Love Yourself First so that You can Love Others!

Who is Your Most Important Valentine?

It’s that time of year…Valentine’s day and love is in the air. Ask SF Bay Area Author, Coach and Speaker Christine Arylo who should be the most important Valentine on your list and the answer just might surprise you.

by Charlotte Manz, SF BAWJ Staff Writer

Christine Arylo

Arylo, author of Choosing Me before WE, Every Woman’s Guide to Life and Love and creator of the Madly in Love with Me event, says that YOU are the most important person to love.

Here’s what she shared with the SF Bay Area Women’s Journal on why loving yourself is so important!

What Does Choosing ME…
before WE mean?

It’s no secret that all women want to be loved. The problem is that they are looking in the wrong places. The real secret is that the love and relationship you crave starts with the love and relationship you have with yourself.

Choosing ME before WE means knowing yourself, being honest with yourself, loving yourself, and trusting yourself FIRST.

Then consider HE and WE. But never settle for less than what your heart and soul desire.

Why is loving yourself so important?

How could it not be? We talk all the time about self-esteem, which of course is really important. But self-esteem without self-love is not enough. While self-esteem can give us confidence and external success, the real happiness most of us seek comes from a deep love of self.

Without self love, we end up in relationships that don’t support or respect us, that take more than they give and that reflect our own lack of deep unconditional love for the woman we are right now, today.

How does one “fall in love with themselves”?

Falling in love with yourself is not easy, I won’t lie to you. But it is possible. And it all starts with a set of 5 vows every woman must make to herself, of which I go into great detail in the book.

They include: I promise to…Know the real ME, Be completely honest with ME, Love ME unconditionally, Trust ME and Never settle for less than my heart and soul desire! With those 5 vows, you are firmly on your way to a life-long love affair with your most important partner, yourself.

Isn’t choosing ME before WE narcissistic and selfish?

Unfortunately that is such a common response. If you actually look up the definition of self-love in the dictionary the definition is narcissism. It’s crazy!

We wouldn’t tell our kids, “Hey you, don’t take care of yourself, don’t love yourself, don’t make your happiness a priority.” But we tell ourselves that all the time!

Notice that the book title is not choosing me instead of we…it’s choosing me before we. Choosing me before we means giving yourself 100% permission to be who you are, to want what you want, and to create the life that delivers it, first.

Contrary to what women have been taught for centuries, there is no honor in giving and giving until you’ve got nothing left, or compromising your dreams for another.

With attitudes like that, there is only exhaustion and frustration.

It’s time for a new story: the more you give to you, the more you can give to others!

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