Do you have to love yourself before you can love others? The self-love paradox | Abuse, Interrupted

How do we thread the needle of needing people but not being a 'needy person'?

*Usually this conversation is answered by the idea that you should love yourself, therefore you are less reliant on the love of others.*

And even that you can't actually love others until you love yourself.

*Yet how do you learn to love yourself in the first place unless you've seen it?*

This is one of the conversations that is guaranteed to deeply trigger people emotionally if they are in that space of desperate loneliness, especially since it is so easy to dehumanize others in the attempt to get your emotional needs met.

*And to justify it as survival.*

And as someone who has been there and through it - needing love, feeling empty, and harming others in an attempt to meet that need - I want to offer a different picture.

*One that understands that love anchors the soul, but that love isn't hinging on one person*

...neither the self, nor another.

*It's the way shingles on a roof protect the home.*

The way feathers on a bird layer and overlap with each other to keep a bird warm.

*It isn't one relationships, it's many.*

It isn't one person, it's people.

*The relationships, the care, the mutuality - they overlap.*

The layers of relationships protect you.

*The other thing that is hard for people is understanding that this mutuality is built over time.*

We see that we have a need and we want to fill it. I've seen people approach dating like they're co-interviewing each other for a job, and even though it seems like that would work and should work, a relationship is a gestalt not an equation.

*It's how these specific people relate to each other, and what interaction they build through that relating.*

This is the truest place for the word "synergy", because the best relationships create something more than the sum of its parts.

*But it takes time to interact, it takes time to build, it takes time to offer and accept bids for connection.*

And when you have that place within yourself that is aching for connection, it's hard to resist rushing, to resist trying to fill in the blank of what 'could be' with this other person.

*It's hard to resist lovebombing.*

This is why therapeutic relationships are so, so important. They create a time-limited relationship of secure-attachment. Not only limited in length of the relationship but also in how much access you have to them. You meet them once a week or every couple of weeks, and maybe you can do an email or so in between sessions, but you are generally limited in how much contact you have with them.

*When we're drowning in loneliness, our desire is to cling onto other people as a life raft.*

But this is not sustainable, nor is it fair to the other person. And the therapy model manages to begin to meet the need while creating safety.

*Allowing a client to have the experience of someone liking and wanting to spend time with them, nonjudgmentally, without allowing the client's needs to overwhelm them.*

But in general, this is what begins that work. Space to experience yourself positively and be reflected back to yourself positively, space to be and be seen, but in a way that is not all dependent on one person.

*And in a way that hinges on the self-anchoring of the hurting person.*

It's yourself...and another. In mutual constitution, with many people.

*It's the small steps toward healthy interaction that build a healthy relationship.*

And to do it with many people so that our mental health and quality of life isn't dependent on one person.

*And truly, this is one reason why abusers are so destructive.*

They isolate the victim, or cause the victim to isolate themselves. They put themselves at the center of the victim's universe, and use that position to punish, harm, and abuse them. The victim becomes trapped in their own mind, their own feelings, their own life.

*Even though we may *want one person to save us, knowing that abuse often hinges on one person, should make us cautious of this yearning.**

It's the yearning for the loving, present parent we should have had. And as we become our own parent, we can intentionally build safe relationships with many others that co-support us.

*As is so often true, what is healing is the opposite of the abuse.*