UNTIL LOVE FINDS YOU | FALL IN LOVE WITH YOURSELF!

Are you in love with yourself?

“Yes”, you say. But pause. Be honest. Do you truly love yourself?

Do you love everything about yourself, physically, from head to toe? Your career? Your finances? Your body? Your hair? Your breath? Your ears, forehead, nose, lips, teeth? Your life as it is now? What have you done today to prove this? What did you do two days ago that shows that you love yourself?

So, I ask again, dear girl, are you in love with yourself? The answer is that a lot of us aren’t.

Again, a story.

In my old self and mindset, which was basic, with a low self-esteem and highly insecure, I dated a guy that I knew I shouldn’t have. I decided to break up with him. It wasn’t easy for me to do because I was needy and over-reliant on him to feed my self-esteem. He tried to convince me to stay and I almost changed my mind. But one day, he asked me “what if I am the last guy who will ever truly love you” and that was when the wire in my head snapped!

This guy believed he was the best I could do in life and must’ve thought I was so unlovable that love wasn’t going to find me if I walked away from him. I moved on with the speed of lightning. I knew I was struggling with loving myself, but that question jolted me out of my madness.

I have been at stages where I did not love myself. I did not even know what it looked like to love me. Because of that, I could not tell when someone was selling me fake love, neither could I tell when someone was loving me the right way. I guess it made it difficult for people to love me authentically.

The saddest part is that I did not know I did not love myself. It took several heart-breaking experiences for me to finally be real with myself. I knew where it was coming from and I knew that I had the power to change it so I changed it! I began loving myself and everything about me.

You may look at me and wonder what there was about me that could make me not love myself. Don’t be deceived, darling, everyone has that. But those who overcome these insecurities and embrace themselves unconditionally are the ones who attain a certain kind of fulfilment in life.  

Let’s find the biblical backing for this. As part of the 10 commandments God gave to the Israelites, He said:

Love your neighbour as you love yourself.

If God thought self-love was evil, I think He would say it. After all, who is He afraid of? Instead, He used the amount of love you have for yourself as the standard of love you should show to the next person. 

But in a world full of unsatisfied, insecure, fearful, anxious and jealous people, do you realise how very little love would be going around? People barely love themselves and if they had to show that same love to others, others will only experience pain.

So, God looked on earth and realised human beings did not even love themselves much. Satan had done well to fill minds with self-doubt, fear, anxiety, worry, discontentment and so much evil. Because God created humans with an in-built system to multiply (in every way) and cover the earth, all the evil listed multiplied through man to corrupt the earth.

God decided to fix it. He came down to earth, replaced the previous command with a higher one:

Love your neighbour as I have loved you. Then He went ahead to demonstrate His love by dying on the cross. 

Jesus was saying, “Look guys, you missed the correct standard. What you have for yourself is not the right measure of love. Look at what I am doing for you, hanging on the cross. That is how much you should love yourself, because I love you so. And that is how much you should love your neighbour.”

Did you notice that Jesus used to go pray early in the morning every day? It’s in your Bible. What do you think that was? Certainly not for show. Jesus was taking care of His spirit because He found himself in a human body. That was self-care. If He was going to stand before the multitudes, to multiply bread and fish, change water into wine, walk on the sea, etc, He could not pour out what He did not have. He had to fill Himself with power, to release power.

And that is the basis for self-love. It is not selfishness, girl. It is you accepting that you can never give what you don’t have.

YOU CAN NEVER GIVE WHAT YOU DON’T HAVE!

Why did Peter say “silver or gold have I none, but such as I have, I give to thee”? Principles of nature! An empty cup cannot suddenly produce hot chocolate unless you deliberately fill it with hot chocolate.

You, child of God, cannot give out love, unless you fill yourself with love. And how best can you do this, except by loving yourself the way God loves you!

Some of you have never known true love from your family. Some of you cannot identify healthy love even if it shouts your name from across the street. You are broken. Hurt. Dissatisfied. Insecure. Maybe you grew up in a verbally abusive home, so your body isn’t used to gentle and loving talk. Maybe you grew up in a place with no warmth or happiness, so your entire being is allergic to sweet, sweet love.

And that is why you keep choosing the wrong men to give your attention to. That is why you keep giving them access to your energy, time, money and your body. As I always say, I understand you more than you think, because I have had these experiences too.

If you love yourself:

You will prioritise yourself. And then you will understand how to love others.

You will set boundaries and insist on them.

You will eat well and drink water.

You will get rid of negativity around you and the negative mindset from inside you.

You will prioritise finding your purpose on earth and completing what your heavenly father sent you here to do. (There is a blog post on this here)

You won’t stay in an emotionally abusive relationship.

You won’t stay in a verbally abusive relationship.

You won’t sit a minute in a physically abusive relationship.

You will accept yourself, warts and all, with no negative vibes.

You won’t fall for “I love you” with no matching actions.

You will not be desperate to marry just anybody.

You will not sell yourself short.

You will find your purpose and choose a man who fits into it.

You will have standards and not feel ashamed for it.

You will invest in yourself.

You will spend time with yourself, to know yourself. (You have no business going about trying to know someone’s son when you barely know your own self.)

You will invest a lot of prayer into your life and destiny.

You will stop making excuses, get out of bed and chase your dreams.

You will prioritise your happiness.

Self-love does not mean you won’t make sacrifices for others. The highest exhibition of love was a sacrifice by Jesus. It does not mean you won’t give. Self-love is not selfish. It is simply filling your cup so that you can pour. And making sure your cup is never empty because you cannot love others when you are depleted. You cannot love if you do not know for yourself what love feels like.

THE ONLY THING AN EMPTY CUP CAN GIVE IS EMPTINESS.

Has it sunk in yet? This is a revelation you should pray for. There must be a mental shift of who you are and what you are supposed to be in life. Ask God to help you understand what loving yourself truly means so that you don’t get it wrong. Not understanding why you should love yourself, is an insult to God. Because you are telling Him that you were not worth His time, and sacrifice.

Have you genuinely liked someone, anyone, and watched them self-sabotage no matter how hard you tried to help them? They never believe in themselves and don’t believe you care for them? How did you feel? Yeah, that is how God feels when we cannot accept His love and love ourselves.

Fall in love with yourself! Fall in love with your life. Be a student of yourself. You cannot be a suitable helpmate if you don’t know what you can offer. Experience chemistry with yourself and woo yourself.

Discover what makes you tick. Discover your talents, what makes you valuable to the environment. Take yourself out on dates. Discover what you enjoy and what you don’t. This way, when a man comes along and isn’t loving you right, you won’t hang around for a minute! And the one who truly loves you the right way will work hard for you.

Serenade yourself. Be your own cheerleader. Fall in love with your damn self, girl! Jesus loved you enough to pour out His blood for you. Do you not realise how valuable your soul is?

Create happiness for yourself. When you are overflowing with all this love, you can easily fill others with it, without you becoming bitter.

The man you are dreaming of to come and make you happy is most likely not happy himself and doesn’t know how to make himself happy. He is expecting you to make him happy. You are your own happiness, girl.

DON’T EXPECT A MAN TO LOVE YOU IF YOU DON’T LOVE YOU.

You attract what you portray. Whatever love you desire from a man is something you should already be giving to yourself before he comes along. That way, you will show up to enjoy companionship. You won’t fatigue that relationship with neediness, and emptiness.

The same goes for the men, ladies. Don’t go catching butterflies for a man who does not love himself! Love yourself enough to walk away from a relationship that isn’t serving you. If the man in your life makes you feel like he is doing you a favour by being in a relationship with you, leave. God does not make us feel like He did us a favour, even though He did do us a huge favour. Love does not puff up itself. 

So, before you start dating and carrying your insecurities into a relationship, it is time to fix not loving you. The power is in your hands. 

Feel free to reach out to me if you need some help on your self-love journey.

Yours-Currently-In-Love-With-Herself😘