Love Yourself

I'm not a funny person. Ask any of my friends to describe me, and I hope my sincerity and thoughtfulness are mentioned. I doubt that my humor will be. I try to live my life with a quiet dignity and integrity. That's why I have almost no typical college stories of drunken mistakes. It sometimes makes me a little sad that I don't have any fun stories for parties. There's rarely a moment when I can say, "Oh, that reminds me of this one time..." I'm not the crazy best friend who remembers how we almost got arrested. I wasn't there. I'm the 3rd best friend who you tell that story to.

Of course I don't want to be boring. Who wants to win Never Have I Ever? Of course, to me, there's nothing more interesting than being smart. The person I want to be knows German. He can talk about his favorite paintings and books on an intellectual level. He can engage with you about philosophies of music and discuss how to keep both Classical music relevant and be receptive to new voices that speak for our generation. He takes creative pictures and watches foreign films. Doesn't my hypothetical dream self sound interesting? He'd even like to be able to make his own mixed drinks, because he's classy, dammit.

But he also wants to be funny. He not only wants to treat his friends like family, but he wants to be considered family by his friends. He'd like to be rid of his inferiority complex. That's not hypothetical at all. Sometimes I think that if I were funnier or more interesting, people might actually think about me and send me a message.

In my twisted, analytical mind I can teach myself to be funny, just as I could teach myself anything else, through practice. Of course, everyone has innate skill ceilings for various things, and maybe it's not in my nature to be funny. But I have the rest of my life to work on figuring it out, if I so desire.

That's not the point I want to make here, though. Feeling that Jesus loves me changed how I see myself. I may not be who I want to be, but I am able to love myself regardless, safe in the knowledge that God thinks I am worthy of love. And if I feel lovable, I'm more ready to trust that the people who I love love me in return. At our last meeting, Amber asked me how I thought I accepted love. I didn't know what to think of that concept, but I see now that I didn't believe that I was loved.

People aren't perfect, and they don't love perfectly. I don't. But if I love myself, maybe it'll be easier to be lovable. How can I expect others to love me if I don't love myself? And maybe I'll be that much closer to being that hypothetical dream me. And maybe he'll get a girlfriend. Because that guy is a real catch.