My bitter reality

I hate how sometimes I’ll see people that I used to talk to, people who were once important to me in some way, and it feels like I’m being forced to look at a collection of failed relationships and connections that didn’t work out. And somehow, despite knowing that relationships are never entirely one person’s fault, my mind still finds a way to paint the picture as though I’m the common denominator—as though something about me must have been the reason they fell apart. It’s frustrating because, if anything, I was probably the person who cared the most. I cared deeply, I overthought things, I tried to understand people, I tried to make things work, and I gave more of myself than I probably should have. Yet somehow, I’m left looking back at everything and wondering what any of it meant when so many people eventually became strangers again.

And I think that’s part of what has made me so bitter toward people in general. Not literally in the sense that I hate everyone or wish anything bad upon anyone, but I’ve started to hate the way people can be. The way they behave, the choices they make, and how often they seem completely unaware of the effects they have on other people. People can be selfish, self-centered, impulsive, inconsiderate, and emotionally careless, and what bothers me even more is that many of them are supposedly intelligent. They have the ability to think, reflect, understand, and recognize consequences, yet they so often choose not to. They have minds, but sometimes it feels like they barely use them. They act on impulse, say things without thinking, hurt people without considering what it might do to them, and then move on as if nothing happened.

Maybe I’m being too harsh sometimes. I know perception plays a huge role in all of this, and I know that I’m not immune to misunderstanding people or seeing things through my own emotional lens. But knowing that doesn’t necessarily make the feeling disappear. If anything, it sometimes makes things worse because I’m constantly questioning whether what I’m seeing is actually reality or just the way my mind has learned to interpret people after everything I’ve experienced.

And underneath all of that anger, I think there’s really just loneliness.

I often feel like no one truly gets me. Not just on a surface level, but deeply. I don’t mean simply having someone to talk to or someone who knows basic things about me. I mean being understood in a way where I don’t constantly have to explain myself, where someone actually wants to know the parts of me that I don’t show everyone. Someone who notices the things I don’t say, understands why I think the way I do, and genuinely wants to know me rather than just the version of me that’s easiest to understand.

I want to feel known. I want to feel understood. I want to feel like someone can look at me and somehow recognize the things I struggle to put into words.

But I don’t really trust that anymore.

Or at least, I don’t know how to trust anyone completely. Time and experience have taught me that people can change, leave, disappoint you, misunderstand you, or reveal parts of themselves that you never expected to see. Sometimes the person you thought would understand you the most ends up being the person who makes you feel the most alone. After enough experiences like that, trusting people starts to feel less like something natural and more like a risk you have to consciously decide whether you’re willing to take.

And I think that’s why isolation can start to feel so appealing.

If I distance myself enough, no one can disappoint me. If I stop letting people get close, they can’t hurt me in the same ways. If I fade into the background, eventually people will stop expecting anything from me, stop misunderstanding me, stop having the ability to affect me. Maybe eventually I’ll become someone people barely remember.

And strangely enough, there’s something comforting about that thought.

Not because I necessarily want to disappear from existence, but because being forgotten feels like it would mean finally being free from expectations, attachments, disappointments, and the constant possibility of being hurt. There would be no more relationships to fail, no more people to lose, no more wondering whether someone genuinely cares or whether they’ll eventually leave.

If there were one guaranteed comfort in this life, maybe that would be it: knowing that eventually, everything fades. Every relationship, every memory, every version of yourself that once mattered so much to someone eventually becomes distant.

And maybe there’s something peaceful about that.

At the same time, I know there’s a contradiction in all of this. Because if I truly wanted to be completely alone, I probably wouldn’t feel this desperate to be understood in the first place. I wouldn’t care so much about people if I genuinely didn’t want connection. Maybe the reason people frustrate me so much is because I still expect more from them. I still want people to think, to care, to be considerate, to mean what they say, and to actually see each other as human beings rather than temporary conveniences.

Maybe I don’t hate people as much as I hate how often people fail to be what I wish they could be.

And maybe what hurts the most isn’t that I’ve been disappointed by people.

It’s that despite everything, some part of me still wishes I could meet someone who would prove all of this wrong.