157. “Love yourself” they say, but how do you do that?

At this stage of life, in senior and mature dating, many of us know that when we expect someone else to love us and make us happy we’re always a victim. I’ve read personal ads online that say, “I want someone who will make me feel special and adored and loved.” But when we’re looking to someone else to do the job of making us feel loved aren’t we giving them an awfully big job? When they don’t succeed we get hurt and angry. When they love us according to what love looks like to us we feel great. Either way, though, we’re always reliant on them to provide our happiness. Not a good place to be.

Many relationship experts say, “Don’t rely on others, love yourself.” They’re nice words and they sound warm and fuzzy. But what do they really mean? How do we do it? Do we go out and get more massages, more new clothes, take more cruises or seek more sex? Lately there’s more research being published about what most of us have seen in our lives already – that acquiring more things, people and experiences doesn’t make for lasting happiness. Experientially we know this, yet we don’t know what else to do so we keep looking for the next thing that’ll help us feel loved and happy.

There’s nothing wrong with newness in our lives. In fact, life is always changing so it’s always new. But when we’re attached to something new, and think it will make us feel happy and loved, we’re lost. So what’s the answer? Here’s the key the ancients have been sharing for centuries, and I’ve seen in my own life: We don’t love ourselves by getting more. We love ourselves by giving something away – our false thoughts and beliefs.

For example, we believe that having a partner in our lives will give us love and happiness. But is that true? Is it ever possible that someone else can make us happy or cause us to suffer emotionally? It’s only what we think about their words or behavior that can make us happy or sad. Let’s say a couple is at a party. The woman has a nice conversation with another man. Her date may feel jealous and miserable. Another guy in the same situation, however, feels at ease and pleased, knowing his friend is engrossed in interesting conversation she enjoys. Does the conversation cause the pain, or is it the interpretation by each guy? Is it the woman who makes him happy or sad, or is it his own insecurities and therefore his own interpretations of what that means?

When we feel another person can give us the love we seek, we’ve automatically put ourselves in the position of seeking and searching. There’s no happiness in that because while we’re seeking we’re also feeling, “I’m not happy now but I will be when I get what I want.” One East Indian sage used to tell his students, “To crave is to slave.” Another way of saying that is this: Seeking is suffering. It’s stressful, we’re continually reminding ourselves we’re not happy, and even when we get the object of our desires we know from experience that the joy lasts only a short time.

So what’s the answer? How do we love ourselves? How can we be happy? If we see that “getting” hasn’t brought any lasting happiness let’s look and see when we actually are happy. Isn’t it in those times when we’re not looking for anything, not searching and seeking? It might be while watching a sunrise, or when we’re contentedly engrossed in a good book or a project we’re working on. Or the moments when we’re fully engaged in playing with the dog or holding a cooing baby. In those moments when we’re just totally lost in life as it is we later notice we were totally happy, not needing love, not needing anything.

With a little investigation you’ll see that exactly the same thing applies to getting something we’ve wanted – whether it’s that new gal in your life, the new car or a big-screen TV. The happiness we feel doesn’t come because we got something. If that were true we’d be happy as long as we had that thing. Instead, the happiness we feel comes from not wanting for that short time until the next desire pops up. Not wanting, even though it’s for only a short time, lets us relax and just be in the world without a problem.

Notice that we’re in the same relaxed, contented place we’re in while joyfully playing with that baby – not wanting or needing a thing. Wanting and seeking is always a problem because we’re on that stressful path of effort to get it. So self-love is really just about being, which means letting Life appear as it does and realizing that all our thoughts that it should be different have never worked and have only caused us pain. Finally we may just stop, and rest… and be happy! In that relaxed place of ease you really smell the flowers, maybe for the first time. You really see the green of the tree leaf, feel the texture of the knife in your hand as you cut vegetables for supper, hear that distant whistle of a train.

From this place of just being present you may experience a vitality of life you haven’t known, with no pressure to get anywhere, accomplish more or be better. Then taking steps to connect with a new date or partner just flows naturally. You're just on a fun adventure, not needing someone to make you happy. You get to simply share life with a date or partner, without expecting or demanding, without seeking, and without judgment, knowing your happiness doesn't depend on that person you're with. Total, unconditional acceptance of life just as it is… that would be my definition of self-love.

Copyright © 2006 Chuck Custer