'NYC Is a Capitalist Nightmare and I'm Miserable Here!'

Dear Polly, I moved to New York City seven months ago because I thought it was still a haven for weird artists and freaks with no money but instead it’s a capitalist nightmare and I feel more trapped than ever. I have never lived in a place where I have felt happy and free, and while I was living in Chicago I convinced myself that NYC was the place for me, because when I had traveled to NYC to work on projects (I am an early-career theatre director) everything had felt so right. Opportunity seemed to be everywhere, people were motivated to start projects with me, there was a play to see or an event at which to meet new people every single night, and I always thought, “This is what I’m missing in Chicago! I feel at home here. I feel limitless! I should move here.” And then I moved here. And I’ve never been so miserable. I work all the time at a horrendous coffee shop in NoHo. Half my paycheck goes to rent. I love my apartment, but come on. Nothing is worth that, right? All I think about is how to pay all my bills- rent, medical insurance, all that. My brain is unable to think of anything else. The limitless feeling I’d experienced here has vanished, replaced by a sense of the walls closing in around me at all times — this sense that I am not allowed to live here simply because I don’t make an insane amount of money, and I’m trying to make it on my own. And that’s the other thing! You wouldn’t believe how many people here are only making it because their parents send them a check every week. How naive of me to assume we were all playing life on hard mode, right? I serve assholes every day at my cafe who never had to work for any of the luxuries they have, and they have the audacity to act superior to me. I’m sorry for raging, but clearly I am in a tornado of rage and frustration that I can’t pull myself out of. I need help. I don’t know how to relax here. I don’t know how to maintain my creative life while freaking out 24/7 about money. I don’t feel like myself. No one knows me or loves me here. Should I just leave? But where would I go? I’ve got it in my head that this is the only place to be if one wants to be an artist. I tried Chicago, but I didn’t feel as inspired there. The theatre scene felt stale and slow there, in comparison to here, where everything is lightning-fast and vibrant. I moved here, I guess, because the energy felt right. And it still does, at times, when I’m free from all my worries and woes. When I’m seeing an insane piece of theatre with my friend, or walking in one of our beautiful parks, or directing a friend’s play, or striking up a conversation with another weirdo at the bar after work. So much of NYC is unique unto itself. That’s why I love (most of) it. Is it possible to live the wrong life? Is it possible to have made the wrong decision? Or am I exactly where I’m supposed to be on some “god has a plan for you” shit? I gave up a lot to come here. I left my best friend (the only peer I have who truly understands and loves me) and I left a sort-of-boyfriend I’d been dating for a year who made me feel so happy and secure. I guess we fell in love but I fucked that up by moving to New York Capitalist City for no reason I can presently articulate. I feel like a dumb idiot for thinking I could “leap, and the net would appear.” There’s no net. I’ve ruined everything. So yeah, you may be thinking, “Why the hell did you move here in the first place?” I wish I could tell you. It was an impulse. I had the feeling something wonderful was waiting for me here. The first three months were great. I was high off the risk I took, and the novelty of everything. I’m on month seven and nothing wonderful has happened to me yet, so I’m losing hope. But I suppose that’s an entitled point of view. Maybe I should be more patient? Give it until 2030 and if my life still sucks and physically pains me then I’ll leave, I guess. But what if the pain doesn’t stop even if I move to another place? Even if I become less broke? How long does it take for life to click into place? When will I feel like I’ve done the right thing? I can’t take this pain for much longer. Here’s what I want: I want to be loved by a close group of friends and by a romantic partner who will never leave me and will never make me doubt them. I want to work consistently as a director and get out of the indie scene eventually so I can start making real money doing what I love and what I have a genuine talent for. That’s what I want to do here, what I want to attain here. And it’s not happening, and I don’t know how to make it happen. I feel like I’m not doing enough. Like I’m letting my terror around money and survival stop me from feeling confident enough to take risks and to believe that I deserve all the opportunities that I’d thought this city would promise me. I’m angry that my life right now is not at all the life I want to live forever. But I can’t picture any other way of living. How will I pay the bills without spending every waking minute serving yuppies at this NoHo cafe? And if there are always bills to pay, how will I ever quit my job and get out of this hellish cycle? They say desire is the root of all suffering — all I do since I’ve moved here is desire, desire, desire. Desire love, sex, success, excitement, freedom, MONEY. It is a nightmare, but I do not know how to stop. It seems like everyone around me is caught in the same desire loop, too, and it feels unique to this city. It feels maddening to be just one of many, many lost lambs. Maybe I should move elsewhere for this very reason. Please tell me what to do. Confused, Terrified, and Broke in NYC Dear CTABINYC, Every city has features you have to ignore in order to thrive. In San Francisco, the fog was romantic, the views were amazing, the food was delicious, the city streets were delectable, but it was always chilly, and there was a chill type of bro who just loved to chill out and do chill shit and work his bro job and then chill, dude, chill chill chill. I hated the weather and I hated the bros. It was very hard to ignore these things. I was broke so I had to work as a temp downtown, surrounded by finance bros. I hated finance and I hated my shit heel of a boss and I hated my sad apartment in the chilly Marina with my increasingly distant bro boyfriend, who just wanted to chill and watch football with his bros. I mean, come on. It was the wrong life. It was all a mistake. My boyfriend dumped me and I almost moved back home to North Carolina. Instead, I looked for a shared flat in the Upper Haight. I talked to four groups of roommates. I didn’t vibe with the first three groups, and then the fourth were my people, weird and interesting. They could be difficult — opinionated, bossy, loud — but they were fun and social and they were trying to do interesting things with their lives. I moved in and life changed and I stopped worrying about how chilly it was and how chill everyone was. I stopped freaking out about the big picture and I engaged in the everyday, mundane, difficult experiment of being 22 years old in the city, ambitious and ambivalent and alone and very afraid. Having roommates completely changed my perspective. Being crowded, feeling aggravated, dealing with noise and mess and trouble of roommates: These things were very good for me at that moment of my life. I signed up for a year with them without knowing much. I committed to staying for another year. This was also good for me. It got me out of my head and into the reality of surviving and trying to feel happy. I don’t think you should leave New York right now. I know exactly what you mean about visiting and feeling alive and then falling to pieces after moving there, because you suddenly know what it tastes like day after day, how cold it can be, and also how ambitious and desperate and pointlessly snobby everyone around you can be. Nothing you’ve described feels inaccurate to me at all, but it’s also the exact shit that you have to ignore or wave off…