Kim Quindlen

1. Learn to be comfortable with the fact that sometimes they will drive you absolutely insane.

When you feel tears well up in unexpected, ordinary moments, like when you walk to the nearby store with your best friend to grab a six pack, or you sit at your kitchen table with one of your roommates and shoot the shit for a couple hours. And you know that even though it’s random to get emotional in these types of situations, it’s also not, because these ordinary, special moments are the ones that made up your entire college experience.

Taking Imodium for Crohn’s sometimes feels like taking Tylenol if your leg gets chopped off – it’s kind of like, what’s the point? But if I use it in moderation, it usually works really well.

“The moments that make life worth living are when things are at their worst and you find a way to laugh.”

When it’s the weekend and you want to sleep in but you feel like you should get up and be productive: Screw it. Sleep if you feel like you deserve it. Don’t make it a habit, but you should let yourself sleep in as late as you want every once in a while. Grocery shopping or cleaning or yogging with a silent j can wait.

Sometimes, the hardest part about this all is the isolation.

I was in an endless circle that never went anywhere. Fridays were for dreaming. Mondays were for reality checks.

Sometimes it feels like we either have two options: Find a man and be happy, but give up all sense of purpose and power. Or, hate men, because they’re evil and they take away our independence.

If you send someone a really sweet text message, they’re usually like, “Awwww, thank you!” And then five seconds later they’re like, “Wait, is this a joke?”

Sometimes, the breakup hits you with a force so strong that it feels like waking up from one of those falling dreams, where your stomach drops and your balance is off and you’re convinced for several seconds that you’re tumbling down a dark hole.

You realize that your looks really don’t matter as much to people as you’re convinced that they do.

Being terrified of moles – both the mysterious underground creature and the strange brown thing that appears on your body and is either nothing or skin cancer.

Be gentle with yourself. Sometimes you will screw up. Sometimes you will not love yourself. Sometimes you will feel weak and sad and like you’re not good enough. Be patient.

Sometimes you’ll go months without reading a book, and then you’ll crush The Girl on the Train in two days.

The older you get, the harder it is to feel like your life isn’t becoming repetitive and predictable.

Find someone who is proud of you for your accomplishments, but loves you unconditionally, whether or not you’re successful.

To a great extent, our lives are decided by far-reaching twentysomething moments we may not realize are happening at all.

She used to just be the adorable little five-year-old who gave great hugs and knew how to cheer you up. But now, she’s somehow become one of the wisest people you know, full of wisdom and intelligence and sound advice.