I feel like the best way to be happy should be to put others first, and in a funny twist that gets me walked on by others because I'm very nice (not as much online). It's gotten to the point where I feel like aanyone who is nice is just trying to get something from me then to leave until they need my help again. And my only real life friend who I felt happy around has moved about 1000 miles away. And after a few years of talking over internet and phones, I feel him finally just forgetting about me. I guess I'm asking why am I so incapable of happiness?
I put myself before others a lot. People take help for granted due to the fact that instant gratification is great, and how many people lack the interest of how that gratification came about etc.
I know this feel, but I've been over it for a long while. At a time like that, you do have to push through it and sometimes ignore the martyr feeling you get and satisfy yourself instead, even for a little bit. Especially if you tend to get walked on in the process, it's human to remember about yourself once in a while. Being totally selfless would mean disregarding your self entirely. You wouldn't give a true damn if the person you just helped turned out to be a mass murderer, only that you're helping someone accomplish something. When you help someone with the intent of good/good use of the help you dish out, it's kind of a biased action based on what you perceive as good/good use of said help. You have to care to have good intent, otherwise you're just keeping a dam open so all the fish can swim through and flood the city.
It's true that doing stuff for people should make you feel great without any external reward, but you're not completely devoid of 'Id'. It's good to sit down and take some time from life to enjoy little things. Satisfy your own needs when it's not imperative that you stand in the rain for an entire night with the intent to take someone out.
Who gives a fuck if that person completely disregarded me, I like to help. I love love and don't even care about hate!
I guess it'd be an ideal world if everyone was selfless to a degree. But the truth is that not everyone is so kind hearted and welcoming... actually getting something back in return makes up for expending 2/3rds of your life just so someone could go about effortlessly.
If you want to keep it that way, that's more than fine. It's only truly rewarding if you let it be, and it's a damn tedious lifestyle to follow. We can't be Superman.
Sometimes you just have to wait, too. Find something you yourself enjoy, and even make the effort to craft friends out of people you didn't think you wanted to know. Eventually they become real friends, or you become a friend that they can actually trust with things you don't usually trust people with. Individuality is great, it's random and it happens every single day. Individuality grants some individuals to find common interest with one another as they stray away from the group and make their own social circle. It also means that individuality may take a while to ferment and develop against some societal stigma in order to be an independent force (Helping homeless people is a waste of time and money!).
Maybe it's not that you're incapable of feeling the goodfeels, so much as you're denying yourself the ability to enjoy yourself by helping people expecting the best of the best, and then sometimes helping people you know won't return the favor let alone acknowledge you exist, expecting a mass murderer to also have a change of heart and hand out flowers instead of throwing knives.
Sometimes people don't change. You said it yourself, part of the problem is that you're surrounded by less that savory people (I guess). You could wait until they eventually turn into nice people possibly, or drop everything and start making small talk with people you have the most in common with. Or, forget about the people (if they really suck) and utilize all the tools you have in your worldly possession to find something nice to do while you wait.
I tend to make a lot of puns and satire here and there. Gotta laugh at something.
Basically, small talk and a little bit of sacrifice for 4 years resulting in 30something friends and a solid job is better than no talk and sitting in a dumpster, forever.
Something I know you posses the ability to do, since we're all friends right now in rNd.