I need to start here: none of what happened to you was your fault. Not one single moment of it. You didn’t do anything to deserve it. You heard right: life isn’t fair.

I wish I could tell you that things are going to get better soon, and that things will never be awful for you again. But I won’t lie to you; life will be more unfair and harder for you than for most. While life may be worse for other people, it is still all right to be upset with your circumstances.

There are some things people shouldn’t have to live with. Even if you can survive something it doesn’t mean you should have to, but you can, and you will. Things are going to stay hard for a while, and I am so sorry it will take so long for you to start getting the good things. But I promise the good stuff is coming, you just have to survive.

Say it until you believe it: everything will be all right.

Listen, I still don’t have all the answers and I don’t pretend too. I don’t know if I believe in Karma or God or that the universe is listening at all to what we want. I don’t have those kinds of things figured out yet, and I am uncertain I ever will. I think it’s okay that you feel stuck and scared, and that you don’t even know how to start to change things. Because life isn’t supposed to be so hard, and it won’t always will be.

I think all your bad stuff is happening now to make room for good stuff later. Never think you are helpless and don’t believe you’re a victim. I know you choose hope over giving up and that allows for the possibility of greater things. Giving up is weak, and you may be a lot of things but that isn’t one of them. Don’t ever feel sorry for yourself, not ever. If you ever feel broken, count on the laws of conservation. Neither energy nor matter is created or destroyed. You are not helpless or irreparably damaged. The forces around you have caused you to change, but you are still whole. Also remember that action brings reaction, and when others see that you are fighting for something better they will help you.

I know you’re surviving instead of living, but do not be too sad about that. You should be nothing but proud of the way you hold your chin up when the weight of the world is on you and how you keep moving forward while everything is pushing you back. You are strong and beyond brave and smarter than you realize. I know you are sick of hearing that you are strong and that you don’t want to have to be strong. You must know that the courage you gain now will teach you to act in spite of fear every time it is required of you. That knack you have for getting calmer as a situation gets more nuclear will become something that makes you uniquely gifted for your chosen profession. You’ll be all fight and no flight. You will find the strength to run towards what others run from, and to fight for others when they cannot advocate for themselves. If ever you feel like maybe it could be someone else’s job to speak out on a stranger’s behalf, remember how you felt when no would speak out for you and find it in yourself to put them first. When you’re older, you will use all of that to truly help people. You did learn from all the bad things, just like you thought you might. More than that you forged them into good things, that’s not nothing. I know all that seems impossible right now, but I know you believe in impossible things.

If a lot of really really bad things can happen to someone, a lot of really really good things can happen too.

Keep writing. It will save you. I know how sincerely pissed off you feel all the time, and I wish I could tell you that you should let go of that. Being pissed off is what is going to make you work so hard to change things. Being so angry pushed you to be better. You were so angry at being unable to change the things surrounding you that you vowed to change things the moment you could. But when you are ready, and when things do start to get better, please do make an effort to let it go. Being angry all the time over things that are in the past just isn’t worth it. And not everyone is out to get you. I know you may have evidence that seems to point to the contrary, but I swear that there are good people out there and that you’ll find them. You’ve got to learn to stop being so angry or you’re never going to connect with people.

Do not give up the opportunity for success out of fear of failing. Yes, you’ll run into people who can be terribly cruel and treat you badly, but the good people out there deserve a chance and are worth the pain they may cause you. I know you probably don’t think so, but people really do need other people.

The reason you don’t think life will always be this hard is because you see the good in people, and in everything around you. Even when the worst surrounds you, you search for the good no matter how small it may be. Hold onto hope and faith in goodness, because the world is going to try to take that from you. But you hang on to believing in good over evil, like in the comic books you read, and you’ll find you have the opportunity to become a force for good. It doesn’t even require superpowers. Though if ambition was a superpower, I think that would be yours. You have a fire inside you that demands better things, and it will serve you well. I promise.

The iron in the blood that pumps so rhythmically through your veins formed in red giants before the idea of you or anyone you’ve ever met existed. Millions of stars erupted and detonated across the universe to create everything we know. It must have looked like complete chaos at the time, but what looked like destruction was actually growth. Every element in your body was made in the stars; you are made of star stuff, forged in fire. You were sculpted from the results of combusting scorching supernovas, and you never felt a thing. 13 billion years of space and time with infinite possibilities, and you exist.

And you have every opportunity for success and happiness as anyone and everyone else as long as you never stop believing in impossible things.