Plenty of people walk out of a betrayal like mine and take exactly that lesson, and become hard, and closed, and small, and spend the rest of their lives protecting a fortune that no longer buys them any joy because they have made themselves incapable of the openness that joy requires.

I refuse to become that.

My generosity was never the flaw.

My generosity is one of the best things about me, and it built the very relationships — with my sister, with the handful of people who actually love me — that turned out to be my real wealth when the false wealth fell away.

The flaw was never that I gave.

The flaw was where I aimed it.