I feel totally stuck in life and like there isn't anything for me in the future

How to start this. I think there are a lot of underlying issues with what I have read and this is only an outside perspective. Some other commenters have already said similar things but here we go. Take this all with a grain of salt and ponder if any of this fits. It is not an attack but my observations and experiences from a cruel world.

First thing I would like to point out is you seem to have a need to gain happiness from others. By this I mean you saying your life hasn't gotten any better, hopelessness, how great this person is and they greatly improved your life, etc to me sounds like you have some deeper issues with yourself. You are broken in the mind somewhere or perhaps an empath where you can't help but rely on others for emotional balance. Where ever that stems from I feel like it may be eating away at your perception of everything around you. This is the first thing you need to correct in your mind before you will ever find happiness with another person. There is no one nor just one right way for people to find who they are. Many are never put in the position to figure that out. But alas it should be something you strive for. Much more to say on this matter because if is important but the night is late so I'll continue. I see this in your comments because you can't let the past go and enjoy the good experiences you gained from it. You are accusing yourself of "not being good enough" for this gentleman. You are comparing yourself to his friends. You've then compared your entire life to not "improving" from something three years ago. That one is is the worst mental shackle you can put on yourself. You say "don't throw me a pity party" but that is the whole post. Why do you dedicate so much of your mental capacity to constantly tell yourself horrible things? Silly humans and emotions. What are you doing to try to improve your situation?

Second part I would like to touch on is has already been covered by others but you sound incredible naive when it comes to dealing with people. There are all times of people out there. Majority of people are good and mean well most of the time but we all carry inherent bad traits. It is on the person to recognize and learn to live a good life with those traits. But you can't rely on people always being good to you because that isn't the world we live in. You need to develop critical thinking when dealing with other people. For example everyone has a motive. What is their motive when interacting with you? It can be good or it could be bad. Narcissistic people are a great example of the type of person that uses emotion or some other form of leverage to turn situations in their favor. But there is just a drop in the river of what kind of people are out there. No individual is limited in their capacity either. You can meet someone that is a master manipulator but only does good with their abilities. The old neighbor that always shows up to help, gives you the best advice, or just makes you happy when you are down. The world isn't black and white though. If you don't have a natural talent to identify people and their motives there are plenty of self help books, videos, and therapist you can gather the knowledge from. The kicker is you never stop learning and identifying new types of individuals. To me it is beautiful to see the diversity that is our species. Learn to see things differently than you do now.

Last part for this evening is learning that sometimes the right thing isn't. Just because we desire or feel something so completely it feels like a missing piece of yourself, doesn't mean it will work out. You may never have another relationship that completes you as much as that gentleman but I say that is pure folly. You've limited yourself to never having room for improvement and it will negatively affect all future judgements you make like shooting yourself in the foot before the race starts. We have to play by the universe's whims and not being able to let go of something will destroy your mind. For context I ended a relationship with what in my mind is the greatest woman for me. But life had other plans. I remember the bad and good but try my best to dwell on the good. Makes me happy to remember her love for baking. I miss her and wish it had turned out different. It would also be extremely unfair to previous and future relationships though to say no one else can compete. All relationships have ups and downs, it really just comes down to how much energy the other person can put into making it work. Also communication. But that is a whole book that would need to be written.

To sum up my rant now that I'm looking back at this wall of text. Get out of the pity party pool, pull your big girl pants up and educate yourself on yourself as well as how to deal with other flesh bags I mean humans. You did good reaching out to others though. That is the first step no matter how small it may seem. Pat yourself on the back just keep trying if even a little. The universe if unforgiving but there are a lot of people willing to help. Chin up you'll make it through.

This doesn’t sound pathetic. These can be some of the biggest emotional pains we ever endure.

I send you compassion, respect, and reassurance that your late 20s feel suuuuuuper old. But only while you’re in them.

I don’t know the person you are talking about, they might genuinely be amazing, they might just have excellent social skills, but the most important thing for you to do is move on.

This isn’t a riddle worth solving. Why did they mesh so well with you? Why didn’t they stick around? Let’s imagine a world where you have these answers with 100% certainty. Does it change anything? No.

I don’t say this to belittle you, but to encourage you. Your happiness, your worth, your life is not this other person.

You deserve happiness and love and all that life has to offer. There are billions of people on this planet and I guarantee you that if you move forward you will find many that will love you and care about you. And you will find many that don’t. And you will find everything in between.

Don’t fall for the trap of there being one true love out there. Take what good you can from that experience and also learn from it. It seems you placed a high degree of importance on sharing similar opinions and interests. That is important, but many people fall madly in love with people that are unlike themselves too. I love my wife with all my heart and we share the same core values but we differ in many ways. I’m loud, she prefers the quiet, I’m an engineer, she’s an artist, but we love those things about each other.

Take away from this that maybe you should bump up how important having a partner who is loyal and able to communicate well is, and notch down how important some of these other aspects.

It hurts going through heartbreak. It is natural and human to want to not feel that pain again. Sadly, love requires that we be vulnerable. Love is a stupid gamble that you can let someone know the real you and they will embrace that and stand by it. It is so special because it is so rare. But I learned something important in my time on earth, most everyone is capable of love, and everyone deserves to be loved.

At the very least, love yourself. We can not change what has passed, but we get to choose what happens next. You get to choose today to love you, and you get to choose it tomorrow and the next day and the next, and I hope you do. And when you love someone, even if that someone is yourself, you won’t be able to bear to see them persist in despair. Find your love of travel, or art, or science, or writing, or whatever brings you joy. Let that love fill your heart for a while.

I hope all the best for you, 20s is far too early to give up. When I feel despair in my own life I remember this quote by Mary Pickford and it’s always made me feel better

You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing that we call 'failure' is not the falling down, but the staying down.

My little sister recently went through a similar breakup. The wound is still very fresh in her case. I will tell her this information in time, but she is in the processing phase right now. So if you'll indulge me, here is a little advice from a big sister on break-ups with 'the perfect guy'.

Often, guys like this are chameleons. I have seen a few people like this in my life. Wonderful, charismatic people who make the person they are talking to at the time feel like they are standing in the glow of sunshine. They aren't being manipulative or intentionally trying to love bomb the person. It is just in their nature to be agreeable and find meaningful connections with people.

You mentioned other acquaintances feeling like he was a wonderful guy. It is completely possible that he is a great, intelligent, funny guy with whom you had a great connection. And yet, he did not feel as deeply as you because he connects so easily with most people he interacts with.

In your own words, he "cared about me more than my own mom" and yet "wasn't good enough for him and he didn't want to continue the relationship." It seems there is a disconnect between how deeply you felt he loved you, and how much you loved him. This is where a lot of the pain and sadness comes from in the breakup. When that glow of sunshine you were basking in is gone, the shadow feels especially cold.

I do not know anything about your relationship aside from what you have described. However, I fear you have fallen into a mentality of thinking no one else could ever compare to him. I have seen people dating 'the perfect guy' (Top of his class Harvard, D1/pro athlete, sexy charismatic surgeon...prodigy in the eyes of many) and yet, he wasn't the right person for their relationship. People who are accustomed to being the best at everything make really good chameleons. They want to be the best at friendships and relationships, too.

I do not want to tarnish your relationship, or discredit the pain that it brought you. I want to highlight the fact that there are other men out there that are absolutely a better, more unique fit for a loving relationship with you. A lot of the successful relationships I have seen are between people whose glow shines more exclusively on their romantic partner. Often times friends and acquaintances will say things like "I don't get it." Rather than him being so obviously great to everyone, he will be more specifically great for you.

All that being said, what to do next? Focus on you. Fall in love with yourself for the time being. Do what makes you happy, and the right person will be pulled into your orbit because you know yourself and what brings you joy. Your late 20's are just the beginning of the adventure.

When my high-school girlfriend broke up with me in college (she was the first person I had ever dated) something broke in my brain. I mean that literally. It's when my depression started and that depression hasn't gone away for over 20 years. It probably never will. My feelings for her caused me a lot of suffering and ruined my subsequent relationships for about a decade, but gradually they became a dull ache rather than a sharp pain and by now they're simply bittersweet nostalgia.

I really hope for your sake that your situation will work out better than mine has, but perhaps you can feel more optimistic about your future if you know that even I eventually got to the point where I was ready for something new. I don't think about my ex even when I'm depressed and I even find it darkly funny that in retrospect she was less compatible with me than the women I broke up with because I couldn't stop thinking about her were.

That's the thing about relationships: they have to work for both people. The fact that it didn't with him doesn't mean you're bad and he's good, it just wasn't what he needed. If you've dated other people, you've probably experienced the reverse.

Unless all your relationships have broken down for the same reasons, there's no reason to think that the next one won't be better, or the one after that.

One thing though - it's clear from what you posted that your self-esteem is really low, and most of us do self-destructive things when our self-esteem is low. There's a cliche about it being hard to love someone else it you don't love yourself, but bring a cliche doesn't mean it's false. It's also very taxing on someone to be in a relationship with someone that has very low self-esteem. Not everyone can handle that.

I'm just going to add my voice.

You likely have been very much programmed to think of this one true love bullshit. It's romantic feel-good stuff that sells books and TV shows and other media, but it's not the reality. It's a fantasy.

You are this, and even more, compatible with a plethora of people. There are a lot of people you could love like you loved this person.

The only thing stopping you from feeling this again is yourself. If you want to believe that there is no one as amazing as your old flame out there, then that is how it is. Your belief in this makes it true. Because as long as you believe this, you will eternally focus on all the ways the new person is not the same as the guy you loved, instead of appreciating the new person for the different features they have.

As soon as you stop believing that guy is the best ever and no one can ever compare, that is when you will find someone new who you think is as amazing. Not a single moment before, you simply couldn't even recognize it.

In the meantime... Another thing everyone has said is that it is actually possible to be completely content by yourself. You don't actually need any romantic partner to be happy. It's the same as above: as long as you believe that you'll never be happy if you don't find someone as amazing as that guy, then that's how it will be, you will be unhappy. But as soon as you believe that you can be happy by yourself, that's when you will actually be happy alone. It is actually that simple. I'm sure there are things you love to do that don't involve a romantic partner. You can do these indefinitely and stay happy. As long as you believe that you can.

Yikes that sounds familiar as fk. My 2 cents: you might be craving isolation (and maybe in part is okay) but actually going out and meet people is better for yourself, force it if necessary. Change habits, meet new people. Shit happens in life, it’s only sad and pathetic if you let it consume you.