When you couldn't love yourself....

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“To say ‘I love you’ one must know first how to say the ‘I.’” – same author responsible for my signature

I agree with Marshall.

A lot of opeople say the advice of 'don't worry about looking for love, just focus on your own life and your own things/love yourself first' or whatever other rubbish.

I disagree with it.

Put it this way: It's lonely at the top.

Truth is doing other things with your life is just what I would like to call a 'temporary distraction' to a long term problem.

For example, you might decide instead of moping about being depressed, you take-up a new hobby/interest.

You might enjoy this hobby and this brings you happiness, you might even learn to be extremely skilled at it, but, again, it's just a temporary distraction to a long-term problem - your loneliness.

Taking up a hobby/interest isn't going to cure your loneliness.

In somecases it might, but it REALLY depends on the hobby/interest.

It is a myth that you will instantaneously meet like-minded individuals who share your passion - not every hobby/interest is common, many are obscure/non-mainstream and many don't involve meeting other people at all.

Sure sports and reading are good ones because you can join a club/group but if your hobby is philosophy and you want real-life friendships/relationships (not online) what hope is there for you? The internet might be your only chance (and yes this is coming from someone interested in philosophy).

Anyway, and if you stop focusing on seeking love/friendships but only focus on your goals in life, what good will that bring you?

I could be a six-figure earning psychologist, and independent musician, writer and actor in my free-time, along with being in good physical and mental health (which is basically some of my dreams/goals for life) but will it cure my loneliness? Well no, not at all if I have no friends and no relationship. And this is coming from an extremely ambitious-minded person - your goals/aspirations do not take priority over your personal relationships, rather they are equal - the people in your life are just as important as the things in your life.

Like I said, it's lonely at the top.

At the same time, I also believe you can be happy without a relationship, anf you don't need love to be happy, and I am capable of doing this plenty of the time, but at the same time no, it's impossible to not feel lonely if you are just that - lonely.

I can say with confidence that I am generally happy. But I do still feel loneliness and other negative emotions a lot.

It's good to see many different perspectives here. I respect you guys' views a lot.

And as I've gone through different experiences from yours, you guys wouldn't be surprised if my thoughts aren't down with you.

In the past, my kind and caring personality caused some acquaintances to misunderstand that I liked them romantically and I happened to hurt them unintentionally, and these feelings of me hurting them gave me suffers and some of them still haunt me at times.

Now that I voluntarily choose to be alone, I feel I have inner peace in most circumstances. Being in a relationship can be a good medicine only to someone who really need it. For me I'd rather need solitude to recover from the bad experience in the past. Knowing what I need in this moment is one way of respecting myself as well.

I also appreciate the various perspectives posted thus far and I like the diversity of thought. I honestly believe that "loving yourself" is really watered-down BS like a few of you have mentioned. What it means to me is lazy shorthand for the related concepts of "self-trust" and "self-acceptance": having faith in your abilities and being accountable and cognizant of your flaws. Nobody is perfect, yet the whole "loving yourself" BS makes it seem like you have to delude yourself into an insular, narcissistic self-image. I do not agree with that. Rather, we must work to recognize and work on our shortcomings, realizing that we cannot completely overcome them.

As far as relationships go, my perspective is to find the people that make you happy. It sounds so insipid and I have tried to take the concept pretty literally: when a relationship/friendship is not working out, I leave because I would rather be alone than miserable with someone else.

Also, I also have moderate depression and so I understand not wanting to do anything or knowing that a hobby is just a temporary reprieve from experiencing loneliness. Obviously, I am not everyone and I guess the only advice I would give is accept that your "fun" will be transient. That, and I firmly believe in accepting loneliness rather than fighting it. I remember reading one of Sartre's essays and he basically said that we must accept loneliness because we all live and die as independent entities. Personally, I appreciate solitude and I understand that we all have individual tolerances for how much "alone time" we can tolerate before we get lonely.

But suppose somebody actually gives a shit--and you don't know it?

Let me emphasize: I'm not on the "love thyself" bandwagon. I like myself okay most of the time; it is rare when I like myself quite a bit. There are times when I really dislike myself.