What is more important, to love or to be loved?

The first thoughts that come to my mind in the mornings are about my children, especially the hope that they are well and safe. Often, I'll message my granddaughters a simple ‘I love you sooo much’ because I like to keep reminding them how important they are too me.

So, when Olivia, one of my eight-year-old granddaughters, replied to my message with 'I know, Yiayia,' instead of the expected 'I love you too,' I felt the confidence in her statement, the assurance that she knew she was loved. And that, for me, is a job well done.

You see, so much of our own self-belief is based on how much love we were given when we were young. Self-confidence and self-worth are based on knowing, when we are young, that we are indeed lovable.

As Tony Robbins recently conveyed in an online summit I attended,

‘Love is the oxygen of the soul’

And when love is absent, we will search for it in all the corners of our life, often resorting to manipulating a situation to get others to love us.

What I mean by this is that when we are unsure of ourselves, or we are lonely or have another motive that drives our desire for love, then we will behave in ways that will bring the illusion of love into our life.

Let me ask you a few questions.

Have you ever said something that you didn’t really believe just to get someone to like you or worse to love you?

Have you ever gone against your own true feelings or emotions to please someone else, so they will love you more?

Have you ever lied to yourself about who you are just so you can be the person someone else wants?

In my book, 'How Did I Get Here?', there is a chapter dedicated to this very theme, that takes you back to your childhood to explore how these self-beliefs were formed in the first place.

Our approach to love is often backward because we tend to overlook the fundamental truth that love begins with self-love.

What we believe about ourselves is inevitably projected onto the world around us. This isn't merely a spiritual lesson; it's a fundamental aspect of how the world works.

Our view of the world is always seen through the lens we have of ourselves. Not only that but our emotions, which of course change every minute, dictate how we react to our external world.

It’s not difficult to see that when we are in a good mood, the world is a different place to when we are in a low mood. We experience this every day of our lives.

So, when it comes to our view of love and more importantly our relationship to love, it determines not only how we give love but perhaps more importantly how we receive love.

Here’s the thing: if we don’t seriously explore our experience and view of love, particularly the love we have for ourselves, then we never truly know if we are giving love to fill a void within ourselves that we are not capable of filling, or if it is genuine, unconditional love.

Worse, if we feel unloved or have an unkind view of ourselves, guess what? We will project that on others, which ends up hurting both ourselves and those around us.

The saying,

‘hurt people hurt people’

is a very important one to remember.

Our job isn’t to change the world; it is to change ourselves, and then world will change.

This is the lesson I am learning from my granddaughters: I understand that their sense of worth will not only come from the words of the adults around them but perhaps more significantly, from observing how they love themselves.

So if you wish to be loved, then learn how to love and more importantly, learn how to love yourself – unconditionally!

I’d like to leave you with this short story from my book, ‘How did I get here? A guide to letting go of your past & living in alignment with your true self.

‘Once I facilitated a support group for individuals suffering from incurable cancer, which included two elderly members who faced unique challenges. One of the members was not only battling cancer but also had to cope with the recent loss of her husband. Whenever we interacted, she appeared to have lost her reason to live. The other member, an eighty-year-old-man who appeared scruffy, warned me during an initial meeting that he had Tourette’s and might unintentionally shout out some profanities. He felt compelled to apologise in advance. However, I assured him that, having grown up in Tottenham, I had probably heard it all before.

In the following weeks, both individuals opened up and shared their tales of regret. The man, in particular, confided in us that his children didn’t like him and were unwilling to communicate with him due to his past behaviour towards them.

So I asked both of them this question: ‘How would you like to be remembered? As miserable, unloving, individuals, or happy, loving parents?’

A few weeks later as I walked into the cancer support centre the lady’s daughter was sitting in the waiting room. She introduced herself to me and told me how much her mother had changed. She had started going swimming and smiled a lot more. In that session the man told us that he had apologised to his children, and they had started to visit him again.’

This brings me back to why the text from my granddaughter was so significant to me.

I've spent a great deal of my life searching for love, often resulting in disappointment and heartbreak. However, since my granddaughters came into my life, I've realised that true love is found in giving, not in receiving. Something I wasn’t quite ready for when I had my own children.

However as I've matured, I've come to understand that love isn't something one can obtain at all. Just like the two stories I shared above, it was only when they stopped expecting others to love them and when they gave unconditionally of themselves that love began to flow back to them.

In the end, the answer to the question of whether it is best to love or to be loved, I'd suggest that love isn’t something we can give or get but rather a state that we should all strive to be in.

If this resonates with you, make sure to join my community of like minded people by:

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