Do You Love Yourself?

Lately I've been encountering people who, for some reason or other, have low self-esteem. Many of them are absolutely wonderful, but they can only see their flaws. Newsflash: We all have flaws. None of us is perfect. Plus perfection is actually rather boring. Looking at myself objectively, I think my belly is too flabby and that my thighs are too fat, but those are just two minor parts of a whole person. When you look at those things in conjunction with the rest of me, I'm not half bad ;-).

A friend of mine has someone in her life that she cares about, but he treats her badly. He's selfish and rude. She did him a huge favor, and when I say huge, I mean life-altering. In return he can't even be bothered to treat her with decency. Her life would be exponentially better if she cut ties with him, but she won't. I asked her if she loved him more than she loves herself. Without hesitation she said "Yes". She believes that his life is worth so much more than hers. When are people going to understand that every human life is valuable? I have a major problem with these assholes that go around killing innocent people because they're pissed off about something or depressed. If you're messed up, don't be trying to take other people with you. Although I feel every human life is important, if someone wants to die, that's on them, not me. It's not necessary or fair to take innocent people's lives.

Although it took me a while to come around to this way of thinking, I do love myself. My love for myself has less to do with how I look and more to do with how I feel. Right now I have a really good life, a part of which I spend letting other people know just how special I think they are. The things I say to them aren't empty flattery because I feel there's no point in lying to people in that way. If I see something about you that I like or that I think is noteworthy, I'm going to tell you. Most of the time I get the response "You're so nice". Yes, I'm a nice person, but I'm not saying it to be nice. I am being completely and totally honest. If there's good in you (which there is in most of us) I will be able to see it. Some of you try to hide it underneath a gruff exterior, but I can see right through it :-).

For those of you that are having a hard time loving yourself, remember this. It's a cliche, but cliches exist because they're based in truth. Until you love yourself, it's not possible for you to truly love someone else. It's not possible to let another person see who you truly are unless you love yourself. My ex-boyfriend said that I never let him in. There's truth to that statement. Because I wasn't comfortable with myself, I wasn't comfortable letting him see all of me. That's just one of a myriad of reasons why things didn't work out between us.