“You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection.” ~Buddha
A popular topic in the glossy magazines, learning to “love yourself” always seemed to me to be a self-indulgent first-world pastime.
It seemed obvious that the commonly-repeated mantra “love yourself first” was just a sign of the times in a world where something like half of all marriages end in divorce. When I dug a little deeper I often found either a list of new spa treatments or a litany of new age catchphrases.
All meaningless – that is until a series of failed relationships taught me the hard way why you have to love yourself first.
I had always walked into relationships from the standpoint of something I needed or wanted. I wanted to feel valued and loved. I needed to feel that my struggles had meaning, and I found this in external validation. I craved for someone to stand by me and tell me that I was worth it.
In my extremely busy and fast-paced life, I was surrounded by people so very lonely, starved of meaningful connections in a world of transactional relationships. Always the alpha-male, I craved a safe space where I could lower my defenses and be affectionate. A relationship became my way of getting what I thought I needed.
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