Self Love and Relationships

I began a journey of inspired collaboration with this post on Facebook:

"Help me write a song. Describe self love in the midst of a relationship. (Work/home/parenting/etc.)"

Here are the first 7 public responses I received and my first drafts of writing creative replies as lyrics and poetry. I received others including private messages and emails and am greatful for all of the voices that have inspired me on this topic. I intended to do a series of these prompted writing experiements at 5 topic X 5 perspectives on each (25 total).

THE POSTS:

Henry L. Jones: I like this definition. Self-love is when you treat yourself with kindness, acceptance and support. We're taught this on different levels. When you pull away, for example, to meditate to help reset your mind at a certain time every day is a way I self-love. Then, there's the commercialized self-love market. It says you've given to everyone but you, so become selfish. FOR YOUR SONG: Untie the ropes which bind you. Run thru the forest inside and find you. The trails of worry make us get lost in life. Remove those ropes with an eager knife.

Henry L. Jones as I meditate on your words, I have been inspired to pen these thoughts:

Sometimes my need becomes entwined

with another’s as if I can read there mind

and meet the needs unspoken from their lips.

I speak and am silent by their mood,

their wants, their needs my prompting move

and forget myself until my self is hard to find in simple asks.

Yet when I love myself enough

It is the knife of toughest love

that frees me from the isolating confines in my mind

to turn around and realize

the forest that awaits inside

of possibilities of love that never left the depth and breadth of my beloved inward light.

Karen Green: My first thought came from this Psalm, "Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me." Psalm 51:10. I think self-love is knowing who we are in Christ so that we may share His love and see His vision of others as loved children of God also.

Karen Green as I think on your words, these come to mind:

Deep abiding love invites

connecting inward points of light

to the points of light within the other’s heart.

Loving self means making room

for light within the glow and bloom

as roots seek ways to close the gaps that keep our lights apart.

Before conduits of connection

can find hope in the resurrection

Those resurrected hands create lay lines

So by divine design in Spirit,

God invested and Christ lifted

Within me a steadfast vision of

the good life rooted deeply in perfect love.

Janjoi Chambers: Here’s a poem I wrote hopefully it gives you some inspiration.

I love me,

All of me,

Below and above me,

Inside and out of me.

I love me,

The beautiful me,

And the me I perceive as ugly,

The out-of-tune me and the me in high frequency.

I love me

Enough to bow down to the God above me.

I love me so much that I honor the God within me.

I love me so much I strive to expand my divinity,

Tapping in spiritually,

So I can walk the physical earth righteously.

I love myself so, I choose to judge myself less.

The less I judge myself, the less I’m judging everyone else.

Janhoi Chambers I am inspired and so have reflected on your words with my own:

How strange and yet perfect

to look upon and see what lays within.

How lovely and how beautiful

How did I miss this wild and wonderful

that radiates beyond my skin

What an honor and a privilege to bear this soul,

both to carry and behold

May this be what I remember, and what you remember too,

that we are worthy to be loved because love has always been our truth.

Nancy Crawford: Self love means not requiring your beloved to meet your every need.

Nancy Crawford I have drafted some lines inspired by your thoughts:

When you love me,

my ability to see,

my imagining of what love is can miss the mark.

What I expect to meet my needs

can be more than you can give,

so I must step back and reflect upon my part.

May the path I take instead

start within my head

and move past my lips with asks and not demands

Let your yes’s and your no’s,

Day-to-day in small hand holds

Include showing up for the big stuff when it counts.

Such a balanced love can only happen

when my hold on what my heart beat patterns

doesn’t always require your hands to pump me up.

I have so much love to give myself

and when I do my hope and health

Find often times a little extra love in my cup is more than enough.

Sara Corum: A simple and short reflection:

Often forgotten.

Sara Corum Simple is often powerful. A sort of poetic monologue on this short reflection:

Did you mean me?

I think you were thinking of someone else.

I am never first and sometimes not even last.

I am not top of mind or a second thought.

I am a ___________.

I don’t think I have ever carried the word “my” on my lips as often as _________.

They ask for what they want.

They call out their needs.

They seek advice and give pushback.

They have boundaries.

Me? I have forgotten myself so many times that I couldn’t tell you what I want. What I need.

If there are words for loving myself,

My memory is tongue tied.

But, maybe.

You did mean me and I just couldn’t see it before.

Thank you for saying that I am _____________.

For seeing and saying what I wasn’t noticing about myself.

Perhaps I can love myself and all of…

My quirks

My imperfections

My passions

My laugh

My smile

My happy tears

My make-up-less face

My bed-head

My unfiltered sleepy talk

I didn’t realize that this is what love looked like when I thought I was alone and no one was looking.

Like just being me and comfortable in my skin.

Maybe I can be like that more often, when I know others may be looking.

If I can be at peace then, no doing but just being, I think I can truly say that loving myself won’t be forgotten anymore.

Justin Swallows: I’m thinking along the lines of how you can’t pour out of an empty cup… help yourself first so you’re strong enough to help others. Being the best you for anybody else actually starts with self love and self care. Maybe I’m off base, but those are the concepts that initially came to mind.

Justin Swallows I appreciate this perspective. I feel like I have been swirling around that concept all day. Here are some initial explorations of putting my own words to this:

There is something just for me

While yet sometimes out of reach.

It never strays away, waiting for my yes to come

I can offer a gift in exchange,

A feeble offer of this frame.

Something to prove that I am worthy to be known.

But, I know my offer may well be set aside

as the cost of such grace is greater than I could ever supply.

Just for me.

Love that never fails

Offerings for a future unwritten.

Inside me.

A fountain I thought I’d let run dry

until my open heart welled up inside

My weakened walls now fortified

So that I can be the love someone else needs.

Alongside me.

Full and wanting for my sails

Winds that pull along toward living water at the shoreline life’s springs

I’m all filled up for you.

An empty cup no longer true.

I carry in my heart an offer of Your welcoming.

God can offer a gift through my hands,

More than a promise or plans.

Nothing is asked of you to gain from this journey.

I know because it was given to me with a covenant

A voice that called even when I thought little of my life.

Just for me.

Love that never fails

Offerings for a future unwritten.

Inside me.

A fountain I thought I’d let run dry

until my open heart welled up inside

My weakened walls now fortified

So that I can be the love someone else needs.

Maria Randolph: Self love is the unconditional bond of your true identity....You are the extension of God himself. This is why he loves us so.

Self love is healing wounds, and watching your inner child return. To which you must reparent with validation and helping your inner teen to set healthy boundaries even with your adult self...meaning just because you can doesnt mean that you should. Its also knowing where and when to let go...of old hurts, expectations, limitations, belief patterns,self imposed ceilings, the identity the world gave you at birth. You only identify by your first name + child of GOD =Love

Maria Randolph thank you for offering these thoughts that I might wrap around and reflect upon. Here is a first go at some musings on what you have shared. Some replies to others have felt more like music lyrics. These however feel more like a poem.:

The pendulum of my heart need not be a playground of isolation.

I know it hurt.

No push to increase the upswing.

No rise to sitting.

Only seeing a horizon out of reach and a vantage point too still with no wind to tilt my world back up right again.

Only down.

Only sitting.

Only fallen.

and no one there willing to kiss the pain to make it better.

No. Today is not yesterday.

Today, my child, you will know joy.

Today, my beloved, you will burn bright.

Today, myself, you will.

You will live.

You will fail.

You will get back up with curious eyes.

You will experiment with your emotions and rumble with wonder.

You will pray, and choose, and trust.

You will love yourself so deeply that even the uneven and awkward path will turn out to be the right one.

How you say? How do I know this way is the right way back to myself?

Because any decision made out of rhythms of healing love in action is a good decision.

Because I love you.

Because in you there has always been and always will be a child worth loving.

Just because, really. Isn’t that enough of a reason to love yourself?

The sky is calling your name and it is time to embrace the rotation of the world.

to spin, and spin, and spin, until the flicker of fear transitions into the flutter of possibility and we say to ourselves, once the rush of the upswing is over, the teeter totter patterns have gone, our vision has come back to center, and we’ve slept a good nights sleep, “Let’s do it again.”

Next Step:

I'll be producing and publishing the song privately in my online community soon and make it accessible for playback and download only for paid members. It was already risk enough posting these drafted creative writings via social media and my blog, but I think having the record of the original creations is helpful should issues with publishing and copywrites arise in the future.

If you are interested in being part of my community, there are more membership options to come, but you can join today at just $7 per month. (This will officially launch and release features and content in stages beginning at the end of March 2026.) Many thanks to all of my early adopters.

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