Self Love

My journey into self love has been life changing.

It began with being made to realize that I was bestowing the kind of love, care, attention and benevolence I’ve always craved, on people I love, as an attempt in satisfying my own need for affection. That’s what I learnt growing up, to go out of your way to help people who have not had your advantages in life. “Be generous with your time and energy”, they said.

I might be famished by the time I get to the tenth person and still be wondering why I keep getting hungrier. Which then begs the question as to how can I ever hope to have a full stomach if every time I am hungry, I feed a loved one? The answer is likely rooted in my belief that, “love begets love”; but that led me to become emotionally depleted.

I received this feedback when I shared my thoughts, and that finally got me unstuck —

You are just desperate for company, love and for your loneliness to go away so you give a lot of what you need because that’s your perspective, and you give it because you think that’s what everyone needs too
But you don’t get it back
Because the truth is that’s not what everyone needs
Or wants

Wow, time to reevaluate my beliefs and the saying, “Do unto others…”. What am I doing unto myself? Everything in excess is poison, even giving of myself to the point that my emotional investment breaks my bank when I feel it has not earned me so much as positive inter-personal relationships, let alone appreciation or kindness. The emotional starvation albeit coupled with the satiation of fulfilment from having been kind is not sustainable. In that regard, I decided to do —

  • only that which makes me feel good about myself
    Reducing investing in people, especially those that don’t bring value to my life, and housekeeping the mean-spirited that bring me down.
  • in only as much measure as I can emotionally afford
    Not over-stretching myself in time, effort and money as these are all means of getting emotionally invested. It’s easier investing from my emotional petty cash followed up with deleting the transaction details, such as the “send and forget” strategy I use for e-mail (viz. deleting the message from my sent mail so I forget having sent it before it gets committed to long-term memory) . I’m not expecting one to be beholden to me in any event, but it eliminates the anticipation of common decency which I might never get, and can thus move on with my life.
  • unto myself as I would do unto others
    Which is, to protect, nurture and pay heed to the needs of my inner child like a loving, caring, affectionate and doting parent.

Which then begs the question, is that the right thing to do? My go to is this blog post from which I have derived that right and wrong are societal constructs whose definitions are constantly changing, so I am not afraid or embarrassed to follow my internal compass. When I brought this up, I was asked with good reason, “But isn’t embarrassment a reflection of social constructs, rather than good or bad?” Fortunately I’m privileged enough to be a free spirit.

So armed with recent beliefs that —

  • doing what pleases me seems to be the only “right” thing to do, if my other beliefs are true that
  • the purpose of life is to be happy, considering
  • life is random and
  • the only consequences in life are those that we wittingly or unwittingly bring upon ourselves through our exercise of our power of choice,

I have decided to not be collateral damage in another person’s story.

You may be justified in feeling hard done by, especially if you have done things for others that don’t seem appreciated, but don’t waste time brooding about it. You are captain of your ship of fate, so it’s your responsibility if you’ve been sailing off course.

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