Self Is Biggest Asset and Biggest Obstacle

I once got in trouble with a friend, because I told this person that self-love needs to come before other kinds of love. I do not regret my statements and I will say it everyday of the week. Here is my reasoning.

The biggest deterrence of contentment is when we put too much on other people. When you expect someone to make you happy or when you say to yourself 'if I had this I would be happy,' because the truth is contentment comes from what you do and how you treat yourself. Friends and love ones are meant to help support not the ones who are suppose to take on all the pressure. I like to think of this as the structure principal. You create a wonderful structure and you can remove certain stones which might make you weak, but you are still standing, and it is self-love that is the keystone. Once the keystone is moved the whole structure falls even if the other stones are strong and sturdy, because it is that stone that takes on the most pressure. My friends are not responsible for me being happy. The relationships I enter are not responsible for my happiness. I have to choose to do the things that make me content. Sometimes that means leaving certain relationships and sometimes that means going after dreams that seem impossible. I'm the keystone and the people around me are my support blocks. Together we build a wonderful structure.

The other fact, that people do not think about, is that the more content you are with yourself the better friend or partner you are. You communicate better, you let things go easier, and you have more in your reserves when life gets tough. I know that when I am not taking care of myself the first thing that goes out the window are my talents as a teacher and as a human-being if I'm being honest.

"If you do not conquer self, you will be conquered by self." - Napoleon Hill 

Sometimes we limit ourselves by thinking in limited ways. Waiting for something to happen limits opportunities. Staying in a relationship that drains you or makes you feel uncertain might make you miss something more beautiful. Not seizing your dreams because of risk means you never progress. Thinking you are unable to do something guarantees you never will. We should all be limitless. That thinking starts by getting to know yourself and trusting yourself to be able to take things on. That involves a lot of reflection an a lot of honesty about who you are. 

Now, I say all this and it seems easy. It's not. I have a hard time of it. I have a chip on my shoulder based on perceived criticism and doubt that was sent my way as a kid. Teachers and certain people in my life made me feel like I had constraints. So I worked to prove them wrong, but sometimes that in itself can be a limit. Motivation should be self-serving not revengeful though it might be fun. I still have issues with this and I often perceive criticism when there probably is none. This is something that I am working on, trying to let go of defensiveness and trying to let go of the past. We all have something that limits us. We need to conquer it. 

I often think of Ron Weasley in these moments. This is where I see myself in Ron in so many ways. He compares himself with older siblings who all seemingly have something that makes them unique. He believes that he is ordinary and is often overlooked by the people in his life. This makes him jealous and insecure which gets him in all sorts of trouble. Especially in his progress with Hermione, his performance in school, and really owning what makes him him. In, Deathly Hallows, he has the opportunity to face these insecurities head on when the locket horcrux began to taunt him. He then destroys the locket and with it those insecurities that hold him back. Cause the truth, movie Ron to the side, Ron is a loyal, good-intentioned, passionate, strategic, and humorous guy who could have written his own story if he was not so worried about how it compared to others. Eventually he learned that lesson though. Through his own actions. Harry encouraged him to destroy it, but Ron had to be the one who had to face it, he had to be the keystone. 

So in short, we need to put our self-limitations in a locket or something then smash it. Because we all deserve to be limitless and we all deserve to love ourselves so we can better love others. We need to be the keystone otherwise our structure will never be able to weather the challenges of life.