love psychology/love diagnosis/love truth

• koishinri

Self-Love: Love Begins with Self-Love

What is the first condition to become a loved person?

It is whether you can love yourself.

Without self-love, you cannot love others. You will be less likely to be loved by others. Even if you are loved by others, you may not notice that love.

Only those who can love themselves can love and be loved by others.

When it comes to self-love, some people may think of words like selfishness and narcissism.

A selfish person is someone who puts their own interests first. However, this is different from loving oneself. A selfish person only thinks about their own interests and cannot empathize with others. Therefore, they are not loved by others, and are often disliked, meaning they are not taking care of themselves.

The attitude of a selfish person, that only they matter, means they cannot love others, but also cannot love themselves. Love arises within relationships. Connection is love.

However, selfish people lack connection with others. The more selfish a person becomes, the more they let go of love.

Love is connection. We want to connect with people we like. With a lover, we want to connect both physically and mentally. No matter how much sexual passion is fulfilled and pleasure is shared, a physical connection alone will not make one feel loved. Simultaneously, we seek a connection of the heart.

Self-love is not narcissism.

Some people may think of narcissism when they hear self-love. A narcissist is a self-loving person. However, narcissism and the self-love (Self-Love) discussed here are completely different things.

Many people know the origin of the word narcissism, it comes from Narcissus in Greek mythology. Narcissus, a young man who fell in love with himself and reveled in himself. The story goes that while gazing at his reflection in the water, he was so enamored that he was transformed into a narcissus flower.

Thus, narcissism means that only oneself is visible, and only oneself is loved.

But, only seeing oneself and only loving oneself is not love.

Love is connection.

The young man in Greek mythology is not connected to himself. He sees himself as an "object."

With self-love, you don't see yourself as an object; you are one. If you love yourself, you are connected to yourself.

However, we rarely manage to love ourselves as we are.

Haven't you ever felt this way?

・Am I unlovable?

・Am I not loved by the person I like?

・Do I deserve to be loved?

・Who would love someone like me?

And haven't you experienced this?

・Sometimes I think I can't love myself.

・I can't like myself.

・I tend to put myself down.

・Sometimes I treat myself roughly.

・Sometimes I hurt myself.

・I lack confidence in being loved.

Many people cannot love themselves as they are. Even those who seem self-confident may feel deep down that their true selves are not accepted, or that their true selves are unlovable, leading to feelings of loneliness.

Many people are afraid of love. In that respect, we can rest assured that we are not alone in struggling with love.

So, how can we become lovable, how can we become capable of loving?

First, instead of searching for love outside yourself, search for it within.
Deep-seated fears undermine confidence and assurance in being loved

What was it like when we were born into this world? Until then, we existed within our mothers, in a state of mother-child unity, only to be physically separated at birth.

Even newborns may still experience a sense of mother-child unity. The mother is an object of affection for the infant. As long as this unity is maintained, the infant may remain content, perhaps unconsciously connected.

However, the infant must eventually separate from the mother. The time for mother-child separation arrives.

Failure to successfully navigate this separation leads to attachment disorders. There are many accessible books on attachment disorders, written for a general audience, available from sources on psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. Please refer to those for more information.

Issues surrounding love are primal. They influence our ability to love others. The fear of love runs deep.

The feeling of being separated from unity may already have occurred at birth in the deep recesses of our psyche. Perhaps when we are thrust into this world, we experience a sense of lost connection. To put it spiritually, it's a feeling of being severed from the unity of the universe, or from whatever sustains us.

What arises from this?

The fear of whether we can survive, whether we can live.

If connection was love, and we are severed from that connection, what do we think? Don't we wonder if we did something wrong, if there is something wrong with us?

The story of Adam and Eve in the Old Testament tells of humanity's loss of connection with God, their expulsion from paradise, and their subsequent experience of the suffering of life. Even here, a caring love between Adam and Eve is absent. Adam blames Eve for eating the forbidden fruit, and Eve blames the serpent.

Eve witnessed Adam's self-preservation. This may be the same thing many married couples have seen in their husbands. They are together yet separated.

This feeling of separation, of incompleteness, of being cast adrift, becomes a fundamental fear in our subconscious, making it difficult to love ourselves and undermining our confidence and assurance in being loved.

Therefore, people must do something to regain love. Children may try to win their parents' love by meeting their expectations. In romantic relationships, people may try to be loved, not just to attract attention. For example, they may believe that being attractive will lead to being loved, and they may cultivate their physical attractiveness. They may try to conform to their partner's preferences to be loved. They may try to do what their partner says and become the person their partner wants, because they want to be loved. They offer a part of themselves to be loved.

However, without self-love, no matter what you do, you will lack confidence. You may not even be able to distinguish whether your relationship with your partner is based on love.



To be loved, start by loving yourself.

If you want to be loved, you must start by loving yourself. Cherish yourself. That's the key.

People who feel unloved, especially in their relationship with their parents, may not be able to cherish themselves. If this is the case, reconsider your relationship with your parents. If you feel unloved, become your own parent.

Imagine how you would love your child self if you were a parent. This parent is not your real parent, but the ideal mother you envision in your heart. You could call it the archetype of the mother.

・This parent would be kind and compassionate.

・They would never hurt you and would protect you from harm.

・They would wish for your happiness.

・They would give you a jacket when you are cold and a warm bed when you are tired.

・They would feed you when you are hungry, with nutritious food.

・They would tend to your injuries.

・They would never treat you like an object or something insignificant.

・They would make you feel that there is always a place you can return to.

The feeling of simply being here, of being accepted just as you are, is important. That is the feeling of connection with yourself.

If you can feel connected to yourself, you can love yourself. If you can love yourself, you will be ready to love others. Those who can love will be loved by those who can love in return.

Trying to find someone who loves you without first learning to like and love yourself is putting the cart before the horse.

Finally, here are a few things you should absolutely avoid if you are seeking love:

・Do not hurt yourself or put yourself down.

・Do not associate with people who abuse you or treat you like a worthless object.

・Do not tolerate any violence or harassment, including domestic violence, sexual harassment, or emotional abuse.

・Do not hurt others or treat them like objects.

・Do not say or do things that undermine the dignity of others.

・Do not use others as a means to your own ends.

Love never involves hurting yourself or others.