Dear Bel,

I am a 19-year-old university student in my second year and feel as if the whole experience is passing me by. I live in a house with six other boys and have several friends elsewhere. However, I constantly feel a sense of melancholy detachment when I am with my friends. I feel somehow unable to make close attachments to people, despite the happy face I put on. With friends I have had for a while I cannot seem to hold a conversation, struggling for something to say, never feeling at ease. When we go clubbing I end up leaving far before the night ends, or I don’t enjoy myself.

So far at uni I have liked three girls, one of whom I knew already, but I could never take the chance to ask them out and got unbelievably nervous around them. This might sound normal, but it has rocked my confidence greatly.

In seminars now when I make a presentation, my heart beats so fast I can barely talk — and it is apparent how nervous I am. With everything I do now, and with everyone I meet, I have this huge sense of inferiority and loneliness — so divorced from this world that I no longer know how to function within it. It is like trying to glimpse the most amazing sunset through eyes tightly shut. Please help me.

— Joe

All of us must be careful not to live our lives according to other people’s storylines, and especially when young. Look at any crowd of people — for example, young City types sinking their beers outside London pubs, or twittering girls dressed up to go out “on the pull”, and I guarantee you that there will be one or two who are not happy, who would rather be somewhere else, but who are going through the motions because they think they should. Singing somebody else’s lyrics. Dancing to an alien tune. They fix the smiles on their faces but their hearts are bleeding all the time.

To be honest, I think it is harder than ever for your generation. When I was a student it was quite cool to be serious and intellectual, to get involved with student societies and debate the issues of the day, such as Vietnam, socialism and race. You could do that, groove to pirate radio stations, and be “normal”. But a generation later, when my daughter went to university, the pressure was to conform to a 24/7 partying ethos — or else be seriously uncool. It made her — like so many others — unhappy. But I doubt that they communicated that to each other.

It’s very hard for essentially shy, unconfident people like you but please realise that if you don’t enjoy yourself in that noisy sweaty club where it’s impossible to have any meaningful conversation, you’re not alone. I want to reassure you that you’re not some kind of freak. At the age of 19 to feel a melancholy sense of alienation and angst? Yes, that’s perfectly normal. In the late Sixties you’d have joined CND, worn black, read Kerouac and Sartre, listened to Leonard Cohen and Bob Dylan, watched Fellini movies, written your own gloomy poetry and read it in smoky rooms to other happily miserable kindred souls. I’m not being flippant; I’m saying that it’s OK to be like that. So instead of thinking of those feelings in a negative way, turn them around and view them as interesting and creative. After all, Greta Garbo saying “I want to be alone” made her more interesting than the average actress hot to trot.

You have told me nothing about your parents, siblings, or even where you are studying and what. It’s as if you have reduced your life to the elements giving you pain, when of course the real reasons for that pain are probably out there, within the untold story. Did you feel like this when at school? Did your parents encourage social life, or was your home quiet/timid? Did you feel homesick when first away? Did you have a girlfriend while at school? Do you have issues with your appearance that bother you? I ask all these questions because I want you to start a little bit of self-analysis. On the surface, your letter sounds as if you do too much navel-gazing already, and a simple solution would be for you to stop thinking about yourself and go out there and interact. But actually it doesn’t work like that. You have to pick your way through low self-esteem to come out the other side.

If you feel inferior to people around you, perhaps it might help to make a list of the qualities you most admire in your friends, then to ask yourself whether these aspects of personality are remote from you. Since you have recognised them, think of them as aspects of you too, waiting to be discovered. Guys don’t talk about feelings as easily as women do, but isn’t there just one friend in whom you can confide? Were you to say “I feel like everything’s passing me by” he might well reply, “Oh God, me too!” Make that effort to look beyond your friends’ smiles, just as you wish they would with you.

Did you always feel this nervous when making presentations, or did it happen because you had no luck with the girls? It would be good if you picked on one situation in which you felt incapable of having a conversation with a girl and deconstruct it. Where were you? What were you wearing?

What mood were you in? What were you thinking to make yourself feel like that? You might find it helpful to make another list, this time of all the negative aspects of yourself that you wish you could change. Then ask of each one, “Is this a permanent state?” Honestly, you’ll find the answer is rarely “Yes.” So then write beside each one positive actions to take. So you might write down, “I always feel so unattractive and scrawny.” The actions to take focus on tweaking how you look — hairstyle, clothes, skincare.

People are unfairly dismissive of self-help books, but you are exactly the sort of person they can inspire. For example, Get the Self-Esteem Habit by Christine Webber (Hodder & Stoughton) uses intelligent and perceptive self-assessment exercises as a way towards self-knowledge and turning negative thoughts into positive ones. Try it. I think you’d find it enjoyable. Once more: stop feeling you’re alone. Summer’s on its way now, so vow to leap out of bed and gaze on those stunning golden dawns with eyes wide open.

Home move that has been a disaster for us

Dear Bel, My husband and I are both in our sixties. We moved across the city two years ago, to be nearer our grandchildren — after living in our previous home for more than 30 years. My problem is that I hate it here. The thought of spending the rest of my life here fills me with despair. My youngest grandchild has just started school, so I’ve suggested moving back to our old area. But my husband says you can’t go back and he dreads the thought of moving again. Do you think I’m being reasonable?

— Jane

I find myself wondering if the way the move worked out disappointed you (the relationships not quite delivering, maybe?) so that you are transferring your feelings on to the area you’re living in. If you dislike the new area so much then act to change the situation now. You must work on your husband by telling him that he’s great enough to be up for this. Decide that it was right to leave the place you’d lived in all those years because change is good. Decide that it was a useful learning curve to be so near the grandchildren, but now it’s time to think again. But don’t try to go back. Isn’t there an area midway where you might start looking? Forget the despair and think of house-hunting as a great new hobby.

DO YOU NEED ADVICE?

Do you need advice about your relationships? E-mail your problems to: bel.mooney@thetimes.co.uk or write to her at: times2, 1 Pennington Street, London E98 1TT. Details such as your age are helpful. Please include your real name, but we will use your chosen pseudonym if you wish. Bel Mooney reads all letters but cannot enter into personal correspondence

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