simple and nice. I have great control of it. I am too scared of relationships. I would not be able to function. With the lack of help in the UK there is no way I am ever going to get access to the long and intensive expensive therapy that would be required to "convert" me back to the old ways. The world of commerce likes me better the way I am too. Business loves me as its little "new age battery" all controlled and predictable, data recorded and harvested.

My only hope is that there is a "Morpheus" somewhere out there. Just kidding! I got Jesus in my life and the connection is very good. I know now why some men chose the aesthetic life of a monk to be quiet and listen for the Spirit. Once you get the hang of it it is a kind of gentle and beautiful simple existence.

I'm a Digi-Monk, ho ho!



I have been through all the catalysts. My life was so diverse and hectic that it blew me apart. I bet I could challenge you spiritually and intellectually any day. Would you like to try?

You patronize me by suggesting that in some way you are all woke and I am not. Have you read my threads and posts? Can you be as diverse and detailed as that? If you can then show it to me. Do you believe you have a right to be so informal as to come at me with advice? None shall be taken because you are appearing far too prematurely judgmental in your perception of me based on just a tiny thread.

See what I mean about you being the problem? I want to communicate yet I can't stand how insensitive and flippant people are. It looks ridiculous to me. That is why I avoid this society of "experts". It irritates me profoundly. I don't claim to be an expert on anything, even with all my academic experience, reading, research, travels, creativity.

It's never too late to have a happy childhood. I couldn't care less if you want to live a reclusive life, as long as you pay your own way. But putting long essays on places like ATS isn't being very reclusive.

Were you writing here for help or to explain your situation?

Sounds like you are comfortable with your lifestyle. I hope it is not the future of our society. We need the human touch for many necessary reasons.

Can't help but hope you get the help you so desperately need- whether you feel you need/want it or not.

Best wishes. Thanks for sharing.

originally posted by: schuyler
It's never too late to have a happy childhood. I couldn't care less if you want to live a reclusive life, as long as you pay your own way. But putting long essays on places like ATS isn't being very reclusive.

Why are yo being hostile?

Why are you suggesting that me writing essays is somehow negative?

I am sharing information. I am always observing and thinking. I want to challenge you at ATS in a constructive way because I see a lot of ignorance as in the rest of the world. I see a lot of intelligence too. I am very worried about what is happening in the West as all my posts here are demonstrating. I am here for the same reasons as you yet you are suggesting that I don't have as much right to post here as you, using this against me. That seems really rather nasty and rude to me, considering we are strangers. That is why I keep you at arm's length because you will definitely attack me even on our first meeting, just as you have demonstrated.

I made that clear did I not that you are a problem to me and that I will appear as a problem to you and worse, a scapegoat to boot.

What is paying my own way? Are you paying your own way? I know you are not and neither am I. We are both paying with Caesar's money because it is his head on it and not ours. The work concept is going out with the dinosaurs as the machines come to take over all that horrible work. We need to learn what to do with the time and how to fund the citizens. Your thinking is small and it needs to be big in terms of the future and our relationship to this "work" you mention.

I'm actually not paying my way even slightly yet I am very useful to business and the economy still, but may be not to your jealousy perhaps. It is a new way that is coming. Me and people like me are an experiment as to what on earth we shall do with our idle hands once the machines take away all the horrible labour from us. We shall be free, but free to do whaty exactly?

People are being free to abuse themselves with too much eating, too many drugs, medications, sexual depravity, et c. That is not tolerable. Free to be artists, gentle, low impact resources wise, imaginative because our resources are finite and we can't all be super duper millionaires, that is tolerable.

I think your thinking is very limited in imagination and regard for the future. You are already trying to paint me as the sinner and the scapegoat because I dare to challenge your old order that was not working and destroyed me and so many others. It will not get the chance to do that again.

I would be glad if you were willing to write more in your response. You only furnish me with a very basic and rather abrasive reply, just because I am being honest with you. You appear to be upset by me already, even with your first words to me. Why is that? Why do you want to be instantly hard and aggressive with me? Am I your enemy? I do not think you are my enemy, just a problem that needs to be addressed as you perceive me to be a problem.

I wonder which of us is the future, you or me? I would say at a guess it is me. The world will be wanting humans to lead productive and creative lives to move on to higher things once the need for brute labour and dreary serfdom is no more required. That is coming, I assure you one hundred and one percent, just as the Bible said it was coming.

Perhaps we need to get ready for that? I don't drink alcohol. I do my walking and I eat just a little healthy stuff, mainly vegetarian with no big game at all. I am digitizing myself and I think evolution is wanting that so we are low impact and ultra evolved., eventually.

Even though you instantly take offense to me as I knew you would, it is good to meet you any way. Do you always behave like that with overseas strangers?

That is the problem. If I go near you people you will torture me. You always have and always will. I give you all a wide berth until you are civilized enough to cope with it. it has to be through the screen for my own emotional protection as both these replies to my thread are showing.

Your life sounds like heaven to me. I have very few important people in my life and frankly, I like it that way. I have difficulty forging relationships and find people uncomfortable.

If my wife and daughter didn't make me go places with them from time to time and I didn't have coaching I wouldn't leave the house either. What's the point?

a reply to: Malak777


The hand of a higher power is a catalyst like none other. I now see your post is more about making people aware of the hermit life, rather than asking for help. If you're truly happy, who am I to say you need help, but are you?

What happens when the power goes out? What happens when the servers are down? What happens when your artificial escape is not there?

Rhetorical question.

Either you find the true escape within that catalyzing moment, or you wither away.

You may be happy now, but you are dependent upon transience. This is a recipe for disaster, or a recipe for exactly the right catalyst!

a reply to: Malak777

Grow up, stop being a #ing child...

That is all hikkikomori is. A bunch of grown up man children who can't face life. Grow the # up, stop being a child. This is the solution.

Or honestly don't. All that means is more jobs and opportunity for those of us that try in life. Go ahead and waste away. When everybody's gone and can't look after you, you'll be #ed.

Guess I was kinda lucky, my mom died when I was 16 and my dad's kind of a # around, I didn't have the option of being a grown up man child.

a reply to: Malak777


Relating to this "work ethic".

I do lots of work. I am engaged in the work of survival and creativity constantly. I never rest. I only sleep a few short hours each night. I don't sit there watching endless Box Sets, knocking back shots or sniffing stuff up my nose. I am always learning and studying.

Unfortunately when I did work I got severely bullied constantly, attacked, really very badly and continually in every work place because you are not civilized to cope with me. As I said I am an expert in my field, but there are many experts and only those with contacts get an opportunity to make money out of what I do.

As the machines come I am forced to explore a life where there is only a limited amount of money, my entertainment and all other media needs are met digitally (low stress on planet resources), where people are completely hostile to me if I step too much into public society. Even with the burden of continual human hostility I am managing to achieve something positive where I can sometimes self actualize. I think my life is worth living for what I get out of it, even as a recluse in a hostile environment. The experiment is working.

Do you all really want to stay like THIS and be doing these very dreary manual jobs forever and a day? All those who get crucified by this life do not. All those who have a sense of their own destiny and want to experience life beyond the usury of industrial labour want it to change very quickly. Yep, change quick as you can.

It will all solve itself. It always has and always will. We are going to be free. Our population size will adjust accordingly of its own devices. That is G-D's business and not ours. I am just going with the flow and making the best of a bum deal. I'm doing rather well considering I was not even given a penny to invest, rather I was thrown into a pit like Joseph. I got lots to give back to the Master when He asks for his return profit on His investment, but it is not treasure of the earth.

Why do this and end up with a broken back and such a basic life for so many hours?



Instead we can let the machines do it all,



Early days yet, but we are getting there. We will have to redefine what our purpose is. Nature will not want us doing as much breeding or using up resources in such selfish and gluttonous ways. We will need to get our creative thinking caps on to live lives in the spirit more, in our minds, just as I am doing right now. I love thinking more than anything. It is the most freedom I have and this brain is the most amazing thing the universe has come up with, albeit in its still very crude early days.

Machines are the solution as long as we do not cause suffering as we bring them into our lives. I am working on all this in my own experiment of living and getting something out of a defined resource ration and digital technology.

a reply to: Malak777


Also, regarding the morality of me not "paying (my) way". Caesar knows why that is. It is his money and I have satisfied him that it is necessary to be like this right now. If you don't like that go tell Caesar about it. I don't think killing lil ol me is your answer though.

He's a witch! Burn him, burn him!

a reply to: Malak777

Time to play, humanity? Do you want to play?

So you're going on the attack? A bit of mayhem, maybe cyberwar?

Get some air and a new perspective. Its not that dark. Leave the "city" once in a while and reground in Nature.

This is very complex. Hitler thought people like me were better off gassed and society be rid of them.

So I get the feeling that out of a sense of belonging to the "machine" you think you are that different as to be special.
Well good morning....We are all special.

The trick is to ride life's peaks and troughs and hopefully survive and even rise to greatness.

a reply to: Malak777

imaginative because our resources are finite and we can't all be super duper millionaires, that is tolerable. I think your thinking is very limited in imagination and regard for the future.

Of course the world needs more millionaires just like it needs more "average" consumer's. What leads you to believe that the world is finite? Have you bought the lie hook line and sinker? Their is unbound infinite wealth. Surely you have seen that as with the new economy more products & innovation lead to new markets and wealth.

I am digitizing myself and I think evolution is wanting that so we are low impact and ultra evolved., eventually.

Then you have succumbed to the "greening con", be prepared to become a part of another machine. One that you may have less control over than you think.

a reply to: chadderson

This is a recipe for disaster, or a recipe for exactly the right catalyst!

Starred!

a reply to: dug88

Guess I was kinda lucky, my mom died when I was 16 and my dad's kind of a # around, I didn't have the option of being a grown up man child.

So just like the OP, you had a few kicks in life. That makes you so special you can lash out with a few expletives.
You are the dinosaur.

a reply to: Malak777


Sorry, I'm on a roll here.

We could easily solve a problem, a very BIG problem using my skills.

We could dance like we used to. We could lose weight and socialize. Ooops, I forgot, we blew that because we used drugs and ruined the vibe and let violence in so the authorities got heavy on us.

People like me could help you. As it stands I have to be here in my little world and you have to be there and we can't help each other. You could help me by allowing for a gentle person who likes making electronic beats for you to "disco" to, make your heart healthier, keep you in shape, give you an excuse to be sociable and party. Women could look great like they used to, but protected from the predator males who ruined the vibe before. Presently, what little excuse for a vibe there is is so elitist and poisoned it has become something depraved.

What would be better than going to parties, seeing beautiful men and women dancing, yet being controlled enough not to let the vibe get all debauched?

I could be useful in many ways, but presently it is impossible for this square peg to fit in the round hole. This works across the board. That was just a very basic example. That is what makes society.

originally posted by: Malak777

originally posted by: schuyler
It's never too late to have a happy childhood. I couldn't care less if you want to live a reclusive life, as long as you pay your own way. But putting long essays on places like ATS isn't being very reclusive.

Why are yo being hostile?

Why are you suggesting that me writing essays is somehow negative?

(Sigh) You claim to be reclusive, and yet here you are writing yet ANOTHER long essay that you think everyone is waiting to read. That is NOT reclusive behavior, though it is self-absorbed. I have a cousin who lives alone, has never married, never had a relationship, and when you talk to him he talks and talks and talks and talks and it's all about him. You can't get a word in edgewise. Your missives remind me of him, total self absorption, no boundaries, no social skills. As long as we are talking about you and saying, "Nice doggie!" everything is fine, but as soon as someone says something contrary to what you want to hear you get all defensive and triggered. That's being a bully on your part.

My main point, however, is that as long as you pay for yourself and don't depend on others, I'm cool with it.

originally posted by: TheConstruKctionofLight
a reply to: dug88

Guess I was kinda lucky, my mom died when I was 16 and my dad's kind of a # around, I didn't have the option of being a grown up man child.

So just like the OP, you had a few kicks in life. That makes you so special you can lash out with a few expletives.
You are the dinosaur.

No...the fact that I don't live in my bedroom and leech off my family/society is why I decided to lash out with expletives as you say.

Dinosaur in what way?

My cousins are like the op and people like that. They're 27 and 25, neither have ever had jobs, my aunt works two jobs to support them, they treat her like # and always have, they sit at home all day and night playing video games that she bought them and watching youtube using internet she kaya for. My aunt's getting close to 65 now. She's broken and should be retiring instead she'll probably work until she dies so she can support their lazy useless asses.

I've got a friend who spent 3 years in bed to the point his body atrophied, from 25-28 his mother, who at the time was going through chemo, supported him and looked after him like a #ing child. He's back living with her now after he couldn't keep scamming the government for disability cheque overpayments.

People like that are selfish, they're a drain on their loved ones and they're in for a really rude awakening when there won't be anyone there to look after them and wipe their asses for them.

Why should these people continue to support an adult who refuses to act like one and look after themselves? Why should my friend's mother while going through cancer treatment have to look after her adult son? Why should my aunt support my adult cousins so they can play video games and jerk off?

In what way can you possibly justify leeching off people who have worked harder than you ever will because you feel like you're so #ing special you need to be treated like a precious #ing child as an adult?

It's going to be real #ed in a few years when these people's parents start dying. Going to be a big explosion in homelessness and suicides I imagine when they can't live in their magic fantasy bubble of being a perpetual spoiled child.

These are the same kind of people that, if somehow they ever had a relationship with someone, would be a useless dependent #.