advice

advice for high schoolers

i think you need to cultivate a very strong sense of self or get really good at something. by a strong sense of self I mean beliefs, tastes, hobbies that you are honest to yourself about, and by getting really good at something I mean honing a hard skill like writing or playing basketball. everyone I knew who was happy and thriving at that age had at least one or the other, and caught up on what they lacked in college.

on not crashing out

i am not a mental health professional and have no antidote to crashing out but i think in general you should aim to be normal, loving, and excellent to your friends and family, be grateful for what you have and who you are, and apologize immediately if you do something you don't mean

on writing or being a writer

there is no such thing as being a writer, there is no such thing as a writerly life or a writerly type of person, and everyone who says otherwise and haven't published anything is just larping. many writers have day jobs. many writers have night jobs. put all the time you spend on thinking about being a writer into reading. to be a writer you have to read a lot and write a lot. and like it goes with all art you just have to put up with making a lot of bad art before you become good

on work

you are only ever paid for doing work other people doesnt want to do or can't do. any "labors of love" can also involve things that are painful or hard or inconvenient or take time for other people but not for you.