It's quite the world we live in these days. Just about everybody will admit to having some degree of distaste towards themselves, but in many cases, they only do this in a joking sense. After all, when you laugh about something that's haunting you, you can almost pretend it isn't actually there. I am actually often in that boat myself.

However, there's a major difference between strictly joking about self-deprecation with the intent of getting a cheap laugh from your friends and actually feeling an intense level of dissatisfaction towards yourself and the person you have become. It's far from uncommon, and in times like these where the world seems to have gone off the rails and most everyone is locked away in their homes, it's even easier for negative thoughts to arise.

Many of us may feel like we don't deserve happiness.

Everyone makes mistakes. It is up to us in our development to acknowledge such things and confess to them when appropriate so as to avoid any potential conflict. Of course, before one can get to such a mindset, they must first experience the repercussions of their own actions. Before you even reach middle school, it's likely that you've already hurt someone you care about and feared that they would cut you from their lives in response. In extreme situations, that's exactly what happens, too.

However, what we do with that failure is up to us. Not everything is so black and white. Not every problem is some insurmountable hill. You should never allow your failures to break you down, even if you feel like no fix is possible anymore. Nobody who truly cares for you the way you want will leave you if they can see you're willing to put in the effort to heal any damage you cause.

That being said, it isn't always so simple.

Speaking on a rather personal level, I've found myself on the giving end of pain to others, even if unintentionally. Acting out on negative emotion is especially easy after a heartbreak or even a death. You say things you don't mean, make promises you know you're going to break, and end up pushing away the people you wanted to keep close.

The more problems we cause for people around us, the more we lose ourselves. We completely lose sight of our own mentality in search of latching on to others, and when no one is left, we believe happiness isn't just out of reach: it's undeserved. Regardless of how many problems we solved or how many people we helped, nothing we can do will ever make up for our damage. Life becomes an endless cycle of trying to regain the positive image we once had of ourselves.

Sometimes, it's hard to understand that we exist.

In my personal life, despite constant anxiety tormenting my thoughts, I have tried my best to see the best in people until given a reason to think otherwise. I make an effort to stay positive even going into dark areas, often to no avail, only to get up and attempt one more time. It may feel like my very existence is out to get me, but I can't allow that to keep me from living.

The problems involving loss of direction of life are becoming more and more prevalent in media these days and it isn't hard to see why. Most people have found themselves entrapped in a dark spot -- that is to say, a time where it seems nothing could go more wrong. You feel alone and helpless, and the terrifying thoughts start creeping into your mind. Would anyone even notice if you completely vanished from the face of the Earth? Maybe the world would be better off for it? Whether you're genuinely suicidal or simply depressed, these thoughts are not to be taken likely and can haunt you for insane periods of time. Sometimes they never leave at all.

We get so caught up in the major mistakes we've made that the future becomes a foggy mess. Nothing you could do would possibly repair the image others now envision when thinking of you, so you may as well not exist at all.

In my own experience, this way of thinking leads you to go from your day to day life feeling as though you're living on autopilot. You're nothing more than a member of the audience for your own life, watching whatever happens and learning to accept it simply because you've lost the will to fight it.

Without the constant support of others, your sense of identity has left you. It isn't just that you don't know what to do with yourself, but that you aren't really sure who "you" are anymore.

And through it all, piled on with your loss of purpose, your opinion of yourself plummets. In your mind, there is no redemption anymore, and there is no future. As long as you think of yourself as a waste of space, that's exactly what you will be, and you will go on to hate yourself for it.

Even with all the time that has passed, it feels like life has stagnated.

Once you've reached this point in your life, you need to stop running from the truth. You need serious help, and plenty of it. The problem has grown larger than you can handle without support. If your loved ones are paying close enough attention, they may even point it out to you before you're willing to admit it.

It's difficult to ask for help. No one wants to be a burden on the people they care about, nor do they want to appear vulnerable. However, the fact of the matter of it is, everyone has their moments of weakness. No one can consider themselves strong without having come to terms with their own weaknesses and done their best to combat them.

Until you can admit to yourself that there is a problem and open up to others about it, you can't have closure. As a result, your progress in life will feel like it's come to a complete stop. Reaching out to others should always be the first step.

Keep the hatred focused on the mistake and away from yourself.

Your mistakes are never guaranteed to be forgiven, and that's okay. Not everyone stays in our lives forever, but the lessons our interactions with them teach us do. The image we have of ourselves should never suffer over completely fixable issues.

In times like these, our brains start going off track. We search desperately for someone to blame, and more often than not, it falls right back onto ourselves. Granted, when it comes to making mistakes, it's more than likely that you may have been at fault of the original offense.

However, this does not mean you should continue to blame yourself for every event that occurs as a result. Life is unpredictable. You never know how others are going to react to something, but once something happens, the best thing you can do is roll with it. Don't overthink it to the point of damaging your mind. Don't overreact, as that could cause even more mistakes. Just take the time to come to terms with the new status quo you've found yourself in and keep a level head going forward. It may feel like the world is against you sometimes, but that doesn't mean you need to turn on yourself!

I'm no stranger to self-hatred.

In my own life, social anxiety has constantly caused me to distance myself from people I want to connect with. In more recent years, there have even been relapses into depression caused by mistakes I could have prevented and have since had to learn to live with. Throughout it all, after having lost several people in my life as a result and being unsure of my relationship with others, I honestly can't say I'm satisfied with the person I am. I've put a couple people down when they counted on me, and I've never stopped blaming myself. This is a personal problem that has led my mind to some darker roads as discussed above, and it continues even to this day -- even after the conflicts of the past have mostly stopped affecting my present.

It's something a lot of people might not even notice, especially for people like me who prefer to be seen as "the positive one" and hate to burden others with struggles that may seem trivial to anyone not connected to them.

There is a lot for me to work on, and I know there are many people out there who have done much worse who need all the support they can get.

The future is never promised to us and there just isn't enough time in our lives to waste so much of it putting ourselves down when help is always waiting around the corner. All we have to do is be willing to accept it.