Why is self love so difficult?
Love Yourself, and it doesn’t matter who you marry
One of the most common grievances or complaints in 30 years of relationship counselling is the belief that a partner has stopped loving or caring for us. This leans into one of the biggest mistakes in relationships, which is the belief that is the job of our partners to love us unconditionally. We assume that if they live with us or marry us then they are automatically supposed to love us. Once you think about it more deeply you ask the obvious question, which is in all honesty how capable are they of loving others unconditionally? Then the next question would be, how can we expect others to do for us what we are not doing for ourselves?
Our ability to like ourselves never mind love ourselves is the biggest issue we face throughout our lives, and the most important life journey should be a journey of self-love. The purpose of having a relationship is not to find someone to fulfill our needs but for us to learn to give love and to receive love. If we lose sight of this the relationship becomes about taking from our partners, and then stormy waters lie ahead and the rocks of life can be our final destination.
However the journey to a place of loving ourselves is not an easy one and requires both courage and honesty, and first we need to give up our denial and take a step into accountability. The initial voice we often hear is the voice that tells us not to look inwards because if we do we will open a pandora’s box to pain, dysfunction and self-loathing and that step into self-examination has most of us draw up the covers. Unfortunately, denial is not effective at distancing ourselves from our self-beliefs because then we project or transfer those self-beliefs onto the people and the world around us which only results in our withdrawal or attack on our world with an increasing loss of self-esteem.
We must learn to reverse this process, starting with our willingness to research and examine each negative belief we hold about ourselves because if we do we slowly recognize that these beliefs are not the truth. Unpicking any destructive unloving thoughts and beliefs is not a logical theoretical journey but an emotional heart felt journey. We need to be able to communicate about these thoughts and feelings because that is always the first step in transformation and if you cannot talk about it then you will not be able to change it. This is the power of a loving and caring relationship, that you can communicate about your dark side with your partner or friend.
As we dig deeper and start to understand the truth of who we are we start finding the gold that is us. Once we truly begin to know ourselves and to fully understand who we really are we see that we have all overcome massive challenges just to be here now. To be conceived we swam the equivalent of the Atlantic Ocean, and we have attained many others impressive goals. As we go further and further into our true nature at some point we discover that our essence is love; that we came from love and we will always be love. Once this becomes our reality then we will understand we are here to share that reality with everyone we meet. And have the courage to allow ourselves to be loved.
“Be healthy and take care of yourself, and be happy with the beautiful things that make you, you.” – Beyonce
With love,
Sue and Jeff
How to Feel Wanted – Guided meditation
These negative feelings that we harbour towards ourselves can manifest in many ways, one of which can be feeling as though the people in our lives don’t want us around. Despite being told that we are loved and wanted we can’t seem to accept it as truth.
No matter how many times our partner or our friends reassure us, we will never truly feel wanted until we heal the original source of feeling unwanted. And we are the only ones who can achieve this, no amount of outside validation will heal the fractures within us.
Guided by Jeff Allen this 10 minute meditation will take you on a a journey through the corridors of your mind.
Delve into your psyche to locate the source of feeling unwanted, and transform and heal this pain so that only light and acceptance remains.