There will be days when you want to just throw in the towel and give up. There will be days of stiff necks and no sleep and sore muscles. People will be cruel. Food will go bad. You will feel like the world is out to get you. Everything will start to frustrate you, the news will make you sad. Winter will creep up on you and you will find yourself alone and burrowing yourself in your schoolwork to try to keep the loneliness at bay.
But then spring arrives. Something big blooms in your chest. Sparrows sing to you and the air suddenly is clearer. You fall in love. You will grow a garden. Good things will start to come to you, beautiful people will find you. Remember those good things when the days get cold and the nights get long. Remember that you deserve to feel good. That you deserve to have good people and good food and a safe place to come home to. Remember that bad moods pass and that all bad days end. And that no matter where you are or how lonely you get, somebody out there is looking for you and is waiting for you to find them and give them your love.

Please don’t hurry to fall in love or fall into anything. There’s plenty of time for all of that. Until then, do more than exist. Remind yourself on every occasion that you are still so young and that is a beautiful wonderful thing. Before you know it cynicism will come on wings and you will have to reshape yourself over and over. Don’t wish for emotions. Long for experiences, and hands that feel good in yours, and the cold bite of winter, darling you’ve got such a long while. You’re not inadequate because you’re alone (not lonely, mind the difference), you’re not unattractive or boring or God forbid unlovable. Breathe a little bit easier. Write yourself lists. Your hipbones right now, the places where you long to be touched, are too fragile for lust. You’ll find yourself crushed under the weight of it all.