A letter from November 20th, 2017

Dear me, If you remember, 2017 (or maybe late 2016) was when I realised how absolutely **** I am at writing. To remedy this, I tried to write a short story from a reddit writing prompt. I stopped after the first two paragraphs because it's hard to salvage anything from a piece that's already a hilarious trainwreck by the end of the second paragraph. The problem may have arisen from my use of second person, which caused my writing to be more self-centered than usual (which I didn't think was possible). On the bright side, I've learnt that I'm a self-centered ******* even when I write. Achievement unlocked? The piece: Wake up. Brush your teeth. Realise that you can’t find the toothpaste. Shower. Find out that you used the toothpaste as shampoo. Stare into the mirror and wonder what you’re even doing. You’re living the life, aren’t you? Your parents said you had great potential, that you could change the world. The only real question was how. Go into government? No, you’d prefer not to dirty your hands in that corrupt, violent world. Go into charity? Sure, but wouldn’t your time be better spent solving the systemic problems that cause the destitute to remain in their condition? You ended up following your friends into tech, reassuring yourself that you’re not in it for the money or the fame. Now, what do you do? You help manage and enhance server capabilities for YouTube Kids. A noble undertaking indeed. You want to do good, but what is good? Spending years going through volumes of discussions about morality didn’t really help. You’re smart enough to kinda critique moral systems that others take for granted, but not smart enough to construct one for yourself or even be confident of an already existing one. Great. Nothing you can do now but roll on. ------- Hopefully, this doesn't turn out to be prophetic. If it does, I convey my most contemptuous laughter through this email. Regards, You.