Self-Care as a Foundation for Love

Many of us have been taught that loving another person means sacrificing ourselves to serve others. We suspend our own desires in a noble effort to love.  Indeed, love relationships are not just about meeting our own needs. They require an effort to listen deeply to what our loved one needs to be happy and feel connected with us. However, if we continually suspend our own needs in order to accommodate others, we may become resentful and unhappy. We fall into a pattern of codependence — neglecting our own needs in order to accommodate the other. Love requires reciprocity. I’ll address two important ways that self-care is vital in our relationships. Finding the Strength to Calm Ourselves  Our human desire system is very powerful. Attachment Theory tells us that we humans have a strong longing to be respected, understood, and connected. It may feel like our very survival is at stake when our needs are unmet. Love relationships ask something of us that is not always easy to give — something we actually need to give to ourselves! We need to find a way to manage our desire system so that we’re not immediately hijacked by the fight, flight, freeze response when we don’t get what we want — when we’re not gratified in the ways we expect or hope for.  Much has been written about the importance of self-soothing. When things don’t go as expected, we may feel angry, hurt, or sad. We might feel shame — a contracted feeling that bespeaks a beli...
Source: World of Psychology - Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Tags: Communication General Happiness Mindfulness Psychology Relationships Self-Help Codependence Emotional Connection Intimacy Love Self Love Self-Esteem Source Type: blogs