When you learn that whatever comes your way is a result of the choices you make, no matter how hard the situation, is you know you'll scrape through it. As a kid I always wondered whose side to take when the debate about karma came up. Karma. It's the only thing that keeps me grounded.

It's not the imposing type of belief, but it's something that I would advocate to most. It gives you a fair idea of your life, letting you steer clear of delusions. I often don't understand how people put off something for later and let stuff happen for themselves. Sure, somethings are best left to chart out for themselves, but I am proud of the choices I make and no matter what comes my way due to those choices, I am willing to deal with them.

There are days when I see myself trying to justify and reinforce so many things that I am not entirely convinced about. We all go through those phases where we give ourselves a hard time for whatever reason. I must stop. I must stop trying to slap on different layers just to make myself feel happy for a while.

It's like this. I work in an ABC way, and if I know it's not right for myself, I'll change. But fundamentals is what makes you, and there will always be a few people who love you for those fundamentals.

So the next time I see a 13 year old girl giving herself a hard time for various reason, ideally I would want to shake her shoulders and tell her:

Time will teach you that somethings about you are here to stay, so you need to start working on dealing with those right now. Otherwise you'll end up being a 21 year old with severe self esteem issues creating due a lack of identity fixation.

I can't say this enough. I love myself right this way. I realize I say this to myself often and it may be annoying to many, the kind of intense, extreme self esteem issues that I pass through on a daily basis. But, hey, that's me :) I come around, eventually. I am your regular, karma fearing, sensitive, junk-loving, semi-ambitious 21 year old. I guess I just didn't have the will when I was 13.

Tell your adolescent sibling/niece or nephew/child that what's important is that they don't let themselves down. What matters is that when you cry, you wipe your own tears and only you know what you're crying. I learnt to love my company :)