It’s time to stop being so hard on yourself. It’s time to start being softer with yourself. It’s time to start being softer with your heart.

It’s time to realize that you won’t have all the answers and you’re not supposed to. It’s time to realize that living a life that you never wished for doesn’t mean you failed, it means you’re living your purpose, whether the one you already know or the one you’re about to figure out. It’s time to stop comparing your life to others who seem to have it all together because maybe there is something substantial that will come out of the chaos in your life. Maybe this is how you will change the world.

It’s time to stop berating yourself for your failed relationships, your bad love choices and the rejections you’ve faced. It’s time to remember that this is how love works in this day and age, people date and break up. People don’t savor the profound intensity or meaning of love like they used to. People are more guarded and more selfish and it’s going to take a while to get it right. It’s going to take a lot of trial and error to know what you’re looking for. It’s going to take a lot of work. You’re not ‘doomed’ or ‘cursed’ just because you haven’t found love yet, you’re simply in the elimination process until you find a winner.

It’s time to stop feeling guilty for doing what’s best for you. It’s time to stop denying yourself so many things in order not to offend or upset people. It’s time to live for yourself and do what makes your heart happy. You’ve been trying to keep everyone happy and everything together until you realized that you’re the one falling apart. It’s time to learn that you can’t always be the perfect friend, the perfect partner or the perfect child. It’s time to be okay with being flawed and making mistakes and letting people down because you’re human and you’re evolving.

If you want people to be softer with you, you have to be softer with yourself. You can’t be your own worst enemy and expect the world to be on your side.

The world is already hard on you. It’s constantly testing and challenging you. It doesn’t really care if you’re tired or if you had a bad day. It just keeps going. But if you don’t know how to be compassionate and patient with yourself, you’ll stop half-way. You won’t be able to finish the race. You won’t be able to appreciate your journey.

I’ve learned that indifference will get you temporary satisfaction because it’s short-lived. But compassion lives forever. Learning to be softer with yourself will be your saving grace when the world turns its back on you.

Rania Naim is a poet and author of the new book All The Words I Should Have Said, available here.