If there is one thing I understand now, it is this: you cannot become successful enough to earn love from people committed to undervaluing you. Success may force them to look, but it cannot teach them how to love unless they are willing to learn.
You cannot build your life around the hope that the right achievement will finally make everyone clap.
Applause is beautiful.
Recognition can heal.
But neither can be the foundation.
The foundation has to be quieter.
A desk in a cold room. A scholarship application submitted with trembling hands. A professor who tells you to stop apologizing for your story. A friend who hugs you in a library. A morning when you buy berries without fear. A stage where you speak not to wound anyone, but to free yourself from being wounded forever.
My parents once said I was not worth the investment.
They were wrong.
