Our mission in life cannot be to make sure that everyone likes us. With this kind of a goal, one is destined for failure. Trying to make everybody like you will always require major sacrifice of self, and result in misery. Be loud if it suits you, quiet if it does not, or somewhere in between if you are comfortable with the spectrum. But be fully you, and expand into the space that is allotted for you. No one else is going to take it up for you.

However, in spite of all that, vulnerability, compassion, humanity, and empathy, are all character assets that can be honed and cultivated over the course of your life, no matter where you came from, and no matter who you think you are. There will be room for self-improvement until the day you die, and the day if you feel there is no more room for self-improvement is the day you open the door to the death of self.

We are here to learn and grow every single day of our lives, no matter what those days look like. We learn more about ourselves from pain than we ever could from pleasure.

At the end of the day, we are all in this together, so let’s ALL act like it.