Mister (Fred) Rogers said that, “You can’t really love someone else unless you really love yourself first.” I guess not many people would disagree with that.
I’ve certainly found in my life that I only had the capacity to love others once I understood truly how much God loves me, which is a roundabout way of saying, “If God loves me, who am I to not love myself?”
I spent the first 15 years of my adult life wanting to be able to love others well, always suspecting I needed to have love for myself, but never really achieving it.
I had come to Christ in my early 20s, but I didn’t really get God if you know what I mean.
I was able to go through the motions of faith, but never really had God’s Spirit. I know this is the case because when my life completely imploded in 2003 it was the first time I truly reached out and surrendered to God. Broken and with no resistance (selfish pride) left, I found God!
Almost instantly I was given the keys to the Kingdom, which from a worldly perspective is the ability to love myself, mainly because I was not afraid of failure anymore.
My world had fallen apart and that was such a comprehensive failure that there was no point not facing it. Indeed, it would’ve been plain embarrassing for me if I had have even attempted to hold up some pathetic façade.
So, God definitely used my comprehensive marriage failure — and my absolute acceptance of my own part in it — for my eventual benefit.
In coming to truly accept God through the acceptance of the truth of my life situation, I experienced God’s love and, hence, could only agree that I was lovable.
So, I get it, and I think the Rogers quote is true.
It also explains relationships where there is a lack of love because of a lack of ability to love.
It explains why there are people who simply don’t have the capacity to love, who also feel the need to falsely bolster their self-esteem, because there is no basis of being loved and of being intrinsically lovable, even if they’re putting on the show that they love and accept themselves.
See how important knowing you’re loved by God is? It’s an absolute game changer!
If there’s a person in our life who will not love us because we suspect they cannot — because of the above reasons — we might well understand and empathise (it helps to empathise) without needing to pander to them. We actually cannot help them. It’s their journey.
Understanding shows us that their inability to love us is not our fault. We’re not unlovable. They’re the ones who have the problem. If we’ve loved them in some co-dependent pattern, we can see out of this that at least we’ve been able to love them. Yes, too much!
It’s important to be able to see that love transcends words.
If a person loves us, they love us with actions. They do not say “I love you” and then control you with their actions. That’s not love; it’s control. They do not insist they love you, yet constantly neglect the relationship.
If we’re told we’re loved, the final test of their ability to actually love us is a reflection of whether they know they’re loved for who they are — yet, it’s not our love that can do this.
They must be able to see their inherent worth beyond performance, for none of us earn the love of God. It’s just there because of Jesus.
To accept the love of God means finally we have the ability to love others.
Photo by Leighann Blackwood on Unsplash
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