Authentic Love
And then it hit me. When you truly love someone, you love who they are, and who they are contains all their imperfections. It’s our flaws that make us unique, and our uniqueness is what gives others something to love about us.
But if you can’t love everything about your flawed self, how can you ever truly love another, flaws included? You can’t love anyone, until you can love yourself, scars and all.
When you look in the mirror and begin to notice all your imperfections, remember that those who truly love you, love you for who you are, imperfections included. Attempting to change who you are for someone else is rarely be sustainable, until that change becomes an evolution of your true self. Loving authentically is about loving who you are, ALL of who you are, both the good and bad. To love authentically is to love unconditionally.
As we lose the ones we love, we may even discover it’s the flaws we miss most of all, so cherish them today.
There’s no need to force a change of who you are, because who you are is in a constant state of change already. It’s when we stop trying to force these changes that we discover the true self. Lasting self development unfolds naturally.
It’s your quirks, flaws, and imperfections that make you unique. And who we love is uniquely you. In fact, your effort to be someone else is actually one of the flaws we love about you :).
Unless you are being authentically who you are, true love cannot exist. The moments I truly feel true love for another is when I see a glimpse of their untethered soul.
When we focus on our own shortcomings, when we attempt to overcome that which we truly are, we fail to live authentically. If those around you insist you be someone you’re not, in order to gain their acceptance, then you will always struggle to find true love. On the flip side, if your expectations of the ones you love reflect anything other than who they already are, you are missing the opportunity for true love.
The longer I live, the more I see that we will always find things in ourselves and others we want to change. But true change occurs naturally, in it’s own time. As much as we wish anything was different than it is, it’s not. The older you get, the more you accept yourself and others for who they are, as you realize all those years of trying to force change didn’t make a difference.
It’s through acceptance that a seed of authentic love is planted. The more we accept ourselves and others for who we are, the more that seed of love grows.
While it’s easy to see the imperfection in ourselves and others, the perfect life contains all the imperfections that make us who we are. A perfect being is the accumulation of all it’s imperfections, which make us uniquely perfect.
True love is a matter of seeing past the human imperfections, into the soul of another and seeing the potential they often fail to see themselves.
True love is the catalyst to bring out the better self that lies within each of us.
Your soulmates love you for who you are, not who you’ve been, or who you’ll become… but who you are now — flaws not withstanding. You will encounter many soul friends throughout your existence if you live with a wide open heart. When you do, cherish and nourish them as you would a best friend, son, or daughter.
To look into the soul of another is to see past their imperfections. To see the true potential of who they will become is to accept who they already are.
Recognizing potential is the first step in realizing it.
To see the potential in yourself, begin by accepting all your imperfections first. Our efforts to change who we are only delay our true potential. The gift of time is that that we begin to overcome who we think we are to become who we truly are. The sooner you accept yourself and others for who they are, the sooner your true potential will be unleashed. Change is only friction to the way things are.
Here’s why this works.
For most of our life, most of us have been putting our focus on fixing our imperfections. From a young age, all our conditioning has been to fix what’s wrong with us. But as you begin to accept who you are, you will recognize the perfection in all of it. Instead of working against yourself, you’ll begin to ride with the current instead of against it. You will see how all those little quirks make you who you are, and the more you embrace who you are, the sooner you’ll realize your true potential.
Our efforts to fix who we are (and our attempts to fix others) is like swimming upstream. It takes far more energy and we don’t get very far.
As you begin to see your imperfections as a part of who you are (but not necessarily a part of who you need to be), you begin to uncover your true self, which you can then bring into the world. Those who love your true self will remain. Those who don’t are no longer your concern.
The opinions of others are no longer your concern.
The only thing wrong is believing any of it’s wrong. What’s wrong with you is right, from the perspective it makes you who you are, the uniqueness that is you. Never forget uniquely you is exactly what we love about you.
This writing arose from an unedited, unscripted, uniquely flawed, perfectly imperfect self, to demonstrate authentic love itself.
I hope I’ve inspired you to love (and live) more authentically. Now share the love!
