by Paula Maher

Created on: December 05, 2008

How To Fall In Love...with yourself!

"You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection."
(Hindu Prince Gautama Siddharta, the founder of Buddhism, 563-483 B.C.)

A few years ago, while I was licking my wounds after yet another break up and I was pondering, "Why does this always happen to me?" It occurred to me that someone did wrong by me time and time again because I allowed it; the reason for this was that up until that point I had no regard for myself.

Dr Phil says," You teach people how to treat you" and he is right. My partner got away with a lot because I let it to happen. I could go into all the reasons for my low self esteem, but that would entail pages of psychological jargon on how I was brought up by dysfunctional parents who at the end of the day did not know any better themselves.

I knew on that day that I could not go on putting up with bad relationships, unsatisfactory jobs and lack of confidence and I wondered if I would ever meet the man of my dreams. How great life would be if I had someone who took care of me at all times whom I trusted and who would never leave me or hurt me. I realized at that moment that the person I was looking for had been there all along. Me.

Rev. Laurie Sue Brockway is an interfaith minister and non-denominational wedding celebrant. She says, "I have said it before and will stress it again: Your first stop on the road to romance is with you! Looking for love externally, and even finding someone who seems to adore you, can be a fleeting thing if you do not have a strong foundation of self-esteem. It is honoring of oneself that opens the door for another to truly do the same."

The first thing is to believe that you are someone worth loving. I know how difficult it is to look in the mirror and say out loud how much you love yourself. You feel so silly standing there staring at your reflection especially first thing in the morning - don't know about you but I'm no oil painting at that time of the day - I still have a hard time with that exercise, but I am slowly getting there and I wonder sometimes whether I am ok just because I exist. It is irrelevant what my job is or how much money I have or whether I am married or single. I am, therefore I am loveable. There. It's difficult but you know what? I am starting to believe it and more importantly live it.

I can be my worst enemy at times. Never mind the criticism my mother bestowed upon while I was growing up. Shes eased off a bit now that I

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