Love. The force that has shaped history, brought powerful men to their knees, inspired artistic wonders like never seen before, driven some to insanity and martyrdom, and yet others to unapologetic vile acts. I can’t begin to describe what love is: Trying to do so will be a fool’s errand as no amount of words can ever do justice to the feeling
We all need, crave, and obsess over love. The entertainment industry for starters understands this and thrives by selling love; 90% of the movies, music, books, and articles we invest our time into are love-themed. Love is like morphine to our souls, a source of hope and consolation: The silver lining on an otherwise grey cloud that is life. From society and the media, we are taught who to give love to (God or any other supernatural force, your country, your religious and political leaders, parents, spouses, children, etc), how to give love, and how to get it in return. We are given a societal blueprint to love; look a certain way, follow some ideologies or religious dogmas, court like this, achieve something, etc, and after that will be worthy.
What society never really bothers to stress is that loving yourself should come first. Instead, you are encouraged to give love to objects outside you before you can finally consider taking them inside. That conditioning is of course done with purpose for if people loved themselves then who will love and blindly follow the politician or pastor? Who will sacrifice his/her life for a religion or country? Who will go killing some innocents for some stupid ideologies? Nobody. There would be no need to get into all sorts of mediocrities just so you can feel worthy, give meaning to your life, be accepted, or earn some love. Those looking to manipulate you understand that fact; which is why society is constantly preaching against self-loving.
You deserve your love too
Contrary to what we are led to believe, the problems in our societies don’t arise from self-loving but from self-loathing. There is nothing evil with self-loving. After all, you only project what’s inside you; a self-hating, bitter, destructive, or unhappy person would only project, attract, and give that back to society. A person who truly loves himself/herself can only project love onto others. For instance, it’s common to find two self-loathing people trying to ‘love’ each other when in a real sense none has any love to give. The comedy of it is that a relationship built on lacking is bound to end with exhaustion, resentment, and bitterness. More so, when self-love is lacking then no amount of external loving will ever be enough to cure the empty void; you will go on jumping from person to person and would still feel empty at the end of the day. Any external love given to you will just be an illusion, and will further serve to remind you of what’s really missing.
Loving yourself is the most natural thing you could ever do. It’s the best gift you could allow yourself and shouldn’t be another person’s responsibility. When you love yourself you are able to be a good lover and can build fulfilling relationships. You are overflowing with so much love from within that all you can do is share that love with others without expecting anything in return; whether they love you back or choose to love someone else won’t be an issue to you. By sharing love you won’t see the need to cling, harass, own, control, or create a prison for your partner.
By self-loving I don’t mean your ability to treat yourself to an expensive vacation, your lack of consideration for others, or your petty selfishness like an eleven-year-old girl. Can you stay single without feeling the need to find someone to constantly hammer into you how valuable you are? Can you stare in the mirror without your clothes, makeup, accessories, or titles… and still feel like divinity? If not, that should tell you something. Loving yourself begins with learning how to be comfortable in your singleness/aloneness. The difference between being alone and being lonely is; that loneliness signifies a void that needs to be filled, while aloneness signifies wholeness. Being comfortable in your aloneness means you are aware that you are complete on your own (you are everything you could ever need), and don’t need someone else to fulfill you. Therefore, a healthy partner is one who compliments you, and not one who depends on you for completion. If we all loved ourselves and allowed others to do the same then no one would feel the need to compare or compete with another. Everyone will be so content and satisfied with who they are to the point that the business of seeking societal approval will perish. Mental health will be at best, and consequentially depression and suicide cases will go down. Everyone will be happier for it.
