Thanks!
I normally don't publish sappy essays like this, but I wanted to try sharing a common experience of rejection with a loud call for optimism and self-growth. I'm still learning how to be an authentic/vulnerable person, and I may have missed the mark
I like myself now. I really do. But sometimes that old self-doubt comes roaring back and I have to beat it down with a stick. You're totally right -- internet strangers cannot beat those feelings down for me.
By the time I published this, I was already back in a great headspace and moving on to the next thing :)
My hope is that somebody reads the essay and grows 1% more motivated to grab a stick and beat down their own self-doubts. I'll be sure to put that front-and-center in future essays
In my opinion this type of blogging - writing about genuine personal experience, ideals, feelings - is a positive.
At the end of the day the grandfather comment is more or less correct, the internet is a cold unfeeling whatever. But the act of writing from the heart is deeply, genuinely human and in this day and age I feel that the more human things I do, the better. And perhaps by being more obviously human will inspiring others to be more obviously human, and eventually making the internet (and perhaps the world) less of a cold and unfeeling whatever.