Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
“You are worth it”.
This book felt like an extended L’Oréal ad that keeps reminding the reader of their self-worth.
It’s been a while since I read a poetry collection, so I specifically typed “poetry” into my Kindle Unlimited subscription’s library, and this was one of the more highly rated titles available to read. I usually fight tooth and nail with some of my friends over how poetry has no rules – it doesn’t need to rhyme, it can be free-form – and I often argue for the freedom of how a poem can be anything. But We Hope This Reaches You in Time was largely a bunch of repetitive little notes about self-love. A lot of it made me think of content writers who work for third parties that expect them to write ten different articles about the same product.
Maybe some younger readers might find comfort in some of its pages. It’s very encouraging. It keeps telling the reader not to feel hopeless, defeated, or devalued; to look at the brighter side of life; to love themselves constantly; and not to depend on external validation.
This wasn’t for me. I expected more profound poetry, and not so much random, generic self-help prose. Maybe I’m at fault for expecting more, but like the writers say in this book –
We’re hard on ourselves when things don’t work out. It’s not enough that it didn’t go the way we thought; we have to punish ourselves for it. It’s our fault that we weren’t what someone wanted or needed. There has to be something wrong with us. We’re lacking in some way. I think we need to stop putting ourselves down every time someone can’t see something within us. Ok, things ended, it hurts, I get that. Chalking it all up to you somehow being “lesser than” or anything of the sort is detrimental. You’re not going to be compatible with every single person you find yourself interested in; that’s ok. You just need to realize that it is ok and learn what you will from the experience without tearing yourself down in the process.
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