You mean that much: From Anonymous

Dear September,
I don’t know that I’m much of a writer, but I’ll try because mental health is something I really care about. I’m 15 years old and have been struggling with mental health since 7th grade. I’ve always been really hesitant to talk about it all- how I feel and things like that. I guess I thought none of it was real and it was just my head playing games. Needless to say, I’ve taken a lot of time to learn about it and myself, and that definitely wasn’t the case.
I used to really hate mental health awareness and self-help books. I don’t actually know why I did, I think I felt called out and that wasn’t something I was ready for. I couldn’t stand reading about people loving themselves thinking I never could. I had it in my mind that I wouldn’t ever find a way to really be happy, and to me, that meant being happy all the time.
Now, though, I don’t think being happy is the entire point of it all. I think the point is to be okay with not being happy, and to be okay with yourself. You don’t need to be happy all the time, you don’t need to be jumping up and down 24/7 to be considered happy. Isn’t that such an amazing thing to learn?
If I could talk to myself last year, or the year before, I would tell myself all of this. I don’t think I’d listen, I would probably return it with: “Crack a book.” And a dirty look. Then I’d go back to reading whichever depressed writer filled my mind that month. Charles Bukowski was the writer I always came back around to. I liked his voice. I thought it was poetic how beautiful pain could sound. It is poetic, but it’s not real to anyone but the person who wrote it. In his writing, that pain on paper were just words, I couldn’t tell you why I was so obsessed with those words. All they did was hurt me more.
For me, loving brings me the most. Sometimes it can hurt to care, but when it doesn’t, it’s so unbelievably worth it. To love your friends, your family. And for them to love you back? It’s the best feeling in the entire world, and I would go days of pain to experience just minutes of that feeling. I love to love. I love to be loved.
I don’t feel like I have a lot I can say because I’ve always been told I’m too young to know what I’m talking about, but happiness isn’t subject to age. If you know it, you know it. If you don’t, you don’t. The happiness I know is found when I’m looking for it. Being happy isn’t an accident. I think that if you want it you need to go get it because it isn’t going to wait for you. When you look for the things that make you happy, smiles feel easier and sleep comes faster. Guilt and grief hurt you less. Distances are shorter. You’ll see that people notice you on purpose, and they do care.
It’s all so worth the work and the pain. I’ll defend love and how it’s a higher power with my life. I’ll defend you with my life. You deserve it all. That might not mean that much, because I’m a kid online and nothing any stranger says (good or bad) is personal, but you mean that much. So please take that into consideration. You mean that much.