In my opinion, people are annoying and rude: they have preconceived ideas of you and hold you to them, preventing your own growth. People mumble in the back corners talking about you– spreading lies and rumors in attempts of defamation of character–but will rarely do it to your face. They take any and every opportunity to make you feel crazy, like you’re an outsider in your own life.

People don’t understand mental health. They lack empathy and knowledge and they happily stay ignorant of problems that don’t directly impact them. My entire life people have tried to hurt me, make me feel like everything that happened and will happen to me is my fault, and that I deserve it. They make you feel like you want to fit in and be a part of the group when in reality they plan to backstab you and make you just as miserable as them.

Time and time again, people have proven to be selfish and arrogant; they think they deserve everything because of their superiority complexes. No matter how close you think you are to someone, you’re always one misstep away from being attacked like you were a stranger. 

People look down on you simply because they think they can. Let’s use an example: let’s say you were tasked with teaching a class with something that you know perfectly and could do in your sleep, and a person comes in and hijacks the lesson. They begin to teach the class and they do everything wrong and inaccurately. In fact, it looks as if they’re adding extra, irrelevant steps that only make the process more difficult. How would that make you feel? Hurt? Irritated? Annoyed? It’s rude: they step on your toes and if you don’t instantly push them off they grow accustomed to it. It becomes second nature to them. To put a cherry on top, then they’ll talk crap about you as if you were in the wrong. Nowadays, it is almost impossible to have an original idea that is in any way contrary to the status quo. You don’t get to be an individual: you’re either a part of the group or a problem that they don’t like.

People will put you into a box and label you, causing immense psychological damage as a child and a young mind. These labels will burn and sting like being branded, similar to how a farmer will brand its animals. You do not get to have depth or be anything more than what you are on the surface. You only exist as you are in the minds of everyone else. 

Break the mold; exist as a three-dimensional being: it is so incredibly freeing to give yourself the room and energy to grow, especially when you destroy the ideas people have of you. My genuine wish for people is that they’ll finally grow and stop being sheep blindly and ignorantly following whoever has the shiniest coat. I hate people intensely because I want them to be so much better than they are. I hate them. I hate how they are now because they have the potential to be so much more. 

I have broken myself over and over again and again because I try my hardest to help those I love finally manage to escape their boxes and be more. In the end, it doesn’t help. I lower myself to help them and they stay just as they are. Imagine jumping into the water to save a person from drowning but they end up taking you down with them. I now know that it is smarter to throw a floatation device out and hope they grab onto it.

I hate people. People break things, hurt people, and blame you for things they did, but I love people because throughout all that darkness shines a tiny spark of light that can grow into the most magnificent flame.