Hi Jara,

I’m not going to pretend to know exactly what you’re going through. But I hope to offer a new perspective.

You said you’re looking for a ‘simple fast solution’. Let’s start here.

Instead of looking for the quick fix, think long term. Any kind of Band-Aid will likely be temporary and short lived. Look for a way of thinking which you can live by, day in day out. The road to feeling better just may be a slow march with little successes along the way. Also consider that NO ONE has everything figured out, and we’re all a work in progress. And at any point in your march, it is possible for you to have peace of mind. Take it slow.

You talk about ‘ugly’ and ‘good’ as labels for people. It’s easy to sort people in a simple way as this, being either one or the other. But people are simply not all good or all bad. Each and every one of us has the potential to do good or bad. Sometimes we do good, sometimes we do bad. Sometimes our definitions differ among people of what good or bad are. Sometimes our own definitions of these change over time.

I accept that I’ve done hurtful things to others. I’ve screwed up. But I also do my best to learn from these experiences, to get a better understanding of myself. Doing hurtful things to others does not make me a hurtful person. I am a person who has done hurtful things. This is a big difference. I’ve also done a lot of good things. Though that does not necessarily make me a good person either. I am a person, who does things, good, bad, right, wrong, constructive, destructive, and on and on. Of course, I strive to do good, though I make mistakes like the human that I am. I do my best to take responsibility for those mistakes and try to learn from them. Notice I say ‘do my best’ and ‘try to learn’. Even if I fail, I feel my good intentions have a positive affect on me.

My point is that there is often a pressure to be a ‘good’ person. It can get blown out of proportion to the extent of attaining perfection. This is impossible. And it distorts our view on who we are, in a bad way.

My hope is to take this pressure off of you. To tell you that mistakes happen. It’s ok to fail. Feelings get hurt. Things get destroyed. But also, lessons can be learned, things can be rebuilt, we can feel better.

I suggest that you think of one thing you enjoy doing. Something easy enough you can do pretty much any day. And just do it. Do it because you enjoy it.

After you’ve done it. Think of another thing, and do that.