That's Not Self Love

I should most likely start off by saying that I am an avid believer of face masks, journaling and not letting anyone else in your life treat you like trash.

That being said I think there is something very wrong with the rising obsession with self-love and self care. And it's coming at the cost of our overall wellbeing.

In my opinion self love is kind of like water. Water is essential.

In controlled amounts it can be beautiful, therapeutic and calming. But in overwhelming wild amounts water is destructive, devastating, and dangerous. Too much of anything is a bad thing and this is even true for good things like self love.

Learning to love yourself, completely, as you are is beautiful and so essential for true happiness and growth. But when you try to maximize your love of self to extreme amounts it gives you a “Everyone vs. Me” mentality that isn’t healthy. That’s not real self love.

For instance being able to recognize when someone doesn’t mean you any well and having the courage to end relationships that have proven to not be good for you is healthy. But being so obsorbed in your idea of self love that you end relationships the moment you feel hurt or rejected isn’t healthy. Having an over-inflated sense of self love can cause us to forget that life isn't a movie starring us and the other poeple in our lives aren't supporting roles that we can write our and recast. We’re all humans, some people deserve second chances or at least to be heard out.

Self-reflection is great but sometimes there are things that other see that we never could in ourselves. When you’re so busy trying t un-oranically establish this perfect view of yourself, you become an echo chamber that cannot be corrected, you give up your ability to see that fault in everyone, even yourself. You forget that sometimes the toxic person is you. And not allowing yourself the chance to have healthy, growing relationships is not self love.

Feeling like you can’t be happy for others is not self love. Failing to admit that you have insecurities that you could work through is not self love. Not being able to reconigze that you are a flawed person and sometimes you are at fault is not self love. Convincing yourself that the only person you need is you and that you can have a healthy life without community is not self love.

Please love yourself.

Take yourself on dates. Wear clothes that make you feel confident. Remove people from your life that only mean you harm. Don’t be afraid to go talk to a counselor or therapist if there’s things you need to work through. Challenge yourself to always be a better you. Allow yourself to love and be loved.

Loving yourself is important, but it’s how we’ve loved others that matters the most to us in the end.

I love speaking with elderly people. I grew up taking care of my great uncle until he died and I loved hearing his stories. He had a life well lived and while he enjoyed doing many things alone, he never told me stories about those things. He talked of his best friends and the trouble they used to get into as kids. His high school sweetheart, whom he married young and lost to a heart attack a few years later. He never remarried. He talked of his mom, his sister, my mom when she was younger, fights he had in grade school, the people he had lost, and the love he had found. It’s the way we live and love with others that really leave an impression on us when it’s all said and done.

Real self love is allowing yourself to truly live and to welcome the ups and downs that come with it.

Please love yourself, but not at the expense of being unavailable to love others.