You don’t need to love yourself fully before loving anyone else
I am sure we all have heard the phrase that we need to love ourselves before loving anyone else.
But, this mantra doesn’t always hold true.
You do not need to love yourself fully before you love someone else. Loving yourself is a lifelong process; it doesn’t have a finish line. In fact, for some people who’ve not had a loving family relationship, or have suffered trauma or loss, it can be difficult for them to love themselves fully first.
However, this doesn’t mean you don’t need to invest in yourself before you start investing in other people. If you’re living a pretty reckless life, investing in somebody else first can instead lead to deteriorating the self esteem of all the individuals involved. You need to like yourself enough so that the action of loving yourself will flourish naturally and so that you can make healthy choices. I’ve personally known people for whom loving themselves fully was difficult but they were able to develop self love after they met somebody who made them feel worthwhile. Of course, for some this meeting leads to a flourish of a long term healthy relationship while for some it leads to the realisation of their worth and their purpose in life.
It is also equally essential to realise that the construct of relationship lays down the track. When we reciprocate healthy mutual feelings like respect, faith, support and kindness; we learn to treat ourselves in the same way. However, in an unhealthy relationship we turn into a self destruction machine.
Human beings are social; they have been designed in such a way that they require people around them to develop different feelings and emotions. The aspect of relationship also comes into play in this as; it is easier to love somebody else than to love oneself no matter how much we’ve worked on us. So isn’t the essence of love such that the person who loves you helps you to love even the parts of you that you don’t like? Again, the idea of loving somebody else doesn’t just boil down to a romantic relationship; it can be your friends and family as well.
For people who are struggling with loving themselves, a little reassurance and support can go a long way and feels like a genuine gift from the heart. As I’ve mentioned earlier, loving yourself is a lifelong process; so even if you are able to love yourself you sure are to come across those days where you don’t, so isn’t it nice to have a little reassurance?
So, we need not be too hard on ourselves to love ourselves fully first; but we should definitely work on ourselves so that we can create a safe space to build a healthy relationship for us.
