This might be a bit long, partly I just wanna get it all down in one place and process while writing, but also help you get the best picture of what I struggle with so you can best tailor your response.
tldr:
My [24M] life has sucked in many ways growing up, especially my relationship with my parents, and that seems to endlessly proliferate itself as I get further into adulthood. I have struggled with very low self esteem, anxiety/depression, addictions, and even now after working through so much of all of that, there's still this immense gravity and frequent falling into this low, paralysed, isolated, small state. It's like a hole that I either need to fill or just fall into. I have taken meditation, exercise, therapy etc seriously and am capable of feeling amazing - but..... something. I don't really know what is needed in order to meaningfully move beyond this and take off and no longer have the gravity to go back there.
Longer backstory:
My dad is a very large, intimidating, highly withdrawn, angry, unsociable, completely uninvolved person, the kind that will sit in front of the TV all day every day not interacting with anyone at all, explode about the smallest things like a manbaby, and fake some sort of fatherly presence at the very last possible moment of something important only when prompted by my mum. He would make every holiday aweful.
My mum is quite an insecure, somewhat narcassistic (maybe more so in the past), anxious/neurotic, and quite annoying person. She has stayed in this relationship that is clearly terrible and seems generally like she's not living her happiest life, has deep regret about a past love. She had to do all the parenting for all of us (3 brothers not including me). She had bouts of depression when I was young. My whole life my parents would argue with eachother, quite intensely. When I was in my teens she was arguing a LOT with me and I eventually lost trust in her and most of the sense of attachment. I kind of rejected them at this point and just kept to myself, had friends over, smoked more and more weed, stopped doing music (which was my heart), became more withdrawn/numb/angry/insecure. I think in many ways it was not easy for her, but on top of that I was probably quite difficult, not doing the things she asked, etc. On the other hand, when I later learned to speak up for myself more clearly and confidently, she didn't get certain boundaries, and it is very difficult and retraumatising to have these conversations because it takes her so long to understand. I don't know how much of it was me or her. The part of my brain that was trying with her kind of exhausted itself. Now I find I don't really have that much in common with her, I often don't care when she speaks, and can't really muster any sense of wanting to be around her or feeling safe or that she's my mum.
I was also picked on in primary school by someone who was also my best friend. In highschool when all the stuff was getting worse, my gf at the time who I was deeply in love with and attached to (who herself had serious trauma) started becoming off and on, confusing signals, weird dangerous behaviours, etc, like breaking up in the middle of sex, or breaking up over text while visiting someone met over the internet for the first time.
I've found it difficult to get into relationships, friendships, have fun, let go, etc, since then. I often feel a deep hole of loneliness, neediness, depression, insecurity, selfhate/selfavoidance/dissociation. I had one relationship recently (after many years of working on myself, graduating, kicking porn/masturbation for 3 months, feeling self love and confident) where she actually came on to me and it we had so much chemistry but then got really confusing when sex wasn't working out and it was getting really deep and I was still figuring stuff out and didn't know if I wanted to commit and we were both still living with our parents, so I decided to end it (even though I'm normally the needy anxious attached one). I moved to another part of the city for a new job at this same time. I had deep uncertainty, regret, pain, etc during this time, but slowly it is dawning on me that I made the right decision maybe and that I might have actually done well.
I've had a lot of therapy and it has helped me in ways, especially in character growth (maybe just not the right therapists ultimately? My current therapist I feel like we just talk about therapy or all this "progress" I'm making, lol, but I don't feel like it's really hitting anything), took ssris for a while (helpful at first, but I'm off them now) I have gone far in meditation (in bouts), eat healthy vegan, exercise a lot (went through a whole transformation during university), read a lot about psychology and mental health, kicked weed, food (to a large degree) and video game addiction, previously kicked porn/masturbation and in the process of doing that again, not yet started kicking internet addiction, have friends (don't get to see them much though, and there's a neediness there) and always working on socialising, know what I love and like my vibes, have many interests that I get very deep into and am a highly intelligent and sweet person. My friends see me as wise, sweet, peaceful and formidable. I am definitely capable of feeling great, peaceful, warm, confident, etc, if I stay with it all for long enough.
But aren't these coping mechanisms fake/constructed? I've tried feeling the feels, breaking down, I've tried psychadelics (genuinely quite helpful), etc. At times this does feel more authentic and cathartic. It can also be incredibly hard to coax things out of the unconscious repression-field, and even then, is it enough? Is there an infinitude of shittiness you can feel? I still don't really know what to do with this hole. If I knew, I would just go down that path without doubt. Do I effort or not? Do I go into it or away from it? Does it need to go away, get smaller, be filled, what? What even are the right questions? What even is the problem?
What maps are there? What has your experience been?
I really appreciate you if you made it this far.