To Love Others, Love Yourself

I record Joyce Meyers every weekday morning and listen to her when I get time throughout the day. It is all part of putting something positive into my head daily. Last week I listened to one of her programs and she was talking about loving ourselves. We can't really love someone else in the way God intended unless we love ourselves first.

It seems at first that there is no problem with people loving themselves. In fact, they seem to love themselves so much that it has indeed become selfishness. I'm not talking about daily needs and providing the things we need, but many of us insist on our own way in everything. Which is neither loving to ourselves or others.

Then there is the opposite side of the coin, where we are constantly sacrificing our wants and needs so that someone else always has and we are always giving. Neither extreme seems to work out long-term.

To truly love the way God intended us to, we have to first have a healthy love of ourselves. We must be patient with ourselves. We must be tolerant of our shortcomings. We must understand that we are not perfect in all areas and we are a continual work in progress. We have good days, we have bad days.

All that applies to others as well. If we are to be patient and kind with our fellow man, we must be patient and kind with ourselves. Negative self-talk is one of our biggest issues. At least for some of us. We tell ourselves how stupid we are, that we are failures; never fully grasping that God made us and he doesn't make substandard things. Perhaps we just aren't fulfilling our intended purpose, so we aren't being utilized to our fullest potential.

We often let others' opinions and comments color how we see ourselves. We mistreat ourselves because we are unable to live with previous wrongs and acts done against us. We self-medicate with drugs and alcohol, we overeat, we overspend, we engage in any number of harmful, destructive behaviors instead of coming to terms with our circumstances and accepting the unconditional love of God into our lives. When we are stuck in those situations, we cannot love others the way we were intended to.

The Bible says to love your neighbor, as you love yourself. What if you are a self-admonishing, conditional lover of your self? If you are flawed in your love of self, what kind of love will you show to your neighbor?

"The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself'.' There is no other commandment greater than these." Mark 12:31

"If you aren't good at loving yourself, you will have a difficult time loving anyone, since you will resent the time and energy you give another person that you aren't even giving to yourself." Barbara De Angelis

Resources

Day 4 - Release The Outcome

Open Bible - Self-Love

Wisdom Quotes - Barbara De Angelis Quote on Love