I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that sentence: “And wasn’t that the ultimate feminine achievement,” thought the character Cat in Julie Buntin’s “Marlena,” “to be too gorgeous, too f----- up, too talented and sad and vulnerable to survive?”

I found this quoted in an article on The Atlantic. It’s true, isn’t it?

For as far back as I can search, women are depicted as emotionally broken, bleeding and bruised.

The narrative a woman is told of her existence depicts some crippling internal conflict. Cry more, it says, but not around people. Laugh more, but only because it’s charming. Smile often, but only because it covers your heartbreak.

Be that girl who suffers in silence. Be the light-catching, heart-breaking, life-changing heroine who overdoses on heroin. Be the pretty face who hates her reflection. Be the beauty queen who props herself up on smiles and sedatives.

Our stories are told for us. Depictions of women are filled with anguish and anxiety. They show us as half alive and then destroyed by the heavy hand of impulse.

In novels, in songs, in movies, our lives burn fast and bright, as if we can barely contain the spark that illuminates our femininity. We are both the most enchanting side of a story and the very reason why it is a tragedy.

John Green’s “Looking for Alaska” comes rushing to mind. Alaska Young, full of life and stunning in the strangest way, throws her life around with abandon. The supernova Green writes her to be bursts with emotion and zeal. She lures those around her into the melodramatic void that Green placed at the center of her character.

Instead of working to be healthy and happy and whole, Alaska weaves whatever self-destruction she can find into her life. She works to make sure her life is artistically antithetical by poking holes in her heart and scratching scars into her sanity.

Smoking heavily and drinking carelessly, she embodies the idea that the most beautiful girls are the ones who defiantly dance on the edge of disaster.

And goodness, what a disaster she leaves behind. With devastating pomp, she ends her life in a spectacle starved of concern for those she conditioned to love her.

Novels like this one, like “Anna Karenina,” like “Marlena,” like “The Great Gatsby,” like “Paper Towns,” suggest perpetual struggle of women is to crawl along in our own misery.

We are apparently doomed to be either the supporting character to a destructively radiant best friend or the actual one being destructive.

Why must women be forced into the highly volatile and deeply distressed character trope we’re perpetuating through TV shows like “13 Reasons Why?”

Is this what I should be? Should I be caught in some sort of existential crisis of character? I’m not. Should I weep like Whitney Houston or ache like Adele or feel lovesick like Lana Del Rey? I don’t.

Too much popular music decides for us that we are insecure, inadequate and involuntarily inconsolable. I love a dramatic ballad just as much as the next person, but I hate how they present women.

We think about more things than romance and social lives. We are resilient and brave and confident. We don’t need constant affirmation, and we do not need someone else to tell us we are loved.

Perhaps, I have an advantage when talking about this point. When I feel my life starts to tip out of balance — that is, whatever slipshod balance I manage — I realize where my worth is.

My worth is found in the identity Christ gives me. That and that alone must be what tethers me to reality and keeps me from being yanked into the whirlwind of my emotions.

Yes, every now and then, it might seem rather romantic to be caught up in the rose-colored drama Lana sings about or the unrequited love poets muse about.

However, I think that lingering in this space of wistfulness can leave us disconnected and disoriented. If we perceive the world to be such an ache-filled space, that’s what it becomes. Therefore, it is no surprise that we see these aforementioned characters end their time in this world.

So, I suppose the conclusion I’d like to offer is this: Let us live. Let us live full lives. Let us live lives of joy and excitement, and health and happiness. Let us be loved and feel love, but not always the romantic kind.

Women are so much more than victims of heartbreak and hurt feelings. We are more than the characters we are written to be.