You know, my darlings, I love you all, and I’m glad if the party line on loving yourself
first is working for you, but my own experience runs so counter to this message that I
must protest.
I’ve found this:
as my heart goes out to other people, to animals, to trees, to language,
to works of art, to landscapes, to ideas, all that beauty and power and complexity comes flooding into my being. Gratitude and delight (and also frustration and struggle) with what’s out there link me to all that grandeur and health and power; I participate in it. It builds my inner beauty. My inner beauty is considerable, would you agree? Has been for a long time.
I do love my “self”, but I don’t exclude from my “self” from the grass going to seed, the computer making magic on my desk, the good piece of toast, the seagulls’ articulate talk. We’re all in this together, thank god.
I’m pretty repelled by the idea that you have to love yourself before you can
love anything else. I don’t think so. You coexist. Re-examine, please.