On Loving Yourself
Papi, I'd like to like myself more
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¡Hola Papi!
In many ways, I’m your typical Asian gay. I was fortunate enough to go overseas to escape the conservative atmosphere of my home country. I remember when I first set foot into this new country (a "Western" one, which I won't name), I was optimistic about setting up a new life.
Fast-forward six years, and the "dream life" has been... rocky. I tried hard to make new friends, and even though I made some connections, many ended up petering out. Certain "friends" turned out to be vindictive and tried to exclude me from the friend group by spreading false rumors. My dating life? Absolutely miserable. Trying to find a guy who wants to have a relationship seems like an impossible task. And with the holidays coming up, seeing people talking about spending time with their loved ones makes me even more miserable, knowing how foreign my feelings of loneliness probably are to them.
When I try to find advice online, a lot of them steer the readers towards self-improvements: going to the gym, getting swole, reading pretentious books from [insert misogynistic white guy here], studying the blade and all that. But I'm not a rich CEO going through a midlife crisis and/or a divorce. I'm just a lonely gay guy who, as corny as it sounds, desperately wants to be loved and is failing at it.
All of this makes me wonder if my entire effort has been for naught, and that nothing is going to work out for me until I figure out how to love myself. We all know the good ol' RuPaulism: “If you don't love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love somebody else?” But is it really possible to love yourself even if you can't find love from others? How do I even go about loving myself? Any help is appreciated.
Regards,
Self Loveless
Hey there, SL!
I’ve been answering some form of this question for years now. This, despite my struggles with the same issue. Did you know no one can legally stop you from being an advice columnist even if your own life is in shambles? Believe me, I’ve checked.
For most of my life, I’ve dealt with a serious case of self-loathing. The long and short of it is that I’ve simply never liked myself very much. I’ve often found myself wishing that I looked different, that I had a different set of insecurities from the ones I’ve been saddled with, that I was someone else altogether. I share this not because I want sympathy, but because I want to be frank with you: I’m quite familiar with the experience of being unhappy with being me. It’s not fun in the least.
You know what I think is the worst part about it? The fragility. Self-dislike, such as it were, is a great inhibitor of self-expression. Self-dislike is rooted less in truths and more in suspicions. We suspect that we’re unattractive, or unintelligent, or untalented, or boring, but, cruelly, we’re not totally convinced. We can be swayed by evidence in either direction. That’s what interactions feel like when in deep self-dislike: evidence. Rejection is proof of our worst fears. Acceptance is a temporary balm, assuring us that we’re actually not correct about ourselves.