Will Things Still Get Better?
Everything Seems to Be Falling Apart:
I can confidently affirm that writing is a part of my life—whether I choose to share it or not. Even during the time I took a break from posting, I was still writing. Earlier today, while going through my computer, I came across a piece I had written earlier this year with this same title.
Reading it again, I realized that the weight I carry now isn’t new. It has been there for a while—only heavier this time. Back then, though, there was a certain distance in how I wrote. It felt like I was observing other people’s lives, imagining possibilities that could have been mine. Now, that distance is gone. These are no longer imagined realities—they are lived ones. And that realization unsettles whatever illusion of control I thought I had.
I’ve said before that I’ve moved from trying to understand why life is the way it is, to learning how to respond to it. Still, there are moments when the “why” refuses to stay quiet. I understand that bad things happen—it’s almost expected—but why do they happen to good people, and often at the worst possible times?
It becomes even harder when most of these things are beyond my control. In just this past week, I’ve encountered grief, pain, and loss almost daily. These are no longer distant stories or passing headlines—they are closer now. And the closeness changes something. It reminds you that you don’t know when you’ll be next. Slowly, what feels like being spared begins to carry its own weight, something that edges toward guilt.
When things keep falling apart like this, it becomes easy to slip into a kind of quiet resignation. A despondence toward life. Just outside the door is a nihilistic way of seeing things—because when nothing good feels guaranteed, even after effort and endurance, you begin to wonder what the point of it all is. We try, we really do—but what happens when the so-called healing phase starts to feel like a cycle you won't ever step out of?
I’ve also learned that there are limits to what we can imagine. It’s easy to predict how we think we would react in certain situations, but the truth is, we don’t really know until we are in them. That realization has changed how I listen to people. When someone shares their struggles, I try to truly hear them. Even when I’ve experienced something similar, I hesitate to say “I understand,” because I’m beginning to see how deeply personal and internal these things are. Suffering doesn’t lend itself well to comparison.
People often say that when someone develops unusual or troubling inclinations, they should talk to someone. And while gathering the courage to speak might be difficult, for me, it’s often the response that feels heavier. I don’t expect complete understanding, but indifference or dismissal can be just as hard to carry—because these struggles are real. As real as anything else.
There was a time I found it difficult to grasp experiences like body awareness distortions, gender dysphoria, mental illness, suicidal thoughts, anxiety, depression, the fear of being left behind, existential crises, self-harm, emotional numbness, hypersensitivity, and more. Now, I no longer see them as distant or abstract. They are part of a shared reality—one that is too present to be dismissed or explained away too easily.
Maybe this is the problem of evil. Maybe it’s the result of living in a world that is, in many ways, broken and distorted. Maybe genetics and environment play their part. Whatever the cause, it is something we keep encountering. And so the ways we cope—the systems of support we rely on—need to be real, not just theoretical. Because sometimes, a cure isn’t immediately within reach.
Like many others, I’ve said it before: it gets better. I’ve repeated it to friends in moments where we lay our struggles bare. And often, the response I get is, “hopefully.” These days, I find myself holding onto that same word—hopefully—because belief is becoming harder to sustain.
I understand why someone like Sebastian Junger would say that many religions struggle to hold if you remove the idea of an afterlife. Because if this world, in all its brokenness, is all there is, then it can feel like we are working toward something that never quite resolves.
Still, it is only human to long for some form of comfort, even here, in the present. There is a quiet privilege in finding a safe space at the end of the day—whether in family, friendships, meaningful work, solitude, or something sacred. Perhaps what holds us together in times like this is what St. Isaac the Syrian describes as compunction: a sorrow of the heart, softened by hope.
And maybe that is what remains when everything else feels uncertain—a kind of sorrow that still leaves room for gratitude, for rest, and for trust in God’s mercy. So even now, we hold on, however loosely, to the possibility that things might still get better.