This Recording

Plz Advise

by MOLLY MCALEER

Plz Advise is an advice column. You can e-mail me questions about almost anything, but don’t like, take out a loan against your 401k or murder anyone based on anything I say. I'm not a doctor, duh. E-mail your questions to plzadviseme@gmail.com, and please keep them to 100 words or less.

Dear Molly,

How do you forget someone? How can I catalyze the beginning of this process? He's an opiate addict and a general emotional fuckwit, but I'm eternally pining for the person he used to be. Please help me stop this obsessive depression before I go insane.

Kara

Oh, you have a problem with opiate addicts? I would normally suggest just taking a shitload of opiates and going to bed as soon as you’re done with work so you don’t have to actually face any real hours of the day (work should keep you busy enough to not think about him, right?) but it sounds like you might frown upon that sort of behavior. Damn, girl!

Turn to your friends, good books and physical activity. Friends will keep you laughing, books will distract you and physical activity will keep you sexier than him.

I don’t know if you’re normally the kind of person that does creative things in your work and free time, but I always find that I experience the biggest rushes of creative energy after a break-up. In fact, the best work that I’ve ever done has been a direct result of losing love. I think that might be why all the best songs ever are about heartbreak.

Use this time to write a lot, paint, make videos or sing, whatever creative thing it is that you can think of that would make you happy. Maybe it’s knitting or something; it’s different for everyone. Keep your mind and hands busy with something that will give you a positive end result. When you’re done, you’ll be reminded of your own worth and how fine you are without a sad addict dragging you down. Maybe it will even lead you to the next big thing.

Molls,

I'm not much of a people person and would like to change that. It's not like I'm crazy lonely or anything, I'm engaged and I have a couple really close friends that are like sisters to me but I am extremely closed off to most people. I'm just naturally real quiet and I don't like to intrude, but I'd really like some advice on how to start a friendly conversation or make more friends in general. Any ideas?

Liv

Yo! I am still figuring this one out myself. I get so shy in certain social situations and stick mostly to my same group of friends. My roommate, however, is really nice and she just came home a little drunk from a date with a guy named Plain Larry, so I’ll just transcribe what she had to say about this:

“Um, I can’t believe you’re typing right now. This is generally totally an adult question and it’s like, wait, you can’t keep typing… This is totally something that you have to learn for yourself and that sounds totally bitchy and like, mean, but it’s like… Find your own way to connect to people and you can’t ask for advice for that kind of shit. Some people sit at bars, some people find a chat room on the Internet and say, ‘Hey, let’s meet up.’ Some people find people at the dog park! You have to find your own way first and it will lead to other people. You have to find out what you like first. If you like to sit at a bar, you will find other people who like to sit at the bar. You can think of the weirdest thing in the world and other people will like to do it. Also, everybody’s lonely. Especially in L.A. Is this girl in L.A.? I feel for her if she’s in L.A. and she’s thinking about making friends because it fucking blows. You know what? Tell her to move to New York City or take herself out of her comfort zone. Like, you know, that’s always good for a laugh.”

Molly McAleer is the senior contributor to This Recording. She is a writer living in Los Angeles. She twitters here. You can find her website here. You can find past editions of Plz Advise by clicking here.

Photographs by Jennifer Nies.