On Loving Someone When You Don’t Love Yourself

As someone who avidly reads self-help books and articles in hope that it will make me “better,” I’ve thought a lot about love and how that ties into being or even becoming a better version of yourself.

A lot of people say, and truly believe, that you must love yourself before loving someone else, and I don’t accept that. You can be unhappy with who you are and fall in love with someone even when you think they deserve better than you.

Hating yourself and falling in love with someone are irrelevant to each other until it’s relevant. Let me explain: When you love yourself, you are more inclined to be happier in all aspects of life. If you love yourself, you will probably have a healthier relationship. Loving yourself only makes the journey easier.

You can easily love someone else and not be in love with YOU, but there’s a catch. There will come a point where your own insecurities will start to affect your relationship. You will have trust issues because you’ll firmly believe your significant other will find someone better, you’ll be shy because you’ll be afraid that who you really are will scare them away, and small fights will seem worse because you’re already fighting within yourself. I said it was possible, not easy.

I find it hard to believe that anyone ever truly does love themselves the way they tell themselves they do. I think we’ll always see our own flaws for what they are and that stops us from achieving this level of self-love that influencers preach. I don’t think we’ll ever love every piece of ourselves.

The secret is turning the love and happiness you feel and radiating that heat within yourself. Love the person that your partner has come to love. Appreciate the person you are and have become and be proud of that. Let that be enough to show you you’re worth it.