Lay down your weapons.

Unclench your fists.

Let the fighting words shooting through your head fall silent.

You have spent long enough fighting yourself. I know it's easy. It's easier than most anything you've ever done. Something goes wrong so just blame yourself. Get in a fight with someone and spend the next 48 hours convincing yourself you were wrong. Tell yourself they are all better without you. Life is hard but I'm here to tell you that you are just making it that much harder.

It's okay to learn how to admit your faults, to learn how to say when you are wrong, to be able to say sorry when you need to. But that doesn't mean every word that comes out of your mouth should be sorry nowadays. You owe no one an apology for being you. Most importantly, you don't owe yourself one.

You don't owe yourself a apology for living, for feeling, for failing, for loving more than you planned to. And you don't deserve to beat yourself up for them either. There are no set rules for how life is supposed to play out, no guidelines you're supposed to follow that say exactly how you're supposed to interact with the people in your life. This is the one chance you get. There is no time to try to figure out exactly how you're supposed to live because by the time to realize that's your choice, you won't have any time left to put it to use.

You are not the character of your story. You are the author.

You need to forgive yourself. I know it's easy to turn everything on yourself for the sake of others, put yourself down so others can stay up. I know you want to yell at yourself for bringing anything but joy to the people around you but you need to remember you're your longest companion of all. It's okay for others to share the load a little bit.

Stop punishing yourself for being human.

Start forgiving yourself as much as you forgive everyone around you.