what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger? nah; it’s not consistently true. what doesn’t kill you makes you different.

what doesn’t kill you makes you different than the person you were before you experienced it; than people in your life who didn’t experience it; than a version of yourself who didn’t experience it would have been.

sometimes, sure, going through something horrible makes you stronger. sometimes it does not! lots of complicated factors there; the human experience is large, etc. but pain changes you, always. sometimes subtly — sometimes overtly — but every time.

this has been a hard year to be alive. i understand the impulse to celebrate that it’s ending, to say “i’m so ready to get back to normal.“ but, because you deserve the warning: you are different now than you were before. we all are. that version of normal is gone.

i hope 2021 is a kinder year. but whether it is or not, it’s okay and probably important to grieve this one, all it has taken from us, and the versions of ourselves we would have been if things had gone differently. we’ve lost a lot. that sucks.

and if, in the coming days, you find yourself feeling really bad: that’s normal, and you don’t have to brightside it. let yourself feel it; make room for the changed version of yourself, the different person you’ve become. that, more than anything, is what will make you strong.