This post is also available in: Español (Spanish)
I find the majority of people manage the term “self-love” very interesting. If you ask people if they love themselves, they always say, “Of course!” Yet, if you ask them to make a list of the people they love the most, 98% of the time you won’t see their own names on that list. Crazy, right?
It is very understandable, though, since self-love is not taught. Actually, a huge number of people think that self-love is an arrogant, selfish way of living. I grew up hearing things like: “I want to find my other half,” or, “I need someone who completes me.” In fact, millions of movies, songs, TV shows, and books make us think that love should be something we give to others in order to receive it. But we tend to underestimate the power of self-love.
When I got married, I totally believed marriage was a 50/50 kind of deal. I had expectations about the way I wanted to receive back the love I was giving. At the beginning, it was easy to meet my expectations. We both were so excited about being together that the 50/50 deal I had in mind was very attainable. I felt so happy making my ex-husband happy that I started competing with myself. Now don’t take this wrong; there is nothing bad about wanting to make your spouse happy. My problem was that I wanted to be the best wife so much that I totally forgot my own self.
I am an extremely competitive person. You don’t want to play UNO with me. Really. But I’m not only competitive with others; I am even worse with myself. I really wanted to keep the title of “best wife ever.” I created an image of “best wife” in my mind, and I worked really hard every day to be that person. Again, there is nothing wrong with wanting to be the best at something, but we need to keep in mind that in order to be the best we need to practice self-love and self-respect ALWAYS.
I was the wife who woke up an hour and half before my husband in order to work out, get ready, and prepare breakfast for him. I promised myself he would never, ever leave the house without eating breakfast and taking lunch with him. I’m not talking about throwing a protein bar at him and claiming I gave him something. I was very serious about it. I prepared a different meal every single day—from scrambled eggs with toast to Venezuelan arepas… you name it. I packed him real meals for lunch that I’d prepared the night before right after making dinner. Yes, I was very committed to feeding him! And that is only one of the million things I did to keep the title of “best wife ever.”
A few days after I asked for a divorce, I was preparing breakfast for myself and I started crying. I wasn’t feeling sad; I was deeply ashamed. I was wondering how in the world I had lost the title I worked so hard to keep. Why, if I was doing every single thing I had listed to be the perfect wife, had I lost it? I had so many questions, and I felt so disappointed in myself. It was a very weird feeling. I felt like I had lost my own competition, and that is a stab right in the self-esteem for a competitive mind like mine.
I was new into meditation at that time, meaning my awareness muscle was very, very weak. So it would take a huge effort for me to get out of the battle with myself. Since day one of my meditation journey I have been using a great app called 10% Happier. I’ve shared a link to it in my Feed your Mind section, so you can take a look later. The app has many different courses, and I decided to explore the Love and Kindness one. Now, I’m not going to lie and tell you that I started loving myself right after I finished the course. What I got from that particular course was the awareness that we should give love and kindness to our own selves first, in order to be able to give them to others.
In fact, even though I was working really hard on my love and kindness meditations, I was still not getting what I needed. Then one day I was listening to a Tony Robbins podcast, and he said, “When we get into an airplane and they give the security talk, they always say that we must put the oxygen mask on ourselves before we can help others. The reason it should be this way is because we can’t help others if we are weak.” What?! I listened to that phrase again and again, for maybe the next five minutes. I was shocked and amazed. I finally got it. I kept repeating to myself, “It’s exactly the same with love and respect. How can I love others if I don’t love myself? How can I respect others if I don’t respect myself?”
My love and kindness meditation started feeling very different after I understood the real meaning of self-love. I have told you before that I lost myself during my marriage. That was my fault, because I saw love as something that you have to give to others in order to receive it. Living life under that rule is like being incarcerated. We have no freedom when we expect love from others instead of giving it to ourselves first. The more we love ourselves, the more we can love others. The more we love ourselves, the more we can feel the love from others.
So I have a little advice for you all: if you want to set your soul free, start practicing self-love! It is the best gift you can give yourself, right next to meditation!
Love,
Irene
