Want to Fully Love Others? Start by Loving Yourself

There’s an old adage that says you have to love yourself first before you can love others fully. Whether this is your spouse, family, or friends — the same saying applies, though these are all different kinds of love. Sure, it’s a wonderful phrase, but let’s try to decipher and answer why it’s so crucial to love yourself first from a practical standpoint.

Let’s use this simple analogy:

Consider something in yourself that you truly dislike. It could be true that it’s something dislikable, or it could all be in your mind. Whatever the case, you are viewing something about yourself in a negative light. This is called cognitive distortion when people have a distorted view of themselves or a situation they are in, regardless of whether they are right or not.

Now let’s understand why you have that dislikable trait. Typically, most people cannot explain why they turn out the way they do. We are all products of our upbringing and genetic makeup. As such, people have qualities they don’t like as a result of shattered homes, strained relationships with their parents, traumatic experiences, and even having teachers who were perpetual critics who were never pleased with anything.

That said, the sad reality is that most people who despise something about themselves can’t even account for it. They just have previous experiences that made them the way they are. Most times, they feel shunned, unaccepted, and unloved which leads them to have dislikable traits. This process leads to cognitive distortion. From this simple explanation, it’s easy to fall back to day-to-day depression, feeling sorry for yourself. After all, it’s an excuse for why you are the way you are. This, however, is self-deprecating and nothing good comes out of it. You have to take responsibility for your thoughts and feelings. Be in control of who you are and how you feel about yourself.

Aestheticians from Bailey Aesthetics Clinic Gold Coast say, “It’s more than ok to want to improve yourself, and we encourage it if it will improve confidence and self-esteem, but the fact that there is something you don’t like about yourself does not take away all your good qualities.” As such, you must battle to quit feeling hate towards yourself and others. You must battle and strive to improve yourself through positive emotions such as love, creativity, teamwork, tolerance, and courage. The lesser your ability for love is, and the more issues you have with yourself, hence the more you’ll have issues with others. That’s all there is to it. Imagine if you easily add weight hence have to stick to a tight diet yet a friend has better body metabolism and could easily eat anything and everything they want. If you’re not okay with who you are, it’ll irritate you every time they eat chocolate. As a result, you’ll end up hating them for no reason.

Business and Finance Mentor Muzi Dan says, “Consider that you’re broke yet your friend leads a luxury lifestyle, buying all the things you can’t afford while bragging about how much money they make. As long as you’re not comfortable with the little you have, you’ll always be irritated and jealous, and end up hating them.” Imagine hating a person because they inherited money from their folks, quite unfair, don’t you think?

In a nutshell, love yourself, forgive yourself, and accept yourself. You are perfect the way you are. The larger your capacity for love is, the fewer issues you have with yourself and others. Sam Gosper specialises in weddings as an events planner, he says, “In my day to day I see couples ready to make a life long commitment to one another, and I truly believe the strongest relationships come from a place of self-acceptance, self-love and mutual respect. I agree that it is so important to have this foundation before committing to another person.”

This is easier said than done but there are always things you can do to  begin your perfect to achieve self-love:

• Make a list of everything you’re proud of about yourself and read it every day when you get up. That will start your wheels turning just before or after a cold shower.
• Make a list of everything you’re grateful for in your life and read it every day before going to bed.
• Only compete with yourself. Compare yourself against yourself five or ten years ago while maintaining a clear vision of your future goals.
• Make a list of all your assets. You’ll feel more confident and proud of yourself if you really excel at something.
• If you dislike something about someone, consider which aspect of yourself you despise. It’s a great method to learn more about yourself.
• If you know you dislike something about yourself, consider the relationships you have that can be jeopardised just because someone else has or is getting something you don’t. Remember, you could be doing it unconsciously to protect yourself by destroying the connection.
• Make sure that when people around you are achieving goals you’d like to achieve, it drives you to start working with them. Be grateful for your new teammate.
• When others have what you want, try to learn as much as you can from them. You can get a lot of information about how they accomplished it. If they’ve inherited it, make sure you work hard in life so that your children will be able to inherit it as well. Consider whether there are any other ways they can assist you. For instance, if someone you care about has inherited money, they could be possible investors in your business.
• Learn from others who aren’t troubled by the same flaws you are. Find out how they forgave themselves and accepted life as it is.
• In life, understand the difference between standards, expectations, and assumptions.
• To deal with cognitive distortions, practice patience, tolerance, forgiveness, and emotional accounting. If you can battle for something you want, fight for it instead of feeling sorry for yourself. If acquiring it is difficult for some reason, learn to accept it. It could assist you in developing your own particular style
  depending on your flaws.
• If you can’t do it alone, seek assistance. Spirituality, religion, psychotherapy, and a variety of other techniques are available to assist you in developing a greater capacity to love yourself and others. It’s simply not worth it to despise yourself or others.
• Practice the art of compassion. See others as an extension of yourself. If they have something you like, allow yourself to feel good as if you have it too. If they too don’t like something about themselves, put yourself in their shoes and imagine what would you like to hear to appreciate yourself better.

Remember 🙂

Loving others starts with yourself. Since we all know that a world full of love is a better world, why not start with these amazing tips to make the world a better place?

And let Vital Partners help you find your special someone contact us today!