Giving in to Social Pressure

It's 8 AM, how can it still be this dark?

Ugh, let's just start the video anyway.

So when I was at secondary school, um,

I always resisted and rejected pretty much

everything that was trending and really

popular. If everyone else liked it, then I

would just automatically hate it for no

reason, just because everyone else liked

it. I would just have no interest in what

everyone else was interested in, and that

was one of the reasons why I ended up with

hardly any friends, and I ended up being

really isolated and not feeling like I

could relate to anyone because I didn't

make any effort to try and integrate.

For some reason, my face feels really

warm. I'm only on 2,400 calories today.

I've got another 600 to go. I'm so full,

I don't want to eat anymore. Anyway, I'm

getting distracted. What was I talking

about? I would just automatically hate

everything that everyone else liked.

Even music, I would hate pop music or the

trending songs at the time. I would hate

things like sport, not just because I was

really bad at it, just because everyone

else really liked it. I especially hated

football. Like, the other kids would

always be asking me, so which football

team do you support? And I'd say none. I

would feel proud that I didn't support a

football team because all the other kids

supported a football team and I felt like,

pfft, I don't support a football team, I

don't even like football. But actually I

enjoyed playing football. When I was

around 15 or 16, I actually started to

make more friends and I got kind of

accepted into this group and we always

used to play football at lunch and, and I

actually enjoyed it. Even with gaming,

everyone else was obsessing and fussing

about the PlayStation 2 I was like the

only one there who had an Xbox. So no one

else had an Xbox, and then they'd tease me

for it. They'd say, haha, Xbox is rubbish,

PlayStation 2 is better, and they'd make

fun of me because I had an Xbox. I used to

have a PlayStation 2, but my mum chucked

it out of the window because I was

fighting with my sister, and it shattered

into hundreds of pieces. I remember

running outside after she chucked it out

the window and picking up the pieces She

also chucked out all my games. They all

shattered on the concrete, and I was just

outside picking up all the pieces. I felt

so destroyed inside, and I never really

felt like I wanted to understand what all

the kids were raving about, what they were

obsessed with. I didn't feel like I wanted

to be part of it. But there was— I had

this friend. He wasn't really much of a

friend because he kept punching me. Every

day he'd punch me on the arm. Like

jokingly, he thought it was funny. I hated

him so much. He used to do really

irritating things, like during class when

I was writing stuff, he would just nudge

my elbow so I'd screw up whatever I'm

writing. It was so frustrating. That

friend started smoking, and then he

started hanging around with all the cool

kids, all the popular kids. And one day I

went with him to the back of the sports

hall, the gymnasium, the sports building

where all the naughty kids go to smoke,

and I bought some cigarettes. There was

this older kid who used to bring

cigarettes to school. He used to sell them

to other kids for like 50p a cigarette,

and I bought one and I tried smoking it,

and I hated it. It felt horrible.

It was like burning in my chest and it

tasted funny. But as soon as I started

smoking it, all the other kids, they

started to talk to me and they started to

be nice to me. They weren't teasing me or

bullying me. They were making jokes and

laughing with me, not at me. And it— and I

felt kind of like I was being accepted,

like people liked me. And it felt good.

It felt warm and fuzzy. I never used to

smoke it properly. You're supposed to

inhale it into your lungs, aren't you?

But whenever I did that, it made me cough

and it felt— I didn't like the way it

felt. So I used to just suck on it and

then swirl the smoke in my mouth and then

just blow it out so it looks like I was

smoking it. So I think that was one of the

reasons why I didn't really get addicted,

because I wasn't even smoking it the

correct way. But it was really strange.

Up until that point, I had no interest in

smoking. I didn't even think about it.

But because all the cool kids and the

popular kids liked smoking, then I felt

like I also liked smoking. After a while,

I started to see that friend less and

less. He just stopped coming to school.

It was like he only came to school a few

days a week, and then he just stopped

coming altogether. I don't know what

happened to him. And I stopped smoking.

I stopped buying cigarettes from that guy.

I stopped going to the back of the sports

hall. And after I stopped smoking, I

stopped interacting with those kids who

liked to smoke, and I reverted back to my

old self. I guess this is the reason why

peer pressure is so powerful. If everyone

else is smoking or drinking, it makes you

want to do it as well because you want to

feel like you're part of it. A similar

thing happened at the Christmas party

where everyone was drinking alcohol, wine

and beer, and I felt like I also wanted to

drink alcohol because it made me feel like

I was part of the group, like I was

participating in the drinking activities,

and I drank a lot, maybe too much. I don't

really enjoy the actual drinking. I

enjoyed the feeling of being part of what

everyone else was doing. That's kind of

dangerous. It's like you can get sucked

into doing something that you're not

really wanting to do, or that can be

harmful to your body, or that can be

dangerous, just because that feeling of

fitting in and being accepted by a group

of people is so pleasant that you,

you just end up not caring about things

like, is smoking gonna be bad for me? Am I

gonna damage my body by drinking too much?

You just, you stop caring about those kind

of things just because you want to fit in

with what everyone else is doing. I think

it's important to feel like you're part of

a group, part of a social group of people

But I don't feel like you should force

yourself to do something that you're not

interested in doing or that's unhealthy

just so that you can feel like you're

being accepted. If you're constantly

having to force yourself to do things that

you don't really want to do just to get

the approval of the people around you,

then maybe you're hanging around with the

wrong group of people. Sometimes I worry,

how much damage am I doing to my mental

well-being by not having this sense of

belonging, not having a peer group, a

group of friends or people that I feel

like I fit in with, that we share

similar interests, that I want to be part

of. One of the expectations I had starting

this new job was that I was hoping to meet

someone that could potentially be a friend

Someone who is around my age,

someone who shares the same interests or

similar interests, or at least understands

the things that I want to talk about.

But, but there's no one like that at my

work. They're all middle-aged women, a

middle-aged man, and one guy who's a year

younger than me, but it's like he's 40

years old. He doesn't know anything about

nerdy stuff, video games, computers.

Movies, and I feel kind of frustrated

about that. I feel frustrated that I can't

relate to any of these people, not even

one of them. I do wish that I could meet

people who are like me, who have similar

interests as me, not just on the internet,

not just chatting online, but someone I

could talk to face-to-face. Is that too

much to ask for? Last night this customer

came in and he just said to me, This

country is effing dope, man. And I just

laughed. And then he said, this country is

amazing. No, he said, this country is

awesome, man. And then I just

automatically asked him, where are you

from? Which is strange for me because I

never ask customers questions because I

never want to initiate a conversation.

And he said he was from America. And it

was kind of strange because we never get

American customers. It was like the first

time ever. And I never, I never get

to speak with American people. I listen to

the American accent all the time watching

TV shows and movies, but it felt

really strange to actually talk to an

American person face to face. It kind of

makes you realize that American people

don't just exist in TV shows and movies,

they actually exist in the real world,

and that kind of amazed me for some

reason. It reminded me a bit of the first

time I went to Japan and I heard the

Japanese language for the first time

naturally coming from people and not

computer speakers. I think that was one of

the most exciting things about going to

Japan for the first time, actually hearing

the language being spoken by people and

not coming out from a set of speakers from

a computer.