Sugar Says: The Future has an Ancient Heart

Dear Sugar is an advice column that author Cheryl Strayed writes for The Rumpus, which is itself a lovely, funny, awesome website. Only recently did "Sugar" reveal her IRL identity. Before we were all just sitting around and wondering who was writing all these things that spoke so directly to our hearts and our minds, making us feel less like crazy people wandering around in a world of un-likeminded people. But now we know who she is! And she is brilliant! Also, Dear Sugar used to be Steve Almond, but now it's Cheryl. I highly suggest that you go check out all of the Dear Sugar advice columns because chances are, she has something good to say about something that you have wondered about once, or are still thinking about today, or will think about in the future when the time comes. 


A while back she wrote this column about the anxiety of graduating from college and not exactly knowing what you have been doing for the past four years, how it is going to help you in the "real world," who you are and what to do next. Not everyone is stricken with this malaise but I know that I was, and frequently still struggle with it even though I feel much further along than I was when I was actually about to graduate. Perhaps I will continue to struggle with it for many more years! Hopefully not, but if that is the case, Sugar has some great advice, as usual. If you too have some questions about life and what to do with yours, go read the whole column... or read the highlights I have hand selected below:

"You're going to be all right. And you're going to be all right not because you majored in English or didn't and not because you plan to apply to law school or don't, but because all right is almost always where we eventually land, even if we fuck up entirely along the way."

and:

"You don't have to get a job that makes others feel comfortable about what they perceive as your success. You don't have to explain what you plan to do with your life. You don't have to justify your education by demonstrating its financial rewards. You don't have to maintain an impeccable credit score. Anyone who expects you to do any of those things has no sense of history or economics or science or the arts.

You have to pay your own electric bill. You have to be kind. You have to give it all you got. You have to find people who love you truly and love them back with the same truth.

But that's all."

and finally:

"The most terrible and beautiful and interesting things happen in a life. For some of you, those things have already happened. Whatever happens to you belongs to you. Make it yours. Feed it to yourself even if it feels impossible to swallow. Let it nurture you, because it will. I have learned this over and over and over again."

These are good things to know and think about, right? Thanks, Sugar!

(for fun I included some art that is left over from when I was pursuing a degree that to this day I struggle with "explaining" to people, when really I am simply "carrying it with me, as I do with everything that matters!" so yes, the art is mine...)