Letter to a friend lost in self-loathing

Nothing Matters.

Try that on as a good thing.

When we get depressed and think to ourselves, “What’s the point?”
we only suffer because we think there should be a point.

But there isn’t.

Hold my hand for a minute and let’s look at this.
There is no point to life.

Whether I succeed as a writer or don’t do anything at all and hate everyone around me because of it…it doesn’t matter at all to life.
Life just is, and we are its children,
and we go about the business of surviving best we can.

But ultimately, nothing matters.
Try that on as a good thing.

You can work just as hard hating yourself
as you can getting to know yourself.
Believe it or not, it requires the same amount of energy.
It’s just that one feels different than the other.

Hate yourself —
use that self-hatred to block all avenues of love —
and you impact everyone around you.
Your children will feel it, too.
They will learn everything Not Good Enough about themselves.
They will become skilled at…