[jrbapna]

You need to make yourself more vulnerable. You're not relateable to most people because 1) they're slightly intimidated by you: you've accomplished something that they've only ever dreamt of. And 2) you're not on their radar: they don't see you at work during the day, happy hour after work, or the football game on the weekends. Why? Well because you're working obviously.

Share your challenges and be completely open and transparent. Use social media to stay relevant and on people's radar. Show people you're just as human as they are.

I'm on the same boat. Achieved financial independence in college. Experienced the highs of having a ton of friends in university and my first job to the lows of not being able to make any good friends as an independent worker.

This seems to be working for me.

[wemysh]

Thanks, this is probably good advice. People have an image of me that I am living a perfect life. With no problems at all. Little do they now, that I endure a situation they would consider hell.

I have a strong tendency to paint myself as bigger and better then I am. And to hide my problems.

Another problem is that I always think everybody should worship me and my big ideas. And forget about those boring little things they do themselves. This I find particularly hard to tackle. Because I really find it unbearable boring what most people do and think.

[w0rd-driven]

We sound eerily similar save the financial independence/measure of success. I've come to describe it as a "genius complex" though I don't think that's an actual phrase. It's basically that I think almost everything is ignorant, that is people choose to be dumb. I have absolutely no time for this behavior and when someone I consider neutral to smart ventures into ignorant territory, my care to continue interfacing with them drops to 0.

Conversely though, I don't consider anything others do to be boring even if everyone can agree that it is. I also won't offer an opinion because I have numerous examples in my own life. You would likely consider me very boring but it's largely because I've shut my mind off to cope with the lack of meaningful input. I think a large part of the population does this without even being able to articulate what's happening.

The best answer I have is empathy. My greatest connections come when I exercise high empathy levels and all I'm really doing there is engaging my imagination to try to understand how someone else feels in the situation they're in. I think most of us on the planet, and especially here, have this capacity but I think we see futile efforts a far ways off so we don't bother to engage. I'm stubborn enough to forgo that understanding to commit an insane act that in rare instances make me feel close to other people. I don't have all quality connections with people but the ones I do have tend to run pretty deep and I believe I owe it all to my ability to relate to how someone else feels.

[joewee]

Sounds like you suffer from an usually strong sense of entitlement. It's generally not bad but it doesn't help if you want friends, friends need to feel as though you are on the same level as them. Hard to solve in a forum but next time you interact with friends, try not to talk about yourself and spend that time finding mutual interest and learning about them. Study rapport building techniques. Find a hobby that requires interacting with others. It's about connecting on a topic other than yourself. Smart people are horrible at rapport, but it's a critical skill in life.

[mtrimpe]

It sounds like Brene Brown's (from the Ted Talk on vulnerability [1] ) book [2] address what might be your main concern.

[1] https://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability?langu... [2] http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1604078588

[ionised]

> Another problem is that I always think everybody should worship me and my big ideas.

This sounds very narcissistic.

[gizmo]

> Because I really find it unbearable boring what most people do and think.

This is not a healthy attitude to have, really. If you care about people you also care about the mundane stuff in their life. Because that's part of what makes them who they are.

[jqm]

I don't agree that people forcing themselves to take interest in things they aren't interested in is healthy.

There are all kinds of people in the world. Very smart ones are a rarity.