Why Loving Yourself as a Prerequisite For Loving Others Is False

Self Love Doesn’t Have To Start With You

We often hear the catchy phrase, “you can’t love others until you love yourself,” as if the pre-requisite for anything interrelational is understanding oneself first. The problem with this is that it assumes everybody is self-aware enough to truly know themselves, and courageous enough to face their fears and insecurities before undergoing personal change.

I don’t know about you, but facing personal fears has been some of the hardest and most terrifying work I’ve ever done—far scarier than sneaking into any al Qaeda stronghold or bomb facilitator’s house in the middle of the night as a Navy SEAL.

We are all our own worst critics, which is where this premise of first loving oneself before others comes from.

It makes sense on the surface, because how we feel about ourselves is oftentimes projected onto others. For example, someone who’s overly critical of others is probably just as—if not more—critical of themselves.

If you find yourself judging others harshly then chances are you judge yourself the same.

Or, if you were raised to see vulnerability as a weakness then you might avoid acknowledging uncomfortable emotions, which means seeing such emotions in other people triggers negative feelings—perhaps even a trauma response.

So, it seems logical that by changing the affect we have for ourselves we can change that which we hold for others. In other words, we can treat others better as a result of treating ourselves better.

But I call bullshit, and here’s why.

The Truth About Loving Yourself

This “me before you” thinking makes sense and it’s catchy, but the one BIG fallacy here is the notion that love is a one-way street; that I must start with me to get to you.

What if, rather than starting that grueling uphill ascent of learning to love yourself before loving others, you instead practiced giving love (i.e., loving) through existing relationships using compassion, curiosity, and active listening? What happens then?

By being loving toward others, we learn to love. The cause-effect here is how being leads to doing, but more on that in another article.

Anyway, we don’t love ourselves first as a pre-requisite to love others because loving is a vehicle FOR love; it’s what we employ to learn how to love ourselves and others.

It’s certainly a convenient excuse to say “I need to love myself first before I get into any relationship” because it keeps you safe. It avoids further attachment that may be harmful.

But the truth is, loving others unearths hidden vulnerabilities and exposes those inner wounds to the outside world which, in turn, invites the opportunity for healing so you can love yourself.

Loving others is how you learn to love yourself.

4 Ways To Build Self-Love

In the midst of giving love to others,