By Miche Lame
We all know there is a reason that airlines tell you to put your air mask on yourself first and then see to others. It’s the idea that if we take care of ourselves first, we are then able to take care of others. The same actually goes for loving yourself first, then giving love to others. If we don’t have something, we can’t give it to someone else, which also applies to love. When we cannot find love for ourselves, opening our hearts to give true love to someone else is challenging.
In a previous writing, I explored the idea of connecting with and loving God first, then ourselves. Our relationship with God is the foundation of our relationship with ourselves and then others. As our love and connection with God grows, this connection becomes a pattern of how we can develop connection and love with ourselves. This connection is important to knowing and loving the divine, God, and our True Self, as well as loving others. Also, knowing both our eternal self and the self we present in this plane of existence is important to knowing the areas where we are here to grow.
Because as we start to love ourselves, our inner perceptions begin to shift. We start recognizing the nasty self-sabotaging inner thoughts and beliefs that keep us down. We begin to recognize the experiences we have over and over as challenges for our own growth in this lifetime.
In this way of knowing ourselves, we can acknowledge our limiting beliefs and sabotaging thoughts that lead to behavior and vibrations that keep bringing these challenges to our experiences in this lifetime. This allows us to start thinking in the present moment instead of going into an old pattern of “How can I be safe with this person,” to “Is this in my best interest if I love myself?” “If I love myself, is this the experience I want to have?”
Because once we recognize our Thoughts, we can recognize the correlation between what we think and what we believe and realize that’s actually what we subconsciously seek. It’s kind of like a sieve through which we choose what is filtered into our lives. If I think “life has to be hard,” something easy will likely go right through that sieve, and I’ll let it go keeping the hard stuff for my experience. Then this belief is verified; it then happens over and over. Then we wonder, “Why is this happening to me again?”
In learning to love ourselves, we get to know ourselves and treat ourselves with the love that we deserve. And coincidentally, that leads to us treating others with love. I’ve written a lot and spoken a lot with my clients about the idea that if we don’t love ourselves, we can’t give it. For a physical example, if I don’t have a glass of water, I can’t give you a glass of water, period.
Taking that further, if I don’t love myself and think I don’t deserve love, how in the world am I going to connect with somebody with true love? I will keep attracting somebody else who also somehow doesn’t believe that I deserve love (and chances are they don’t believe they do either” and possibly deserve, in their eyes, to be lied to, cheated on, hit, disrespected. Whatever we think it is that we deserve will be reflected in the relationship we have with others. We teach others by our energy and actions how to treat us. So if we do not love and accept ourselves, we will find ourselves feeling unloved and unaccepted by others, wondering why we never fit in anywhere. Our life is just reflecting what we’re already expecting, and our experiences coincide with what we’re already expecting.
So next time you find yourself in a relationship where you feel disrespected, look and see if you’re respecting yourself. Chances are you’re not respecting yourself. And when you love yourself, you will be more able to recognize when the divine is giving you a message because you can filter what is true and what is not.
For example, there were two weeks where the theme with some of my clients was lying to themselves. You can bet I spent a lot of time going within and finding out where I was lying to myself. And it was a rather big lie that I have been living with for years, probably since my childhood. Now I have the opportunity to change that by looking at how this belief has manifested, how lying to myself has manifested. The next step is remembering to feel love for me, then ask myself how this started with me in the past. Am I loving myself to continue having this experience? And, if not, how can I resolve this, my mistake, my lie to myself, and have the least hurt possible with those I love? I can also look at how can I grow from this and prevent this experience from continuing. I then continue to build the loving life of my desires in a conscious way.
When we love to God, then ourselves, – we can change our lives for the better. And we are more able to give others love also.
Love and Light,
Miche Lame’, M.A.L.L.P
248-212-0808
Like me on www.facebook.com/spirituallivingllc
See my webpage at www.michelame.com
