we're all addicted to our misery

we're not loyal to the pain, we're loyal to the story it told us

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Misery is a velvet cage. It’s soft enough to cradle you, familiar enough to feel like home.

Yet its bars are forged from the stories we tell ourselves. The stories we can’t stop reciting.

I used to think I was the only one who lingered in my own sadness, replaying old hurts like a scratched vinyl record, each skip carving the groove deeper.

But I see it now: we’re all addicted to our misery, not because we love pain. We clutch it because it’s the only map we trust.

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The path loops, but we follow it anyway, mistaking pain for direction.

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It started with a night I couldn’t sleep, my mind a carousel of regrets: every wrong turn, every word I didn’t say.

I’d lie there, not trying to escape, but sinking deeper, as if the weight of my mistakes was a blanket I needed to stay warm.

Why do we do this? Misery is a mirror we keep staring into, hoping to find something we recognize. It’s the cracked vase we carry, leaking light but never empty.

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We cradle the broken vessel not to mend it, but to feel something spill through our fingers.

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It’s the riddle we can’t solve but won’t stop asking: Why am I like this?

Here’s the truth nobody tells you: misery feels safe. It’s predictable. Joy? Joy is a wild card, a guest who might not show up.

Misery stays. It breathes, “You know me,” and we nod, because we do.

We’re not masochists; we’re just human, clinging to the familiar ache because it’s ours.

But what if we’re not meant to stay there? What if the addiction isn’t to pain, but to the story we’ve built around it?

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Somewhere between ache and awakening, I heard the silence ask: What if your sorrow has already done its job?

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I started breaking free when I stopped trying to “fix” myself.

I wrote a letter to my misery, not to banish it, but to thank it. It had kept me company, after all. I folded it into a paper boat and let it float away in my mind.

Then I asked myself one question: What’s one thing I can do today that isn’t about surviving, but living?

For me, it was writing this. For you, it might be a walk, a song, or cooking chocolate pancakes.

We’re not doomed “to be or not to be” miserable, as Hamlet might’ve mused if he’d had a Substack.

We’re fragile, yes, but every fracture holds a seed of creation.

Start small. Rewrite one line of your story. Ask yourself: What’s the one question I’m afraid to answer? Then answer it, even if it’s just a whisper.

Because even a whisper can slip through a locked door. Even a question can carry the key.

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Sometimes the cage opens without a sound. Just a moment where the ache loosens its grip. You don’t run. You don’t soar. You step. One foot out, then the other. Not toward freedom, but toward possibility. Because maybe healing doesn’t roar. Maybe it arrives like a breath you didn’t know you were holding, and you let it go.

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Thank you for reading. If this found you in a quiet moment, I hope it kept you company. If it stirred something, I hope you’ll sit with it. And if you’re rewriting even one line of your story: I’m rooting for you.

Love, Maddie

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