The kindest thing literature does is remind you that your peculiar little feelings have always existed. Someone, in some century, was equally confused by love, bored by society, tired of performing, and hungry for meaning.
Thinking about the time my uber driver got cut off and yelled “COCKSUCKER!!!” then immediately looked at me in the rear view mirror and blurted out “not that there’s anything wrong with sucking cock!”
“you don’t owe anyone anything” is for, like, trauma survivors learning to care about themselves for the first time or whatever. it’s not for you when you’re an Awful Friend
Hate to break it to you guys but sometimes you have to do things you don’t like for the sake of having a community. Avoiding consistency with the people in your life is working against us and the data already shows it. If you think connections can be sustained on absence carry on
Anytime I’m about to try something new and fear starts to creep in, …I think of this interview Oprah gave in 1986.
It always reminds me that growth so often waits for us on the other side of fear.