No one gets through life unscathed.
No one gets through life without loss and death and grief.
I used to write as a way to deal with my inner demons.
Ravi Roshan
What made liking YOU so undesirable?
Gradually, my writing flourished.
When I fell in love, I wrote about the fall.
When I got divorced, I wrote about how shitty and empowering the dating process was.
For all these stories, youve been by my side.
Because writing about your problems is giving a voice to those who feel like theirs is buried.
My life is pretty shitty at the moment.
My dad has cancer and lives with me.
My husband and I have started arguing out of frustration at our lack of privacy and hectic schedules.
I hate my in-laws on and off.
Like everyone else, I have financial woes.
Growing up, my dream was to move to New York and become a writer.
Now I look up apartment rentals in Florida on Zillow.
I vacationed in Florida a lot growing up.
My family Disney addicts at their core visited at least once per year.
I want to move to Florida.
I once read an article that talked about the illusions of escape.
Your problems will follow you through any destination in the world if you dont address them.
That aching, hollow feeling on Christmas mornings and Thanksgiving dinners will always persist.
Your problems my problems will persist, and they will follow you unless you resolve them.
But theres a flip side to all this.
You cant work on yourself when youre pummeled.
But I can start over.
I dont know what youre struggling with right now, but I know its something.
Maybe youre struggling to love yourself.
Maybe youre struggling to fall in love with an idea a lifestyle you think you should have.
Maybe youre struggling with a loss youve never recovered from.
Maybe youre struggling with crushing guilt.
Maybe youre struggling to know what your next move should be.
Maybe youre struggling with identifying how to get there.
Whatever it is thats plaguing you right now, youre not alone.
Thats the beauty Ive found in writing.
Our shared experiences serve as a gravitational pull that draws us in.
No one gets through life unscathed.
No one gets through life without loss and death and grief.
No one gets through life without regret.
No one gets through life without self-doubt and the need for reassurance.
That is, indeed, incorrect.
There is power and strength in starting over.
If youre not mentally healthy, how can you work toward the goals you feel so passionate about pursuing?
If youre not mentally in a good place, how can you be expected to work through it?
Our society has ironically become a safe haven for mental health awareness.
The stigma that its not okay to not be okay is slowly shattering.
More importantly, its okay to start over.
In the past three years, my life has been far from easy.
I watched my mother slowly die over the course of six and a half years.
I take care of my father.
I endure nothing but worried chatter about cancer, cancer, cancer.
For the longest time, I stopped writing because I had nothing of value to contribute.
Ive been trapped by carnivorous situations that have devoured me.
I deserve to be living a life where I can have control over my situation.
I need to detox from the grief.
I need to heal.
I need to start my life instead of allowing it to be perpetually on hold.
Maybe thats what you need, too.
Starting over is not the same as giving up.
Giving up is remaining in a situation that is not healthy for you.
Its putting your needs on the backburner continually so someone else can have the life they deserve.
Life has to be about more than that.
Its because of these nonsensical pressures that women suffer from a higher rate of depression than men.
We need to take a break and remind ourselves that it is okay to take one.
Ladies, you are not unworthy of love from yourselves.
Starting over doesnt need to translate to a new zip code.
Starting over means identifying your triggers and slowly removing them from your life.
Starting over means putting your foot down.
Sometimes it means a blank slate.
But, when the time is right, youll know.
Trust that there is a light at the end of your tunnel.
Lets find strength in our recovery of reclaiming ourselves.
Lets find power in knowing were not alone.
