I’m sure most of you out here are already familiar with the classic immortal song by Whitney Houston with the line”… learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all.” Last Christmas season, it was the time of celebrating and gift giving. But have you ever thought that probably the best person to give a gift to is probably yourself? Yes, I will suggest that you should love yourself since it is the best gift you can give yourself.
Remember, it’s been said that you can’t give what you don’t have. To love yourself is not being conceited or being self-centered. Now, this is a constant misconception most of us have. Loving yourself is, in fact, all about embracing and accepting yourself for all that you are, despite your faults, failures, and imperfections.
Nobody is perfect and we all make mistakes one time or another and we should deal with that. It’s your self-awareness that makes you tolerant of yourself that you are an entirely distinct and one-of-a-kind human being created for all that you are and you have a purpose in this universe.
Your mere acceptance of yourself is strengthening. At the same time, it can prove to be validating since you acknowledge that you can always improve. Also, to love yourself means doing away with those unnecessary and poor comparisons of ourselves with other people. I know most of us are guilty of this, comparing ourselves with others—yet we must put an end to this once and for all as it will just lower our self-esteem.
Ask yourself, if we try to compare ourselves to anybody else, what can we get or benefit from this? Not only can this weaken our self-image and diminish our greatest qualities and assets, but it also makes us seem as if we’re inferior to others and we have to live up to their standards.
It’s useless, actually—why do we have to be like other people if we can only be ourselves, right? Self-esteem and regard for others are only a few of the characteristics associated with those who genuinely enjoy and appreciate themselves. Not to mention being generous and giving in spirit and in deeds.
Self-harm and self-destruction are most emphatically not characteristics of self-love. Of course, gift giving is a sign of love and almost all of us care for or adore other people, especially those dear to our hearts, but that’s not to say that it’s the only degree of our affection.
We must first learn to love ourselves before we can love others. Before you help others, take care of yourself first. It makes sense in such a way that it is hard to help other individuals if we ourselves are also in dire need of aid or assistance? Some of us have our own vision or perception of what loving is.
Most of us say or tell us what love is and how to be loved in return. But then again, we choose to decide about these things because we also have our own way of thinking regarding different matters, especially how to love ourselves.