MOST RECENT ARTICLES BY:

Heather Havrilesky

  1. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘How Do I Decide What to Do With My Life?’I think that the answer, for you, begins with your shame.
  2. ask polly
    ‘I’m Depressed and I Want to Leave My Perfectly Good Husband’You don’t want to talk about difficult things, like the fact that you’re falling apart.
  3. ask polly
    ‘My Ex-Boyfriend Hates Me and It’s Messing Up My New Life!’You’re living inside his twisted perception of you.
  4. ask polly
    ‘I’m Scared of Failure’You’re hidden, which doesn’t help.
  5. ask polly
    ‘I Will Never Be Who I Want to Be’You’re playing a role that doesn’t suit you anymore.
  6. ask polly
    ‘I Can’t Stop Comparing Myself to More Successful Writers!’You need to stop seeing the world through the lens of your fears.
  7. mostess
    Stop Throwing Terrible Holiday PartiesAnd start throwing parties the rest of the year.
  8. ask polly
    ‘I Always Steal My Friends’ Boyfriends, and I Can’t Stop!’You’re telling an inaccurate story about how you keep falling into emotional quicksand.
  9. ask polly
    I’m Broke and Mostly Friendless and I’ve Wasted My Whole LifeWhen you live inside of your shame, everything you see is inadequate and embarrassing.
  10. advice
    ‘How Do I Survive Staying With My Judgmental Family?’Give them your poker face and don’t say a word.
  11. ask polly
    ‘He’s “Confused.” Should I Wait for Him?’Confused is a placeholder that could keep you in a state of limbo indefinitely.
  12. ask polly
    ‘I’m Lazy, Reckless, and Addicted to Social Media. Help!’The way you’re processing the world is broken. If you don’t fix it, you’ll just keep creating new problems.
  13. ask polly
    ‘I Am So Bad at Making New Friends!’Resist the urge to treat friendlessness as a personal failure.
  14. ask polly
    ‘My Boyfriend of Three Years Just Ghosted Me!’Your ex-boyfriend strikes me as the kind of person who is acutely aware of his own feelings, but has very little knowledge of other people’s feelings.
  15. ask polly
    ‘I’m Slow at Everything and It’s Ruining My Life’I think you have to work with what you’ve been given.
  16. ask polly
    ‘I’m Obsessed With a Woman Who Doesn’t Want Me’You seem to want to get swept away in a fantasy without ever having to show up.
  17. deciem drama
    How Did the CEO Meltdown Become Ordinary?Why we couldn’t look away from Brandon Truaxe’s social-media collapse.
  18. ask polly
    ‘Everything I Do Is Wrong’A lot of people — women in particular — feel unbelievably accountable to others.
  19. ask polly
    ‘My Broke Boyfriend Wants Us to Live Together!’No no no no.
  20. the kavanaugh hearings
    Mediocre White Man Falls Apart and Is Promptly Put Back TogetherBrett Kavanaugh barely even had to try.
  21. ask polly
    ‘My Ex-Best Friend Is Talking Trash About Me to Other People!’It’s understandable to want to know what others think of you, but at some point you have to recognize that you’re gathering information you can’t use.
  22. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘My Parents Don’t Love Me!’You don’t deserve to get hurt, over and over again.
  23. silenced by a hashtag
    I Was Admired By All, But Then an Angry Mob Came for Me!“My accusers won’t even acknowledge me or check up on me, to see if I’m okay.”
  24. ask polly
    ‘How Can I Make Art When So Many People Expect So Much Greatness From Me?’It’s crucial to recognize that the work IS the end, not a means to an end.
  25. culture
    Don’t Look BoJack’s Gifted Horse-Lady in the MouthJust keep working, advises Lisa Hanawalt, who turned her freakiest passions into a thriving TV career.
  26. ask polly
    ‘How Can I Believe in Anything, After So Many Shitty Things Have Happened?’When the stakes are high, trying to navigate your current, disappointing reality is the most terrifying thing of all.
  27. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘All of My Friends Are Terrible But I Love Them. What Can I Do?’Your old ways of doing things won’t work anymore.
  28. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘Should I Quit My Day Job to Write a Book?’It’s harder to finish creative work when you view it as a means to an end.
  29. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘I Like Myself, But I Hate Being Single’I can tell that you believe in yourself. But do you believe in love?
  30. ask polly
    ‘How Do I Start Over Now That I Know How Damaged I Am?’Start by grounding yourself in reality.
  31. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘Should I Divorce My Extremely Frustrating Husband?’You both seem to like having someone to blame when things go wrong.
  32. ask polly
    My Husband Dumped Me and Took My Business and I Don’t Know How to Move OnThe way you’re thinking about your pain and loss is making it harder for you to live.
  33. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘Who Am I Without My Anger?’It takes a long time to learn how to feel your emotions without identifying criminals.
  34. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘I Feel Empty’You have no connection to your success because you don’t know why you do what you do.
  35. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘I’m a Single Mom and My Friends Walk All Over Me’You have to accept that other people have different priorities, values, and rules from yours.
  36. ask polly
    Ask Polly: I’m Having a Hard Time Making Friends at My Fancy UniversityBlack-and-white thinking makes this situation worse.
  37. ask polly
    Ask Polly: I Love My Friends, But I Hate Making Plans to See Them!You’re not just trying to escape the plans.
  38. ask polly
    ‘Someone Is Saying Bad Things About Me and I’m Losing Sleep Over It!’Eventually, we become so exhausted by games of make believe that we not-so-secretly relish the idea of making a gigantic, ugly mess.
  39. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘Why Do New Mothers Hate Their Husbands?’Asking for what you want does not make you ungrateful.
  40. offspring
    Why Did We Ever Leave Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood?A new documentary offers a chance to reconsider Rogers’s mission and examine why his message is still so hard for adults to hear.
  41. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘I’m Starting a New Life, But There’s Pressure to Get It Right!’Eventually, your old self is going to crawl back into view.
  42. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘My Son’s Girlfriend Is Keeping Me From My Grandchildren!’You probably have your reasons for disliking your daughter-in-law. But she is your daughter-in-law now, even without the law involved.
  43. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘I Can’t Stop Being Angry at My Boyfriend for Moving Away’The story you’re telling yourself is inaccurate, and it’s hurting you.
  44. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘My Mother Has Stage 3 Ovarian Cancer and I’m Falling Apart’Ultimately, only you can decide how you want to navigate this sickness with her.
  45. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘Should I Dump My Toxic Friend?’It’s crucial to learn how to tell people what you will and won’t do for them.
  46. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘I Might Get a Big Job Offer, But I Don’t Want to Change My Life!’You have to tune in to your deepest feelings as you explore this possibility.
  47. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘I Want to Find True Love, But I’m Afraid!’You need to understand your truest strengths.
  48. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘My Boyfriend Isn’t Interested in Helping Me Out’You and your boyfriend are more alike than you might think.
  49. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘Should I Leave My Amazing But Incredibly Frustrating Relationship?’You can’t fix this. Because no matter how “good” you are, he encounters you as a threat.
  50. ask polly
    Ask Polly: ‘I Love My Boyfriend, But I Can’t Stop Cheating!’Romance cannot exist when one person is lying.
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