The 3 Principles Of Healthy Selfishness

Thousands of movies and novels about romantic love appear each year, but they rarely teach us to love ourselves. Why do we know so little about this habit so essential for inner harmony and good relationships with others?

Oscar Wilde affirmed that “loving oneself is the beginning of an idyll that will last a lifetime”, but the truth is that it is difficult for us to maintain this romance, since we often make our self-esteem depend on the opinion we perceive of others, which reveals that we do not value ourselves.

Why is it so difficult for us to love each other, regardless of our environment? Most people are afraid of losing the esteem of their friends and colleagues because of loving each other in the way they deserve. However, it is possible to love ourselves and respect our priorities without neglecting the needs of others.

The keys to loving yourself

The word “selfishness” has such a negative connotation in our culture that we identify this concept with disregard for others, just as a person would gorge himself on a platter, without leaving enough for the rest of the diners.

Although our economic system certainly favors greed and inequality, we learn from an early age that it is morally more important to satisfy the needs of others than our own.
This is an idea present in almost all religions and that is deeply ingrained in the collective unconscious, which makes us feel guilty about procuring what we need individually.

However, it is worth asking yourself: is it possible to take good care of others without taking care of yourself first?

The foundation of positive relationships

In romantic relationships, people with low self-esteem often fail to love the other, because their own insecurity causes them feelings of dependency, jealousy and anger. The same is true of any other kind of relationship. If we don’t respect our own needs, we won’t be well enough to understand and meet the needs of others.

We often do things that we do not want inwardly to gain outward recognition and have our worth confirmed. This self-injurious attitude has its origin in the infantile anxiety to obtain the affection of the parents.

Under an excessive availability there is the buried idea that if we do not do what others expect of us, they will punish us by withdrawing their love. The problem with this belief is that the first thing we disable is self-love, since we stop living for ourselves and we do it to please our circle.

Don’t sacrifice more for others

“Sacrificing oneself” for others – a concept very present in Christianity – and prioritizing the desires of others, is an insurance of unhappiness and, in the end, of anger, because the self-sacrificing person reacts with resentment when he realizes that the world does not He acts with the same diligence.

Then reproaches arise such as: “With everything I have done for him / her, and look at how he pays me”. This kind of complaint shows that the delivery itself was not sincere, since payment was required in return. Therefore, wouldn’t it have been easier to attend to one’s own needs than to demand, late and badly, that attention from others?

There is the possibility of looking for yourself and taking care of yourself without harming anyone. On the contrary, loving ourselves as we deserve provides us with a flow of positive energy that we can then revert to others. Just as dissatisfied people tend to pay for their frustration with their environment, happiness itself is a catalyst for the happiness of others.

3 principles of healthy selfishness

In that sense, we can speak of positive selfishness. The Gestalt school of psychology exposes three principles that we must understand:

1. In order to give, you must first give yourself.
2. To be able to love, you must first learn to love yourself.
3. In order to deliver, you must first surrender to what each one is and needs.

If we are not able to recognize our priorities, we will not be able to identify and satisfy those of others either. Care from lack is like an empty shell: the person insists on offering something that they do not really have.

The image of trying to serve water with an empty bottle is often used. Let’s look at a couple of practical examples of this attitude that stems from low self-esteem:

• “I want to be alone, but I’m going to this party so no one gets mad.”
• “I would like to talk to a good friend, but I don’t want to bother him with my problems.”

When positive selfishness kicks in, we give ourselves permission to do what our body, mind, and spirit demand. Something that corresponds to us to give ourselves, without thinking that we are taking anything from anyone.

Do you love yourself enough?

By now you may be wondering if you love yourself enough. One way to find out is to ask yourself these questions before making a decision where your self-esteem may be in question:

• Do I do it to look good or because I want to?
• Am I attending to my priorities and wishes?
• Do I act out of fear and obligation?
• What do I really need?

Honest responses allow us to distinguish what we do from the heart from what we do to gain the approval of others.

Respect your wants and needs

By respecting our wants, our needs and our time, we allow ourselves to be authentic and thereby others receive a more valuable version of ourselves. Self-esteem depends on the confidence we have in our talent and authenticity. It will be higher or lower, therefore, depending on the love we feel for ourselves and our degree of acceptance and support.

Loving ourselves requires being aware of our desires and shielding ourselves from criticism and adversity, two of the hammers that call into question our self-esteem. Every time someone questions us or when things don’t go as planned, our natural tendency is to review our own worth.

However, our reaction to these incidents –because they are that: day-to-day incidents– will also depend on how we have worked on love for ourselves. A person accustomed to listening to himself and respecting himself has a much greater capacity to cushion setbacks than one who lives in the anxiety of obtaining the approval of others.

The inner workshop of self-esteem

The development of self-esteem, if we have not cultivated it until now, requires from us an exercise in introspection, in alliance with ourselves to build a good opinion that is proof of attacks and cracks.

Self-esteem does not depend on our having an enviable physique, having a job with social recognition or having a great economic status. It is an internal arrangement that we can choose and cultivate on a day-to-day basis.

Let’s see some keys so that our levels of self-love are always optimal:

• Avoid comparison with others, especially if it is not objective.
• Don’t be more critical of yourself than you are of other people.
• Be generous in love and understanding for your own person.
• Remember that you are human and imperfect, and therefore you can fail and make mistakes.
• Refuse perfectionism and the tendency to please and please.
• Flee excess humility and personal boycott.
• Consider that you are as worthy of love, affection and recognition as the most loved people.

Assertiveness and accomplishment

There is a fundamental key to loving and respecting yourself, and it is called assertiveness. The assertive person is able to express their opinion or demonstrate what they think clearly, without fear of what they will think of them. Although socially they try to present these exercises of sincerity as a negative or harmful trait, it is a positive quality that protects our self-esteem.

If we use the right language so as not to hurt our interlocutor, we put our priorities in their place.

As the motivator Shannon L. Alder puts it, “staying quiet is like a slow-growing cancer in the soul and the trait of a true coward. There is nothing smart about not defending yourself. You may not win every battle. But, at least everyone will know who you stood up for… yourself. “

People who put their priorities on the table and, observing those of others, are able to ask for what they need, will face misunderstanding or irritation from time to time, but without a doubt they live more calmly and in coherence with what they need. they feel and are.

Lead the life you want

It is about being clear about the life we ​​want to lead and acting accordingly. According to the famous speaker Anthony Robbins, to love each other we have to be more demanding:

“When you sincerely want to make a change, the first thing you have to do is raise your level of demand. When people ask me what changed my life eight years ago, I tell them that the most important thing was to change what I demanded of myself. all the things that I would no longer accept in my life, all the things that I would no longer tolerate and all the things that I aspired to. “

There will be people around us who will not accept that revolution. They can call us selfish – we know there is a positive meaning for that term – or point out that “we have changed.” The latter, in the school of love for oneself, is a reason for pride and celebration. It means that we have learned to take care of ourselves in order, from the fullness, to take better care of others.

Get started with these 5 doses of self-esteem

To love yourself more you must make changes in your life. I propose some very simple and everyday ones:

1. When you wake up in the morning, don’t be obsessed with how you look. It is normal to be pale, disheveled, and haggard.
2. Dress in comfortable clothing that defines you, rather than “dressing up” for others.
3. Eliminate phrases like “I’m stupid” from your vocabulary.
4. Congratulate yourself every time you do something right.
5. Make a list of your accomplishments, no matter how small, at the end of each day.