I’ve learned a lot from maintaining a blog over the past year. Nothing can get you out of your own head and expose you to other perspectives more than displaying your innermost thoughts on the internet. People from different countries, backgrounds, genders, ages, all offering their take on my life and opinions - that’s worthy of its own book right there. But the chief lesson I’ve learned is this: no matter our income bracket, geographic location, political affiliation, ethnic background, religion, etc. human beings are fundamentally the same. We all harbor hopes, dreams, aspirations, insecurities and prejudices based on stories we tell ourselves and think of as true. We are all deeply concerned with what other human beings think of us. We all desperately want love. And we have all created ingenious defense mechanisms to protect ourselves when we feel close to rejection or failure.

Those defense mechanisms are what gush like blood through burst arteries from every enraged comment, nasty e-mail or snide article that I’ve come across about myself or my current path. Threaten people, however inadvertently, and they’ll bare their fangs and crush their windpipes against the metal leash in their rush to attack you back. Every single one of us carries around a mental suitcase filled with pride, and an intense need for validation. I am a good, smart, worthy person, and to prove that I need to be RIGHT. I need to make the RIGHT choices, have the RIGHT opinions, the RIGHT career, the RIGHT life. Someone comes along telling us that no, actually what you think is right isn’t right for me, and what’s our first reaction? Tear the motherfucker to shreds.

This human truth leads to an unfortunate consequence: If you decide to step outside the mold and do something unorthodox, people in the mold will race to rip out your throat rather than face the possibility of your success proving them wrong. While your actions may have nothing to do with these naysayers, it’s nonetheless very personal - they have a stake in making sure you fail, all to maintain their right-ness. So they attack: You’re a shit writer, you have no talent, you’re pathetic, you’re a one-trick pony, you’re ugly, you’re writing about a topic that is fundamentally boring, no one will ever want to read anything you produce, and above all, you will FAIL FAIL FAIL.

I’ve heard all of the above, and much much more. It’s come from complete strangers, friends, former superiors, parents and peers. But after a year of internalizing the criticism, doubting myself and swallowing prophesies of my failure and eventual starvation, I have developed an official response: Thanks for sharing; now kindly get the fuck out of my way.

I may succeed in writing and publishing a book, I may fail. I may be able to make a living as a writer, I may have to beef up my law resume in a year and beg for a job to make rent. But a person shouting from the rafters about how I’ll never amount to anything because “bloggers can’t write” or “workplace novels are boring” does nothing but reveal his own insecurity and personal desire for my doom (not to mention ignorance of my book’s plot). Whatever happens to me, it won’t be a result of your bleeding ego foretelling my failure. I’ll do my best, and if it doesn’t work out, I’ll dust myself off and go on. All you do by spouting scorn-tinged condescension is reveal your unhappiness with the way your own life turned out, and your subsequent need for mine to end up no better.

Here’s my suggestion: Give it a rest. Perhaps it didn’t all end up exactly the way you wanted it to - maybe it’s time to do something about it. Something besides just wishing failure on others.