“Love is all you need…”

At least that’s what lyrics to a famous song say.

But what if love is a two-way street? What if we can discover how to receive AND how to give it?

The Bible talks a lot about loving your neighbor as yourself, and for important reason.

That isn’t always as easy as it sounds because most of us struggle to love ourselves, quite often because we don’t understand how much God really loves us.

Like, He loves us unconditionally.

But loving oneself is much different than being self-absorbed. 

Someone who is self-absorbed is now most commonly called a narcissist, but there is a big difference between that and self-love. 

The root of narcissism is said to be a deep pain and an even deeper sense of unworthiness. Unworthiness can come from self-hatred. 

Either way, when we are extremely focused on self, we lose the ability to focus on others. But at the same time, if we don’t love ourselves, we will struggle to love others.

It’s not exactly black and white. It is something we have to discover ourselves. 

In our culture, we have all kinds of definitions for love. To some, love is a feeling, to others, it’s an action, and to me, love is God because scripture says God is love. 

If God is love and we are created in His image, we are the image of love. 

It sounds simple and pretty, but is it? 

If you live in a world where you think you are worthless, yet you try to cover it up and present a false-self like a narcissist does, trying to love others will be difficult because you are not in touch with your true self and therefore you will have no way of loving that true self. 

The bottom line is, you have to be confident in what you were created to do. In my life, that looks like an ongoing, personal relationship with God through Jesus Christ. 

I believe He gives us not only our identity but also a call to accomplish in life. 

What are some things you do to keep you encouraged and confident in what you were created to do?