It's been a difficult time around here.

I didn't know her well at all, I only knew her to say hello to as you do when you see the same faces over a number of years in an apartment building, a petite woman, perhaps in her 50s, who lived in the apartment directly below mine. She seemed to be an energetic career woman, and that's all I knew about her. At 10 o'clock in the morning, pushed by who knows what despair, she ended her life by jumping off her balcony, 15 floors down to the edge of the park. There's a fine line between thinking about suicide and actually doing it, and all it takes is a couple of seconds to cross it. This I know because I've been there, but with me it was never negotiable; my stubbornness pushed me forward, the stubborn thought that there has to be something better than whatever is making us think these dark thoughts.

And it's because I know what it feels like that I don't judge her. But I feel incredibly sad that no one she knew could help or even saw the signs. I feel sad that someone who knew her much better told me that she had lost a lot of weight and that her hands shook the last time he saw her. She hadn't opened her door for days and newspapers were piled up outside. And yet, and yet.... those who saw that didn't think to check on her. But I can't judge them either.

Her name was Wendy. I found that out today.

What really matters

It doesn't matter what others think of you. What matters is what you think of you. It's only taken me years and years to understand that: be genuine, be kind to yourself and others, and do your best.