Self-Love Equals Full Love: Lessons Learned From Loving Oneself, Others, and Letting Go.
“My heart was a cloud brimming with rain, Full of the goodness of water. And when we stared at each other, love overflowed. But on the day, we detached and soared the sky, His absence did not leave me feeling empty, I still felt like the brimming cloud I was before.”
What occupies the most significant space in your spirit? Are you full of love, hate, fear, faith, or pain? The most important gift you can give yourself or work towards attaining is the gift of self-love and that should take the centre stage in your spirit. No one can love you on your behalf. It’s a job that only you can do. The love you have for yourself will determine most of your life choices and, consequently, how you love others. When you love yourself, you want absolutely nothing but the best because you see yourself in the most incredible light, and as a result, loving others becomes easier. I only grasped the importance of loving myself in my 20s. Had I known about this earlier in my teens, I would have made better choices in relationships, friendships, and life overall.
My self-love journey began when I decided to take control of my life. I took time out from dating to unpack and heal myself. In parallel, I also started to complete online exercises to help me discover myself. I ventured into my interests, strengths, weaknesses, dreams and hopes, and the more I got to know myself, the more I fell in love with the girl in the mirror. Suddenly, the girl that had lived her life to please others was suddenly living for herself and evolving into a confident woman who embraced her power and uniqueness.
Loving yourself is a continuous journey. You can never fully achieve it all in one go! As you grow and reach new levels, you also face new challenges that need to be dealt with. I am still working on loving myself even more, and the journey does not stop. Neither do I stop pursuing it. It’s a journey of acceptance, acceptance of the past, present, and yourself as an individual as you evolve with each changing season. Simply put, loving yourself requires you to unpack yourself daily.
The beauty of loving others from a place of self-fullness is that you focus on loving the other person, while also actively working on loving yourself daily. By this, I mean you actively continue to pursue your self-love journey instead of being so engrossed in the other person. Your relationship with yourself does not stop just because you’ve met someone. Sometimes it’s harder to strike a balance when one has family and other commitments but setting aside an hour each day for yourself goes a long way.
Though sometimes we love from a place of fullness and give the relationship our best, things can also end one day. Simply put we bump into different kinds of people in life, forming connections, bonds, and friendships that will one-day end. When the cycle of goodbye comes, carry within you all the lessons which you would have learned. Try not to lose yourself. Every goodbye I’ve had has introduced me to something better. Be kind enough to pass on the lessons to someone else because that’s how we empower other people. We are simultaneously drifting into each other’s life like clouds, passing lessons, experiences, and knowledge with each encounter. I honestly can’t think of a better foundation to achieving all of this than from a place of self-love!
