WELL BEING: SELF-LOVING

‘Allegory of the Vanity of Earthly Things’
Unknown Master, French (active in 1630s in Paris)

While looking good and feeling good maybe seen by others as vain, especially if others can see it: by how you’ve changed, or notice it by your behaviour. It must also be remembered, that it is also part of self-loving, in an empowering way.

This positive vanity, is not by only focusing on looks, which is a surface level of ‘Acceptance of Self’, but by going much deeper, as it’s a social label given to those who care about themselves. And yes, this getting to know another, does take time and effort, going beyond a person to call another person ‘vain’ to look for other qualities. If they accept the challenge. As it is partly down to self-discovery, and not to impress others, but to have a better positive self-expression of themselves and others.

As, there are some people who judge others, on how vain supposedly they are, which can have a negative connotation on someone’s self-esteem. If they accept the stereotypical concept without challenging it, rather than focusing on the positive, that is, how self-loving are they. For I believe, if you love yourself, your love grows for others too. It reflects back to others, not as a mirror image but a lens. It means you have a greater capacity for humanity.

For negative ‘vanity’ is what others may want see, when they you look at you, and they do this on three areas:

• how close you are to being natural ie. realism
• how much time it’s taken to look groomed, ie. idealism
• how aligned is it with personality and gender, ie. moralism.

But, is this doing your well-being any favours? Especially if it means, that they who judge, only wanted to focus on the surface anyway. As they couldn’t be bothered to get to know the deeper person beyond the “vanity” stereotype in their own minds. And their value of you, which is linked to their own ‘Sense of Self’, as to where they place their own self-worth on, which they hide from view. And when you’re measured on the vain metric standard, in this way, it means, that it’s to another’s expectations, it’s to another’s feelings, and it’s to another’s aesthetics. But their lens should be adjusted.

For ‘vanity’ itself does no harm to another person, when you think about it. It just means, as far as I can tell, that the positive ‘vain’ confident person, is not seeking another’s attention to authenticate them, but have their own validation in place, to feel good about themselves.

However, there is a deeper-connection to ‘vanity’, that can also be positive to our well-being. And that is by taking in the whole person. And the whole person, in every aspects loves themselves from inside-out, as well as, from outside-in. This is called Self-Loving and Self-Expression.

Why is this important? Self-Esteem, Self-Respect and Self-Regard.

The consequence of a low self-esteem, is the fear of disappointment, of how others may see someone, who takes pride in how they look and/or think of themselves. Self-Care and Self-Loving needs attention to do otherwise is neglect.

The effect of this, is the level of respect associated with the amount of how secure one feels within oneself, to withstand the negative or bias judgements, is crucial to well-being and having Self-Respect.

Thereat having some Self-Regard is about the amount of compassion one is showing to oneself, that you may not meet other expectations, but you can certainly meet your own.