Dear Eddie,
I just turned 23 a few days ago and I am confused and lost with my life.
That's how I started my letter to you. I wrote about some of the miserable things that have happened to me in the past few years, and as I was writing and thinking about them, I stopped in mid way of that letter. Then I thought about why I was writing all that bad stuff. I feel like I am complaining and giving excuses about my life in the letter. Well, I was being honest. But still, I want to write because I need an advice from someone out of my society.
My surrounding is full of many people who are younger than (and some the same age with) me and all I do is give them advice, comfort them, and listen to their talks. And I do know that I need to be in their place sometimes too. I mean, I am not an all positive, happy, fluffy girl who is enjoying the best of her life. I am struggling too, like really hard.
One of my friends, who I helped a lot mentally and educationally, got her first stable job, which she really loves. She gets a salary way higher than me. (I am not mad or anything at her. I am just sad with myself).
And my sister just got a full scholarship for a master’s degree and now my mom is pushing me to get one, which is a really uncomfortable and saddening topic for me.
And another totally different thing is I want to do my own business, and yes, I am doing it. But I don't know why I can't seem to make a great progress in it or I don't know if I am not seeing it or if it is making small progress and I am rushing and overlooking it.
Anyhow, after reading this, you can picture me as a girl who wants to give up and just do a normal nine-to-five job, live a normal life, and die in this tiny community I live in.
Do you have any advice or idea on how to pull me up from the bottom of the ocean please?
With much appreciation and sincerity,
Anonymous
Hey Girl,
I get you. Let me start by saying I’m terribly sorry I’m only responding to this so late. I didn’t think I was in a legitimate place to be giving out advice to equally lost people, save from sexually confused guys.
We compare so much of ourselves to others. I mean it’s basically ingrained in our brains, probably from all those years of parents saying, “My child is this. They’ve accomplished that.”
It’s awful. And then there is social media. But the worst is that little shithead living inside you saying, “You’re not good enough,” while sipping miniature fancy cocktails, probably with tiny glasses on.
To all those accomplished people that we know: good for them! Congratulations and fuck off! While I still don’t think I can tell you what to do, let’s imagine a scenario because we’re kindred spirits now.
The scenario is every time that little shithead says “You ain’t shit” or when your parents compare you to other parents’ children who are doing whatever feats they’re doing, let’s tell ourselves “I’m gonna be kind to myself because I’m doing my best for me. And that is more than enough!”
Let’s love ourselves. Buy us whatever comfort food we love. Work out if inclined that way. Let’s do everything except feel bad about ourselves more. It’s a lonely business forgiving oneself but let’s try.
There’s something great about your friends being able to confide in you for all their hard times. But like you said, you need a listener too!
And honestly, it was the same with me, but I quickly realized that once I destroyed my figurative walls like that big ass wall being destroyed by that nightwalker dragon in Game of Thrones, but only, in this case, the dragon was...me.
So you gotta be the zombie dragon and destroy your walls. And then maybe your friends will listen to you. Commiserate! And indulge yourselves in unhealthy complaining coping mechanisms together!
Also, I pictured you as a girl who wants to do things on her own terms and forgets conventionality. To that thing about pulling you up from the bottom of the ocean, I read somewhere that the human body does quite a good job rising above. Buoyancy or some physics shit. Just let all the bullshit slide and let them go. Buoyancy girl, buoyancy.
Fashionably late as always,
Eddie
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