By ROSIE WATERLAND

Dear Life,

I’m pretty sure I’ve figured you out.

No biggie – it just came to me while I was in bed bulk-watching Season 1 of Orange is the New Black. I was sick and in that weird place where you have a temperature so you can’t decide if you need seven blankets or an ice-bath. Perfect epiphany conditions.

It was probably the worst day for me to get sick, as it meant I had to stay home alone. And I really, really didn’t want to be myself, because the day before I had done something silly. Something nobody who works online should do:

I Looked At Mean Things People Have Said About Me On The Internet.

I know. Stupid.

Look, Life, you’ve done a lot of great things. Tina Fey is basically perfection.

But trolls? You made a major miss-step there, my friend. A major miss-step.

Now, I get that in the grand scheme of things, trolls are a pretty enviable problem to have. If you’re being trolled, it means you’re doing so well in whatever it is you’re doing that people you don’t even know are taking notice. I certainly don’t begrudge where I’m at in my career right now. In fact, I’m pretty darn stoked about it 99% of the time.

It’s just that pesky 1%, when I see that someone I’ve never met has called me a “F%$KING #$%^$ #$%^#, that I get a bit… sad. Eg:

Generally I don’t take notice of it, but the other day I fell down a hate-filled rabbit-hole and didn’t resurface for about three hours. It made me pretty darn depressed – a depression that then got worse when I was forced to stay home alone coughing myself into oblivion (again – thanks a lot).

You see Life, you’ve programmed me so that when I’m feeling crappy, I need to be around people. I need other people to help lift me up. But on this day – the day after I Looked At Mean Things People Have Said About Me On The Internet, you decided that I should be by myself. Which meant all the lifting up would have to fall to me.

I needed to figure something out, ASAP.

I decided to try out this new thing I invented, called a Boost Bank (well, I invented the name, but the concept’s been around for a while). Basically, a Boost Bank is a section of your brain devoted to remembering all the wonderful things anybody has ever said about you.

That way, when you’re having a crappy day like mine, all you have to do is access your Boost Bank for an instant, easy boost. I’m sure everyone out there is familiar with the concept of the spank-bank? It’s kind of the same premise. (If not, Google it. Actually, wait – don’t. DO NOT GOOGLE SPANK BANK.)

I accessed my Boost Bank yesterday, and it worked. Despite what you had decided to throw at me Life, I managed to stay feeling pretty darn positive.

So, it looks like I may have figured out how to beat you at your own game, and now I’m going to spread my secret.

To everyone besides Life reading this letter – get yourself a Boost Bank. It can be hard to fill it, especially if you’re ridiculously bad at taking compliments like I am.

But if you can remember every crappy thing that anybody’s ever said about you (and I know you can), then you can definitely remember all the good things too.

Just let yourself have a big head for two minutes and think about how awesome you are. Then you’re going to be ready for anything Life decides to throw at you.

To start you off, I want you to remember the best compliment anyone has ever paid you and put it in the comments.

If you can’t remember the best one, try to at least remember one that was really, really good. The other day (when I was wallowing in the sadness of mean people on the internet) Mamamia Ed Jamila told me she would gladly trade her Law AND Commerce degrees to be able to write like me.

Do I feel like a bit of a wanker for telling you that? Yes, a little. But it’s also the perfect thing to save in my Boost Bank for when I’m feeling like crap.

Trust me – this works. So start filling up your Boost Banks and beat Life at it’s own game! (And Life – I’m kind of over being sick now, so please hurry that along if you wouldn’t mind.)

Yours truly,

Rosie xo

Time for a big love in. What’s the best compliment you’ve ever received?