You probably think you should’ve been healed by now. You probably made it a goal to heal within a month at the start of every new month. Or maybe last year, you made a vow that next year was going to be your year, the year of extraordinary accomplishments and absolutely no room for bullshit from all the pain and trauma of the past.

It’s been a long time and you’re not healed yet. You’ve spent many restless nights and frustrating days fighting a war within yourself, wondering why you aren’t healed yet or even close to healing. You believe that everything is supposed to go from good to great from one moment to the next with no crashes or abysmal heartaches in between.

But healing isn’t something that you can rush by the sheer force of willpower. Throughout the years, you’ve realized that you can’t always put your mind to anything and have it turn out alright because life keeps hurling you face-down when you’re least expecting it to, throttling you even when you are at your weakest, begging for mercy somewhere out there. Maybe you won’t ever be completely healed from everything that’s hurting you. It’ll be okay, but you won’t always feel okay about it.

When you think you should be healing faster than you are, here are some little reminders for you when you’re at odds with what you expect and what you’re actually feeling when you’re trying to heal:

1. Just because someone else seems to have healed much faster from something more traumatizing than what you’ve been through, it doesn’t make you fragile, spoiled, or deficient in any way.

2. Healing, like all wonderful things in life, takes time and the more you rush it, the more agony and resistance you’ll feel.

3. Maybe time will never heal all wounds and maybe your wounds will never disappear, but that doesn’t mean you’ll never feel joy again.

4. Some days, you’ll feel like you’re finally healing faster, but on other days, you’ll feel like you’re stuck in a cycle of hurt and endless grief.

5. Likewise, you can feel extremely productive and cope really well, but then the next day, you might want to bury yourself under the covers and hide yourself from the rest of the world, and even when you feel frustrated with the tumultuous ups and downs, healing isn’t meant to be consistently upward.

6. No matter what you think and no matter what you might hope for, no grand accomplishment will automatically heal you or resolve any emotional trauma you’re currently battling against.

7. Don’t be afraid to let go of everything that seems like too much for you, especially when you’re still hurting deeply and unable to take one more step.

8. Your scars, bruises, and wounds do not define who you are, and they certainly won’t sentence you to a future full of dead ends.

9. Right now, allow yourself to step back and process everything you’re feeling right now, no matter how much you desperately want to avoid the reality of your pain.

10. You’re harsh with yourself and have high expectations when it comes to self-healing, only because you feel the external pressure to keep up with everyone else who seems to be completely happy, productive, and fulfilled, but the truth is, people tend to hide their brokenness and not do as well as you think they’re doing.

11. You’re doing enough today, and even when you feel like you’re going through the worst, you’re still surviving and coping with little, simple things that brighten your day.

12. You may not feel like you belong in this world, but the world needs you and everything you have to give because your presence is a wondrous and irreplaceable gift in itself, and you don’t need to have the recognition of everyone to validate that.

13. You don’t have to make your life look better than it feels because that will only exacerbate the wounds festering within, and what you really need to do is allow yourself to pursue a life that’s best for you, no matter how much people question it.

14. There is no such thing as a destination called “completely healed” because over the course of your life, the pain won’t entirely leave you, and while you may not always feel okay with this, there will be better days ahead, and you will never lose your ability to savor the phenomenal moments of life.

15. The best thing you can do right now is to let go of all your expectations and your tendency to rush through life without questioning why you’re doing so.

16. All this time, you’ve grown so much, and you’ve moved forward, no matter how slowly others might think you’re moving, because deep down, you know you’re capable of more than just feeling pain.

17. As long as you keep building yourself up and pursuing all that you find beautiful in life, you’re never stagnant, even when your darkest emotions make you believe otherwise.

18. There is no such thing as failing or falling behind in healing because it isn’t a linear race to see who can rush through it at record speeds.

19. You don’t owe anyone an explanation of why you’re not healing quickly enough because that really isn’t their place to judge.

20. No matter how much you’re hurting or how overwhelmed you feel, you can still transform your life by choosing to move forward and persevere the best you can.

21. You really don’t need to be immune to pain to pursue what you deeply desire because you’ll be waiting until death if you believe that you need to eradicate every negative emotion to be qualified for anything in life.

22. Even when you haven’t been able to heal yourself, realize that you have, at some point in your life, healed other people, and let this remind you of how much power you really have that you can use for your own healing, which will never be perfect but will be undoubtedly better.