This post is about the love we have been looking for. And it starts with a lesson that some middle school students once taught me.
Dignity and Respect
Middle school students taught me some of the most important things I know about love.
Before becoming a college philosophy instructor , I was a middle school humanities teacher for many years. Early on in my teaching career, I decide the best way to approach my students was to hold high expectations for them and believe 100% in their ability to achieve these expectations. I adopted three guiding principles for my students and our class community:
One: Treat everyone with dignity.
Two: Take responsibility for your education.
Three: Help to create a positive learning environment.
To be honest, when I first started teaching, I was not totally sure that all of my students could accomplish these goals. But I decided that I would just assume they all could. I believed that no matter how ornery or angry or withdrawn students seemed, they carried a Light within them. This light was their original goodness, dignity, and beauty. (This is something that almost all world religions and ethical systems speak of in one way or another).[1]
I focused on cultivating and nourishing students’ Light[2] every day. And I consistently held them and myself responsible for upholding our classroom standards. In addition, I sincerely praised them for all of the good things they were accomplishing in class.
And I noticed that when I conducted my classroom in this way, it became a peaceful, productive, and creative environment.
I learned that honoring students’ Light and nurturing them with unconditional love cultivated more good and beautiful actions. On the other hand, I discovered that failing to honor their Light and depriving them of love brought forth the opposite results.
Four Lessons about Love
I am not suggesting here that teachers must adopt my teaching methods and class principles.
And I am also not suggesting that I am a perfect teacher. I’m not.
What I am trying to say is that middle school students taught me four really important lessons about love. They taught me that . . .
One: We are all bearers of a beautiful Light.
Two: We all deserve unconditional love and nurture because of this Light.
Three: The more we nurture ourselves with love, the greater our Light grows and expresses itself.
Four: When we treat ourselves with harshness, disrespect, and self-loathing, we cut ourselves off from our Light. Accordingly, we began to act out in all sorts of self-destructive and unskillful ways.
Living according to these principles in my classroom brought about beautiful results for both me and my students.
A Big Surprise
So, imagine how surprised I was when I discovered something strange a few years later. I discovered that although I had adopted these important lesson of love towards my students, I had almost completely failed to adopt them in my relationship with myself.
I treated my students as though they were bearers of a beautiful Light. But I treated myself as though I was flawed, horribly imperfect, and not to be trusted.
And I treated my students as though they deserved unconditional love and nurture. But I treated myself as though I only deserved love if I met a long list of extremely high (and often impossible) external standards.
It was like I was constantly walking around with this awful “To Do List”. Practically speaking, it was actually a “You Might As Well Give Up List”.
I believed that the more I nurtured my students with unconditional love, the more their Light grew. But I treated myself as though I was generally undeserving of love and nurture.
And I knew that if I treated my students with harshness, disrespect, and loathing that I would make it difficult for them to remember their Light. But I treated myself with harshness, disrespect, and self-loathing every day.
It took me quite a few years to figure out how badly I was treating myself. And when I finally did, I thought, “Why I am acting this way? Why do I treat myself all the time like I hate myself?”
The Love We are Looking For
I have increasingly realized that my situation was not unique or unusual. In fact, I believe that almost all of us struggle to love and nurture ourselves unconditionally. And it is no wonder. We are constantly surrounded by messages that we are flawed, gross, not beautiful enough, not successful enough, not thin enough, not good enough.
Such message tell us we are never good enough.Here are some of the most common ways we are told these things, directly and indirectly:
Advertisers constantly tell us that we are flawed or lacking and that we need to buy their product to fix ourselves.
Distorted media images tell us that there is always someone more beautiful, thin, fashionable or athletic than us. And because of this, so the message goes, we will never have the love we want.
Distorted religious teachings tell us that we are horribly depraved and evil and that God is constantly ready to punish us because of this.[3]
Certain economic systems tell us that we are only valuable if we produce a lot, make a lot of money, and beat the competition to claim the place at the top.
Misguided teachers tell us that we are only deserving of love if we get “it” and get the A.
Misguided friend, family members, and significant others only give us love or treat us with respect when we please them.
These types of messages are incredibly common in our culture. And because of this, we run around terrified that we are not good enough. We fear that we are deeply flawed. So we despair that we will never have the love we so desperately desire.[4]
As a result, we constantly try to do more and be more, hoping that eventually we will be the kind of person who deserves love. We think in doing so that we will be able to soothe the pain we carry and fill the empty space in our heart.
But nothing we do is ever enough, and no one’s love is ever enough. That is because what we want the most is actually our own Love. We will only be able to Love ourselves when we realized that we don’t have to do anything to deserve love.
In fact, we are already deserving of Love right now.
Honoring My Light
When I realized how disrespectfully I treated myself on a regular basis, I was shocked. And I decided to change. I made a pledge that I would always love myself, treat myself with respect, and stick up for myself. And I promised to give myself unconditional Love.
I also started spending time consistently connecting with my Light through reading books and sacred scriptures that reminded me of my Light. In addition, I spent time in peaceful silence or meditation. I had read good books and sacred scriptures my whole life. But I had somehow used them to beat myself over the head, rather than connect with my Light and the Love inside me.
The more I showered myself with Love and connected to my Light, the more I began to heal old patterns. These were patterns of anxiety, self-loathing, sadness, loneliness, and despondence that had been a part of my life for a really long time.
In learning to Love myself, I finally found the Love I had been looking for.
You Don’t Have to Do ANYTHING
Dear Friend, I want to tell you today that right now, you are absolutely and completely deserving of unconditional Love. You do not have to do anything to deserve it. I also want to tell you that in your True Self, you are already perfect, whole, complete. You are Love.
If you believe in God, you may think of this Light as God’s Love in you. This light is is what is most YOU and is also like a vast ocean of Love that you belong to.
If you do not believe in God, you may think of this Light as something greater and more powerful that you are a part of. It is the dignity that everyone bears. You might also think of it as loving rationality or loving kindness.
You do not have to do or to be anything else. You just have to remember who and what you already are.
*****
If you enjoyed this post, please consider sharing it on social media.
If you are worried that remembering and loving who you are is an excuse for bad behavior, you might like this post.
*****
Valuable advice no another great post. Xo
So kind! I’m so glad you enjoyed it. Xo