The most important thing is to know the fundamentals and then build on that as you dig deeper into what you want to master
Peter Mwansa
Of course, each one of us has at one instance or instances in life used the word “love”.
For some it is to our parents, family members, spouses or even just friends.
WHAT IS LOVE?
According to the Cambridge Dictionary:
“To like another adult very much and be romantically and sexually attracted to them, or to have strong feelings of liking a friend or person in your family”
“To like another adult very much and be romantically and sexually attracted to them, or to have strong feelings of liking a friend or person in your family”
Before we dig deep into the definition from the Cambridge Dictionary, let us look at the etymology of the word “love” itself.
The word ‘love’ was once ‘leubh’, a word used by the Proto-Indo-Europeans approximately five thousand years ago to describe care and desire. When ‘love’ was incorporated into Old English as ‘lufu’, it had turned into both a noun to describe, ‘deep affection’ and its offspring verb, ‘to be very fond of’.
Now, with the dawn of different religions and its teachings, the word love has been perceived broadly and more explained.
LOVE IN HINDUISM
Hinduism addresses six different types of love. It doesn’t surprise me that definitions of love tie intricately to the mythology, belief system, and religious basis of Hinduism.
Kama — sexual desire or craving (yup, the Kama Sutra)
Shringara — romance and emotional intimacy between lovers, and represented in mythology as the relationship between Radha and Krishna
Maitri — which can translate as “mother’s love” but really encompasses compassion for all living creatures, and which is demonstrated by simple acts of kindness. One source defines maitri as amity, or goodwill despite the differences between us.
Bhakti — devotion, to God or to the world or to some higher ideal. In Hindu mythology, Hanuman epitomizes bhakti.
Karuna — compassion. This word originates in Sanskrit as “sadness,” which I find interesting, since compassion is rooted in understanding and wanting to help others. However, karuna differs from pity, which Hindus believe to be rooted in selfish motivation.
Atma-prema — love for the soul, or love for that part that connects all of us. Interestingly, atma-prema is defined as self-love. In recognizing that the unique thing that makes one’s “self” is shared among all of creation, one can offer unconditional love because everyone is connected at the source.
LOVE IN JUDAISM
The Torah is the foundation of the Jewish faith, and the Torah is explicit in its commands to love God and to love other people. Deuteronomy 6:5 states, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.” Leviticus 19:18 & 34 explicitly command that Jews are required to love both their neighbor and the stranger that resides in the land with them. In short, Jews are required to love everyone. But the Torah does not rest on the assumption that someone will always have warm feelings towards everyone; it gives concrete commandments on how this love is supposed to be expressed. Chapter 19 of Leviticus offers many examples: don’t commit slander, don’t steal, don’t lie, leave part of the harvest in the field for the poor, judge fairly, pay your employees on time, don’t curse the deaf, and don’t put a stumbling block before the blind. Similarly, the Torah does not expect people to live on a spiritual high where they always feel love towards God. Rather, the Torah is explicit in its assumptions that a person’s love for God is expressed through following the commandments. Deuteronomy 6 follows the injunction to love God with statements on how to do that, in short: be mindful of the commandments and do them.
LOVE IN CHRISTIANITY
In Christianity, the whole of religion is based on love. That is, the love of God and man. We hear Jesus himself who is considered God by some Christians and just savior by other denominations within the religion give a well explained example on the greatest commandment:
“And one of them, a doctor of the law, asking him, tempting him: Master, which is the greatest commandment in the law? Jesus said to him: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments dependeth the whole law and the prophets.”
Mathew 22: 35:40
LOVE IN ISLAM
Love in Islam is all-encompassing, comprehensive and sublime, rather than being restricted to one form only, which is love between a man and a woman. A real type of love is the love of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (saw). This love also makes you follow the example of Holy Prophet Muhammad (saw) in all his dealings and manners. Allah says:
“He (is) the One Who created for you what (is) in the earth, all. Moreover, He turned to the heaven and fashioned them seven heavens. And He of everything (is) All-Knowing.”
(Surah Al-Baqara, 2:29)
EXPLAINING LOVE
Now that we have had a clear view on the etymology of the word “love” and on how it is perceived in different religions, let us try to break down the definition of love as defined by the Cambridge Dictionary.
As you noticed right from the etymology to the point of views of each and every religion that we have looked at, love is mostly considered as something that can only exist at least between two beings. Unless for Christianity which talks about ‘loving a neighbor as yourself’.
This explains to us that love is something that you give out voluntary and selflessly in order to have a mutual benefit between the parties involved. Religion explains it as something that God offers to his people and the people have to offer it back to him through the way they live with one another (Judaism explains it very well in the example given above from the Torah)
In order to offer yourself in any form of love to another person, there MUST be love within your inner self, for you cannot give out what you do not have. You first have to develop and possess love for yourself before you can offer any form of love to another being.
This brings us to the the core and the whole essence of this article, “self-love”
WHAT IS SELF-LOVE
I few weeks ago when this question first popped into my head, I had decided to ask my followers on my social media platform Instagram on what they understand about self-love.
I got interesting and very helpful answers that with the consent of the people who took their time to reply and give their opinions I am pleased to share with you in this article.
Although most of the answers that were given were originally given in the Russian language, I will try by all means not to distort the meaning as I translate them into English.
“Being satisfied with the way you look and everything about yourself. Basically satisfied with the way you are”
Alina
Instagram: le_nom_cache
Thank you, Alina, self-satisfaction is really one way of showing yourself self-love. By being satisfied with the way, you are created, short or tall, thin or slim or not slim, you take away all the negative thoughts that may arise from within your inner self which may bring about low esteem. Low self-esteem brings about the thoughts of self-hatred for not doing the things that you think and know that you are able to do. Therefore, always strive to be satisfied with the way you are, accept your body, appreciate your background be motivated by your dreams build on your flaws, improve on your abilities, just do anything that will make you shift your paradigm from not being satisfied with the way you are to being satisfied with the way you are.
“Waking up to love your reflection. Development in your favorite direction.”
Olesya
Instagram: _vihna_
Loving the person you see in front of the mirror is a huge step to acquiring self-love. Thank you very much Olesya for that.
As I earlier stated, you cannot give what you don’t love, if you can’t smile at the person you see in front of the mirror, which is you, how do you think it will be possible to smile at the people you meet? You might end up giving a frown face instead of a smile even in situations that requires you to smile, because you don’t practice smiling.
Make it a habit every morning when you wake up to look in a mirror and smile at yourself and carry that smile throughout your day.
Another point raised by Olesya is to develop in your favorite direction. Each and every person on the planet has at least something which they are very good at. Find that thing that works for you in your favorite direction, the joy it will bring to you after doing it and doing it to the fullest might touch and benefit other people and make them feel loved. See? You are showing love unknowingly just by doing what you love.
“When you take care of your mental and physical health”
Valeria
Instagram: lera.manyuk
Thank you, Valeria, for raising a point on Physical and mental health.
One thing you should take note of the is that your feeling are attached to and controlled by your thoughts.
Have you ever wondered why, for example, you pass a very challenging exam you tend to feel better and more relieved than the way you were feeling the moment you were stepping into the exam room?
This is because your thoughts were of fear which controlled your feelings and love itself is a feeling.
Therefore, with a bad mental health which controls your thoughts, you can never acquire self-love. Always make sure you have a good mental health by thinking positive thought in your head.
I came to the conclusion that love for others, loved ones, for everyone and everything is very much connected with childhood. If in childhood we were given this love and we are filled with it, then we can easily warm the surrounding hearts. If in childhood we did not have enough love or we were not given it at all, then all attempts at self-improvement and self-love at the expense of external factors are to buy some things for ourselves, pamper ourselves with goodies, send ourselves on vacation they will not be able to make up for this lack completely! In such cases, you definitely need an assistant, a soul mate, a person who is ready to share his warmth.
Katya
Instagram: zorina.katriin
Nice point from Katya. Thank you Katya. This calls for making sure that as you grow up and start your own family if you are still young, you should provide a serene environment for your future kids to grow up in. Make them feel loved, accepted, appreciated, adored. This will have an effect on how they will grow up in relation to the environment and the society. As it is said, “Charity begins at home.” Learning to be loved from a young age will make them find it easy to love them selves and radiate that love.
If at all you didn't receive that love, find yourself a suitable person to fill you up with it. But remember to try by all means to love yourself first.
“Always having the best interest in mind for oneself in all areas of life, mentally, financially, etc.”
Taizya
Instagram: taizya__
This as well goes back to what I said earlier that you cannot give out what you do not have. Thank you Taizya. You should understand that, according to the law of attraction, what you think of yourself is what you become and in order to become what you want you have to vibrate at a frequency that attracts that which you want. By putting your interests in mind for oneself in all areas of life, you are sending out a frequency to the universe of how you want your life to be and how you want to be treated. Of course, each and every person who loves oneself would like to be treated in a special way.
On the contrary, we have been told to put ourselves last, this made us attract feelings of unworthiness, whereby you feel others are more worthy than you. As this feeling keeps on growing within us, we tend to attract more situations that makes us feel more unworthy and not good enough.
Drop that thinking and change your paradigm. I am not saying that you should now start being arrogant and stop considering the needs and the presence of others. What I am saying instead is that, always try by all means to put your needs, by doing so, you will be able to satisfy other people’s needs with pleasure and satisfaction.
The following opinion from Rita clearly explains all. Take a look below:
“Hmm I think self-love is expressed in those moments when you can put yourself, your time, your needs in priority, but at the same time does not belittle others. I think this is such a fine line between self-love and selfishness”
Rita
Thanks to Rita we are now able to see a clear picture on how we are supposed to acquire and exercise self-love on ourselves whilst respecting the needs of others. One thing you should understand is that all things in this universe are connected to one another as you have heard it said, ‘What goes around, comes back around.” Therefore, as you drop that thinking of putting yourself last in situations that involves other people, you should keep in mind never to belittle the needs of others.
Finally, to answer the question: “What is Self-love” in simple terms but with kind of advanced words:
“Self-love” is a feeling from which culminates “love”. For there can never be authentic love without there being self-love, for love has to be rooted from within in order to be radiated to the outside world.
Therefore, in order to acquire love, you have to fill yourself up with it until you become a magnet. Yes, a magnet of love.😉
I really wanted this to be a short article since it is just a present to you from me on my 23rd birthday. But there is a lot more to write about love and self love. I think I will just put in a book, so be on the radar for that. I hope you enjoyed your read though. Don’t forget to put some claps down there if you did enjoy and drop a comment as well. It is open for discussion. I love you all.💕
Most importantly, thank you very much to all the people that contributed by airing out their opinions.
I also thank Fr. Davies Chileshe OfmConv for a final check on my work to make sure it is close to perfection as possible.
Facebook: Davies Chileshe
You guys are the best. I love you all. Yes, because I love myself😊
Check out this article on Medium