Michael I. Bennett - Life Sucks: How to Deal with the Way Life Is, Was, and Always Will Be Unfair

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Text copyright 2019 by Michael I. Bennett and Sarah Bennett. llustrations copyright 2019 by Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved. Published by Penguin Workshop, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, New York. PENGUIN and PENGUIN WORKSHOP are trademarks of Penguin Books Ltd, and the W colophon is a registered trademark of Penguin Random House LLC.

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Ebook ISBN 9781524787912

Version_1

To Mona, who accepted me forty-three years ago as a work in progress and continues to give me tolerance and love that I dont always deserve

MB

To Mr. Dale DeLetis, my eighth-grade English teacher and high-school academic advisor. Without his encouragement, passion for literature, and utter refusal to suffer my sulky adolescent BS, I never would have survived middle or high school, aka the suckiest years of my life

SB

INTRODUCTIONS SUCK:

FIVE FACTS ABOUT THIS BOOK

Whether were a preschooler or a young teen, a graduating college senior or a retired person, we human beings all want to know that were acceptable, that our being alive somehow makes a difference in the lives of others.

Fred Rogers, The World According to Mister Rogers: Important Things to Remember

FACT #1: T HIS BOOK CONTAINS no magical answers or the keys to self-help, happiness, flawless contouring, etc.

Our experience has taught us that no matter what so many self-help books and well-intentioned therapists, teachers, and counselors tell us, those answers dont exist. And pushing yourself to find them instead of dealing with what youve got will make you more frustrated, miserable, and mad at yourself. So even if this book doesnt hold the secrets to fixing all your problems, it will show you how to develop your own unique problem-management skills.

FACT #2: This book makes one promisethat life is hard, but never impossible.

The only guarantee we can make is that life is difficult and often painful. And so many of the major factors that influence our lives, from the way other people act to our own emotional responses to things, are completely out of our control. Instead of learning to blindly trust and act on our feelings when it comes to making important decisions, its better to look for guidance from facts, experience, and the pride that comes from achieving the least-crappy outcome in an altogether crappy, miserable situation. In other words, weve found that your heart is full of blood and your gut is literally full of crap, so its best to follow your brain instead.

FACT #3: This book will ask you to give up on wild expectations, but not to give up on yourself and on doing the right thing.

Giving up on false hope doesnt mean giving up, period. It just means letting go of your unrealistic wishes for what you hoped would happen, figuring out what aspects of the problem you can control, and readjusting your goals accordingly. The only thing youre actually giving up is endlessly punishing yourself and feeling like a failure for no good reason.

FACT #4: Although this books for not-yet-adults, its really for everyone.

In theory, this book is aimed at not-yet-adults. We wanted to write a book especially for them, in plain English, about how to deal with lifes biggest issues, if only to try to reach readers early enough in life to save them some misery in the future. In reality, however, solid advice isnt limited to any one age group. Thats because many of the most painful problems in lifeno matter your agestem from feeling different and alone, and feeling like an isolated weirdo can make anyone see themselves as a failure.

FACT #5: Although this book will not necessarily make you feel better, it will make you better at dealing with life.

In fact, if this book does promise any keys to lifes difficulties, its one so simple and obvious that we have no problem sharing it before the books even officially started. And that is: When the problem tormenting you is unsolvable, at least for the foreseeable future, the best way to get through it is to stay focused on doing your best to be a good person, despite how crappy you feel and how hard things are.

Our advice will give you methods for managing problems when happiness is not an option. It will also help you rate yourself, not on how much youve achieved, but on how hard you tried to do the right thing when good results and happiness just werent possible. And at the end of the day, thats all any of us, at any age, can truly hope for. Even if most people or books wont admit it, especially in an introduction.

HOW THIS BOOK WORKS

Each chapter of this book will cover a big thing in your life that can suck: friendship, school, cultural differences, bodies, homes, and sexuality. Feeling like you dont measure up to others in these areaslike you have too few friends or look too differentcan make you feel more isolated, miserable, and generally sucky than any one person should have to put up with.

Then, instead of telling you how to feel better, or offering solutions youve already thought of, we challenge you to use your own experience and sense of right and wrong to fight all the undeserved and unfair negative feelings and find a way forward. Thats why each chapter begins with a simple quiz to help you determine what your own values are and whether youre living up to themdespite what you hear from parents, teachers, guidance counselors, and others or from your own negative feelingsor whether theres room to improve and change.