i used to listen to some spiritual teaching a few years back, dont really remember anything of it anymore but one thought tends to come back to me from time to time and i made it into my little, fraked up, non existent love-life’s philosophy. it goes something like this.
you cant love somebody else until you learn to love yourself because without appreciating your own values and beauty how could you believe that somebody else would love you for those same qualities? loving somebody else without loving yourself is practicly just clinging, a supplementary to our own, missing positivity, grabbing somebody in the hope that they can help us be complete. in such a relationship there are no equal partners, only host and leech. i dont wanna be a fraking leech and i definitely dont want a partner who expects me to be the lesser one, sitting in the corner quietly.
im still working on that “love thyself” part by the way, but for what it worths i definitelly dont want to be in a relationship just so i can be in a relationship. of course, i have been alone in the last three years, so what do i know?! lol 😀
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“you cant love somebody else until you learn to love yourself” – i’ve always loved and appreciated this quote. maybe because i haven’t followed it yet. good luck in your quest.
I’ve never liked that particular quote. It doesn’t hold up under scrutiny, and worse, enables sort of blocking mechanism in which the person who struggles with wishing for impossible changes to the self, can be falsely justified as being disqualified or undeserving of receiving love.
It’s really more of a selection mechanism. It feels very similar to “blame the victim.” Some people have flaws they can’t change about themselves, and they know these cause problems, and they despise the flaws, for causing those problems, as well as the inability to change them. And further, they are then told that they “cannot love someone else,” because there is something wrong with them.
I assure you, even the most flawed people can love someone else, even while being totally displeased with themselves. It’s just another one of those stupid platitudes that people parrot, instead of bothering to really think about things. It’s a short cut to an incorrect view. It’s a cop out. It’s just a way to justify an excuse to reject someone you see as flawed.
I fucking hate that phrase (and so many others like it).
Plus, how in the hell can anyone else presume to tell me whether or not i love myself, and what i am allowed to do, based on that, which they cannot possibly know? You can’t decide for me whether i do or don’t. Anyone who truly believes they can, is full of shit. The only way you might think you can, is because you’re judging by some arbitrary aesthetic, which is entirely subjective.
You can’t know whether i love myself, just by looking at me, or just by me saying i disagree with something you believe. Maybe i’m just having a hard time? Maybe you’re just wrong about something, and i’m just right?
I think there is “some truth” to the phrase, but it is wildly misunderstood, misappropriated, and twisted, in the minds of those who most frequently resort to parroting it as an excuse to deny someone.
well, yeah. the quote i actually like is: “love yourself, and you will start loving everything else too” (or something like that). but then i was in lazy mood and thought of simply copy-pasting.
there is something funny about that quote that i’ve learned the hard way over time… usually the people that loves themselves and know all they can do and acomplish tend to be more independent and prone to leaving the weaker one… even in hardship moments, even if the weaker one loves himself as well but is just having a bad period… i believe they do that because they know “their worth” and won’t waste it on someone who has issues… on the other hand people that are usually seen has incapable of loving themselves seem to work more on supporting others and sticking when things are tough… i know it’s not always like that, but i’ve seen it happen more than one time (it has happened to me as well)