Dear You,

Right now, things are rough. Actually, they are more than rough and it feels like every single thing in the world is turning against you. It's almost as if you are trying to swim in the ocean but the waves keep knocking you back and the more you get knocked back the deeper you go under the water.

To an extent, you feel completely give out. You are spent. You give so much of yourself and still that isn't enough for people. No matter how hard you try, somehow it seems that isn't good enough for them either. You find yourself beating yourself up over certain things that you cannot change and trying to do the best that you can do but it almost feels like dragging around dead weight on your shoulders each morning you wake up and prepare for the day.

And no one understands your pain or the guilt you feel about decisions made. How you find yourself at night, depressed and silently crying. You stay awake for hours after crawling into your bed due to overthinking and overanalyzing everything and questioning if it is really worth it or not and then when you do finally fall asleep, you find yourself awake again due to the noises outside of others rushing to get to class and your alarm buzzing to ensure you get ready and make it to class. Even then, you are still overthinking things while writing notes and listening to lectures.

But..

REMEMBER THIS:

You are doing the best that you can do.

Repeat it.

You. Are. Doing. The. Best. That. You. Can. Do.

You are NOT what someone's opinion is of you. They do not define you or who you are as a person. They do not know what is going on in your daily life and if they want to assume it's all this or that, let them.

Not every single person has to understand how others make it or how they do things. We are all different. That's the beauty of thing of beauty in life.

You were NOT born to be a people pleaser or someone who follows the crowd. You were born to stand apart from the others, create your own path and make your own way in this world and if it takes you two years, four years, seven years or ten years, then do it, go for it. This is your dream or dreams and regardless of how others feel, you prove them wrong.

Understand that there will be some bad and not-so-great days that come in as a storm with raging winds but it isn't the end of the world. No matter how far you go in life or what comes your way, you will always have an advantage to those storms. You are in control.

Learn to love yourself, especially during the tough moments because that's when you need it most. Learn to be thankful for all the good things in your life and count your blessings because the good days will outweigh the bad ones by far. Remember that no one fully understands what all you are going through and you can sit, explain it til they are as blue as the moon and they still wouldn't understand it and that's okay. Removing toxic people from your life will always be the best decision. It may hurt at first and be hard to adjust without them being in your life but it is for the absolute best.

Like Katy Perry once sang in "Firework" : "You are original/can't be replaced".

No matter how this will all turn out, in the end, you are more than worth it. Every bit of your struggle(s), of your journey to accomplish your goals and making your way in the world and do not let anyone ever make you feel otherwise.

Love,

Me