Sara Bareilles is my favorite solo artist. She can crank out a girl anthem and empower you, but she can also belt out a ballad and leave you helpless on the floor crying for hours. The latter isn't particularly an uplifting past-time, but when you're sad and need to be comforted by her beautiful lyrics, she's your girl.

1. "It's like I'm standing on the edge with just a telephone wire, trying to get to you first to say the world's on fire. Holding my breath until I know you're all right, because the water will only rise."

The song "Islands" is a particularly tear-worthy melody about that terrible distance that sometimes comes between two people.

2. "Does anybody know how to hold my heart?"

"Hold My Heart" is another beautiful song about the disappointment that happens when you trust someone with your heart who doesn't deserve it.

3. "Cause I can't continue pretending to choose these opposites sides on which we fall, the loving you later as if at all. No right minds could wrong me this many times."

This song, "Between the Lines," has a lot of great lyrics in it. This particular lyric talks about how as much as you can believe in someone, they will usually only keep hurting you.

4. "It's not what I asked for. Sometimes life just slips in through the backdoor, and carves out a person, and makes you believe it's all true."

"She Used to Be Mine" depicts the realization that you have let another person, or life in general, change who you are, and sometimes you stop and mourn the loss of that person you used to be.

5. "In another life I wouldn't need to console myself as I resign to release you."

The song "1000 Times" is one of my favorites. Sometimes you fall in love with someone you would do anything for, but eventually have to let it go. This song is all about that.

6. "I'll wish this away, just missing the days when I was one half of two. You can have Manhattan, cause I can't have you."

"Manhattan" talks about how sometimes when two people grow apart, certain things and places remind them of each other and the joy is taken away from such things.

7. "All I am, all I need, he's the air I would kill to breathe. Holds my life in his hands, still I'm searching for something. Out of breath I am left hoping someday, I'll breathe again."

Ever lose a loved one, a friend, a partner? In that they literally passed away or just exited your life? "Breathe Again" is about that feeling.

8. "Won't somebody come on in, tug at my sleeves? Oh, send your armies in of robbers and thieves to steal the state I'm in, I don't want it anymore."

This song, "Basket Case," has this lyrical beauty within it. Sometimes when you are hurting, you want so badly for someone to come help you.

9. "The situation's always the same. You've got your wolves in their clothes whispering Hollywood's name. Stealing gold from the silver they see. But it's not me."

Some people will try to get something out of you that you simply don't have. "City" is a song about that.

10. "I live here on my knees as I'm trying to make you see that you're everything I think I need here on the ground. But you're neither friend nor foe, though I can't seem to let you go, but the one thing that I still know is that you're keeping me down."

"Gravity" talks about the person in our lives who is no good for us, yet we cannot seem to leave them. But someone should never keep you down, they should raise you up.

To all you going through a hard time, listen to Sara Bareilles. You might find an odd comfort in her beautiful, somber and often times painfully true lyrics. I know I do.