Learning to love yourself.

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Hi,

I've been feeling to put the following thoughts down in words for a while so here it is.

Like many of the posters on here, I have felt pain arising from feeling incapable of having the skills to find a partner. Perhaps the greatest pain has arisen from the thought that I will never find a woman who 'loves' me for who I am. A major change has happened which has made me realize the inherently false and damaging nature of this thinking...
I have had two long term relationships before. But they were both with women who, it turned out, were suffering from fairly severe emotional pain issues. I believe they were drawn to me as aspects of my character (dependability amongst other things) represented to them an available source of security and refuge. Almost without conciously realising it they believed they had found someone who would never leave them no matter what they did. When their behavior started to prove problematic I realized it was damaging for all parties to continue with the relationship. I was not helping them by providing a refuge from their pain and their behavior was not always healthy for me to be around either.
It was hard to acknowledge at first that they didn't really value 'me' but rather the security that my reliability and character offered.
At the times I got into these relationships I was perhaps overwhelmed that an attractive female was expressing an interest in me and so just dived right in without getting to know them. My experience of being with them was pretty challenging at times and led to a lot of suffering. However in hindsight I am very glad to have been through this experience
These relationships have shown me that I was guided to them through reacting to the feeling of desperation of wanting another, and so just jumped into a relationship with the first person that expressed an interest. They showed me that I was partly responsible for getting involved with people who were psychically damaged and having to deal with the realities of that type of relationship. I realised that it wasn't just them who had issues, it was me too. These relationships showed me how superficial the mentally produced concept of 'love' can be when we confuse this term with the process of attaching to the first person who comes along and shows an interest. Far from being 'love' it strikes me as being almost an impersonal addiction to just have somebody or anybody. It devalues the beauty inherent within each being. In the same way that these women wanted security, I wanted something from them. We were both using each other. It is important to note that at most points during the relationships I truely thought I was 'in love' and I have no doubt they believed they were 'in love' with me too.
I realized that the narrative which my mind produced on the subject of finding another is is all about 'me'. Thoughts like: 'why can't I find someone who loves me', 'why does no one love me', 'why was I born like this'. Ultimately these thought processes all re-enforce an ego-centric view of the world. And from this place of 'poor me' you search for someone to make it better. And of course they can't. Because underlying the very fabric of any relationship which is based in a reaction to desperation, will be insecurities, fears and doubts that drove you to seek solace in another person in the first place. These demons will gradually attack any prospect of a harmonious relationship and can manifest in so many ways such as: jealousy, envy, fear, possessiveness, obsessiveness and the list goes on. The mind will identify possible threats to the security that the other person temporarily creates. Or as in some cases, they may not stand up to the picture you created of them. You may have idolized them, telling yourself they were the greatest, only to discover later with an unpleasant shock that they had a lot of issues. And then you have to deal with this.
I know this from experience and I have seen the sort of relationships it produces: they are painful.
So what is the alternative to this situation I have described? Well I think it lies in learning to love ourselves for who we are. Part of this is learning to come into acceptance of the pain that we will feel of not having someone. To do this, we have to bring our conscious awareness to that feeling of pain and learn to feel it for what it is. When we are able to do this, we introduce an element of consciousness and objectivity that means we can choose to stop feeding the pain with our thoughts and stop unconciously reacting to this pain by running for the first person who shows an interest. So we can stop ourselves from feeding the unconcious constant thought process of: 'why haven't I got anyone...' and the like. When we stop feeding these negative emotions, we will start to feel less suffering and begin to accept any feelings of pain. So the pain won't necessarily stop its just that we are no longer reacting to it. It is as it is. It will not act as a fuel for more pain or as something we might react to hastily creating yet more suffering for ourselves. This requires conciously focusing on what the mind is thinking and not becoming identified with it. Instead you become the watcher of your mind. For more on this I thoroughly recommend reading Eckhart Tolle's: The Power of Now (or check Youtube for videos).
By learning to accept ourselves for who we are, I believe that we can reach a stage where we no longer 'need' another person to make ourselves feel whole. This is the moment it can be said that you love yourself. Not in the vain sense In the real sense. You have accepted yourself as you are. You are not trying to add to yourself. When we no longer reacting to that thought or feeling that we need some else to be happy, it no longer matters whether you are with someone or not. That is not to say the option of being with another might not be attractive, indeed it might well be. But the difference is that there is no longer a desperation of self seeking there: 'I need someone'. It is our unconcious tendency to feed this craving continuously with our thoughts that generates so much pain.
Whilst I have come to the above conclusions and realised the truth in them, everyday is a challenge to put them into practice. This involves trying to be aware when pain arises. I might meet an attractive woman and my mind might say: 'you're too weird for her', 'you're not good enough'. By listening to this thought and not feeding it with other thoughts, I can accept the situation. And the more I continue to do this, the easier I feel about the idea of being alone. Who knows: I might meet someone who I have a mutual bond with, but if I continue to be mindful, my happiness won't depend on it.
All this being said, if I am unable to do what I have just said, I might end up back in a destructive relationship or feeling miserable on my own. And the benefit of this is, that sooner or later this pain will be the thing to make me see the light again. That is why there is a benefit to destructive relationships and deep lonliness. They help to point us towards the light.

Thanks for posting such an insightful piece