Here's my answer to the very real existential crisis that grips me midway through everything I've ever tried to do: I think stories help us fight the nihilistic urges that constantly threaten to consume us.

Were she better or you sicker, then the stars would not be so terribly crossed, but it is the nature of the stars to cross.

So often we try to make other people feel better by minimizing their pain, by telling them that it will get better (which it will) or that there are worse things in the world (which there are). But that's not what I actually needed. What I actually needed was for someone to tell me that it hurt because it mattered. I have found this very useful to think about over the years, and I find that it is a lot easier and more bearable to be sad when you aren't constantly berating yourself for being sad.

Facts, even false ones, cannot be copyrighted.

Pain is like fabric: The stronger it is, the more it’s worth.

That's how writing works, at least for me: even the stuff that doesn't work out gets funneled into the stuff that does work out.

I even tried to tell myself to live my best life today.