Why Do I Feel Unloved? How Do I Love Myself?

"More and more, the world around me seems cold and unfriendly. People, even family and friends, seem distant and detached. There's a void deep within me that always needs to be filled. I look for love wherever I can find it, even if it's an unhealthy relationship. I would do anything to be loved and to gain the affections of others. At times I feel abandoned by the world and rejected by everyone."

Although you desperately crave to be loved, you barricade yourself in, protecting yourself from rejection, pain, and hurt. Shielding the remains of your self-image is your first priority and necessary for your survival. You wont risk further damaging your self-image, even to gain much needed love and attention. While you crave to be loved, you cannot risk being rejected. If you don't let others in, then they cannot take part of you with them when they leave. When someone does manage to break through your barricade, you push the person away because you feel undeserving of the very love that you so deperately seek.

Widening the moat around you may be a facet of your own self-absorption. If you are too filled and consumed with your own ambitions, interests, and wants, there's no room for love. Love, like all emotions, is a reflection, and you cannot receive from others what you do not possess yourself. Those who are filled with greed and hatred feel only greed and hatred from those around them. Without love inside, your thirst can never be quenched by others, no matter how hard you seek.

Take Care Of An Animal

Having pets is one of the very best things you can do for your mental and emotional health. In fact, studies have shown that ill or injured people who take on the responsibility of caring for a pet recuperate much more rapidly. Why is this? One reason is that pets offer unconditional love and the joy of giving. They're easy to love, and it makes you feel good to give them your affection.

When you take care of someone who depends on you, you cannot help but fill up the emotional void. Once you give love, you attract it from other people and are more open to receiving it.

Do Loving Things Anonymously

Experience what it's like to give unselfishly, motivated by love or compassion, without being afraid that your generosity will be rejected. Donate books and clothes to a halfway house for battered women. Contribute toward a fund for sending underprivileged children to summer camp. Help support your local library, cultural arts center, or research institute. No one will turn your gifts away.

Love Yourself

It's ironic, but those who love themselves - those who appreciate their own worth and values, not those who worship only themselves to the exclusion of others - are loved by the rest of the world. It's almost like the common belief that banks are willing to lend money only to people who don't need it!

Make yourself an "excellent credit risk" by loving and being good to yourself - immediately. Don't wait until you've scaled Mount Everest or created the next big software merger. Just do it now. If you've been telling yourself for three years that one of these days you really are going to spend a week in that cabin by the lake, do it now. Go to that seminar you've been curious about for months. Take flying lessons. When you taste the zest and exhilaration that life holds, you become irresistable to other people. So don't deny yourself any longer - do it now! And don't worry that loving yourself means you have no room for loving others.

Why Do I Feel Unloved?