What does Self-Love mean to me?

I had a lot of myths of what self-love is. I thought self-love meant that I would like and love myself all the time. I wouldn’t have a negative thought about myself or I wouldn’t beat up on myself. I craved to feel good about me. Ironically my “self” love was very outer based. Based on things I could not control, circumstances, and other people.  I would receive approval or outer validation but it was temporary. It was a perfectionistic view of self-love that did not account for reality.  Because as life would have it, I would make a mistake and then that love, approval or validation was withheld. Or because of illness I was not able to “DO” all I wanted to do and then I felt I was not valuable without DOING.

One of the reasons I am a self-help junkie is because I thought if I just worked hard enough on “improving” myself enough then I would be worthy of love.  If I read enough I would somehow only mess up 1% of the time and do perfectly the other 99%. As you can imagine, setting such an unrealistic and unreasonable goal drained me. I constantly felt inadequate and discontent because there was always somewhere else I needed to be. 

I thought I could only love me as much as others loved me. The truth about self-love is that I can love others only as much as I love me. Self-love I have learned is not about just the pretty things, acknowledging the good I have done or giving myself rest, doing things that I love and feel authentic to me. 

Unconditional self-love at it’s core, at least for me, is about the undesirable, the challenging, the parts I don’t want people to see. It’s about not abandoning myself or keeping the undesirable parts of me in a closet, separate from the rest of me. It is owning the parts of me that are selfish, judgmental, lazy, scared, jealous, easily offended, the part of me that worried way too much over what others thought, thinking everything is my fault, thinking I am a failure, thinking I am not enough. 

It was about loving the parts of me I devalued. The part of me that struggles with the “Invisibles”. What are the "Invisibles"? They are fibromyalgia, panic attacks, psychogenic seizures, depression, and anxiety. Things that people can’t see. Things that have been minimized. 

A dear friend of mine took her life because of her struggle with mental illness. What tore my heart was that not everyone could understand her pain. Who hasn’t had thoughts of giving up on life? But through her tragedy I saw the other side of that choice. The pain that it leaves those who love her to carry. Her passing gave me a reality check. It put me on high alert to the lies that depression can scream in my ear at my lowest point. It helped me to see if I did not learn to love these undesirable parts that make up who I am as a whole. Then I too could be a victim of the lie that depression tells that I am not worth life. 

It also taught me that in the pain I can find the lesson and opportunity for growth. In this instance a huge motivator to love myself. My son is also my greatest teacher and motivator to be the best I can be. I want to give him an example of how to love himself. Amazingly he taught me that by loving him I can see the definition of unconditional love in action. As a toddler, when he acts out, or has a hard time, I see how I apply compassion to him. I don’t define him by his outbursts or difficult moments. I see the smile, the beauty of who he is despite the challenges. 

So unconditional self-love for me is not about loving me when it is easy, when I get it right, when I meet my goals. It’s loving me STILL despite the mistakes, the struggles, the less than desirable circumstances.

CompassionatelyMe