BE SELFISH in LOVE !

on Love... from a slightly different viewpoint...

Who comes first, YOU or YOUR RELATIONSHIP? Answering -THE RELATIONSHIP- may sound the only appropriate answer with a deep sense of love, loyalty and commitment... but it would be a very unhealthy answer, for sure. If you do not seem to agree, just think over it again... Isn't it true that only when you can honor and love yourself first, that the relationship can be a truly loving one and not one based on need, dependency, fear or insecurities? Only when each partner comes to a relationship whole and complete, the relationship is healthy. That relationship becomes an enhancement of your life and not life itself.

Still not convinced? Just think. When flying on an airplane, ever wondered why the flight announcer tells you to put on your own oxygen mask first, before you help your child, in case of an emergency? Seems selfish, doesn't it? Because we have been taught from our very childhood, that the ultimate in love is to sacrifice. Then why do these airlines tell us to save ourselves first? There is definitely a practical and more sensible reason to it, as against the preaching from our school-time moral science lessons. Think about it. How can you save someone else, for that matter your own child or spouse or anyone else so dear, when you're either unconscious or worse still- dead?

Love is similar to that air mask. We can't love fully and wholly unless we love ourselves first. If we strap that air mask on, good and tight, we can love an endless amount. If we don't love ourselves first, we would have no love to give. If we truly put ourselves first in love, nurture our souls and hearts, honor what we want, and make our happiness of the heart and peace of the mind the number one priority, we are better equipped to love others... love deeper.

Again, we ought to know exactly what we want in love. Today, the definition of love is not the same as it used to be. People are more materialistic, conveniently termed more 'practical'. Today, when a relationship starts, most of the times the word LOVE does not come into the picture at all... as if it is associated with some kind of fear of committment. Most of the times its an unsaid 'understood' term for later convenience. But why the pretence? If we do not want to be in a relationship, we should not force ourselves to be in it, just out of any kind of obligation-be it sex or social pressure. It would just make everyone in the relationship unhappy and do no justice to anyone. It is better to be single than to be in a relationship which is incomplete, makes both the partners unhappy and hurts everyone else involved.

...because love is an emotion, a feeling, a wanting and a being, which should make us and everybody else, feel good. An unhappy mother cannot raise happy children. An unhappy husband will never be able to keep his wife or children happy. An unhappy boss can never motivate his subordinates enough to get good work out of them. An unhappy lover will always break the relationship than blooming it into a beautiful one. If children choose careers just because their parents wanted them to and not because of their own passion, they can never excel in their careers. We love others to the degree we love ourselves. So before entering into any kind of relationship or taking onto any commitment of a new or existing relationship, we ought to make ourselves happy first. Only then can we work at our relationships... be it with friends, parents, children, lovers, spouses, friends, colleagues or anyone else. Only then, our lives would be different... healthier, happier and more meaningful...