Self Reflection

Love your neighbor as you love yourself. You can’t really love your neighbor unless you love yourself – at least this is what is popularly taught. I don’t believe that. As the years have gone by, I am astonished that I ever parroted such a notion. In fact, I believe it is impossible to love yourself unless you first love your neighbor. Sounds absurd? It certainly runs contrary to our popular, self-centered cultural mentality. It even flies in the face of what is popularly taught in the Church. Of course this is not really a revelation; the Church has hardly been immune to the infiltration and subsequent assimilation of pop-culture ideals, even the veneration of self.

But I don’t want this to sound merely religious or sermonic. I want to argue that deference to/for “the other” is the legitimate manifestation of true love for all people, even those who are not typically thought to be religious. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not suggesting that those people who have never encountered Christ have exactly the same capacity for emanating His love or fully understanding that love. How could they? Christians, for the most part, seem baffled by this antiquated notion of selflessness. Still, I want to suggest that all people were designed to receive, reflect, and release this thing called love from and to others.

Love should be understood as a fundamental nature that is “otherly-focused.” The whole world should embrace that notion, not just the Church. It should be an integral part of every relationship (romantic or platonic), every community and society, and every institution. The world would be better for it.

How can I argue that we should put others before ourselves? Is that even healthy? Don’t we run the risk of getting used or used up? How can we even truly love others until we love ourselves?

I think that Christians and people in general have been duped by the belief that love starts with the self. The truth is: the self doesn’t even start with the self. It begins as an awareness of others and develops as we imagine, interpret and internalize how we think others perceive us. This is called the concept of the looking-glass self. It can be summarized as follows:

1. We imagine how we must appear to others.
2. We imagine the judgment of that appearance.
3. We develop our self through the judgments of others.

This can be a shocking revelation when it is really reflected upon. It also becomes a considerable responsibility. In many ways, we really are our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers. Very often we sway the perceptions of others about themselves, whether for better or worse. People many times see themselves as they think we perceive them. And this process begins very early.

Babies begin to notice right away that their cries elicit a response in their environments. It would be difficult to know exactly when a baby realizes that it is a self, a distinct entity. But it is clear that at some point they are aware that they can affect the world around them and that there are other entities out there. In fact, this would be a good point at which to move back a step and underpin the idea of how we can even know we are a self.

The only way any entity could know that it has self is if that entity has something by which to objectify itself. I know that sounds very confusing, but let me explain. Suppose that you were the only entity in the universe. Nothing existed except for you. You are everything. How would you know that you existed? I mean, what would you compare yourself with? What would you contrast yourself against? How could you even know that you were an individual if there was nothing by which you could individualize yourself against? Does that make sense?

In other words, you couldn’t possibly know your self unless you knew that you stood in contrast to something else. You would simply just be. You could not be self-aware because you could not be aware of any other thing by which to objectify yourself as a self. I know all of this sounds confusing, but I promise that I will be leaving the esoteric stuff behind shortly.

Now for all of those theologically-minded folks who wonder how God could have self-consciousness and self-awareness if He existed before there was anything else, let me simply say this: the argument for a Triune God is strengthened considerably by understanding love as a selfless nature that is otherly-focused. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have forever enjoyed this communal love fest. God has always been self-aware precisely because He has always lived in community. Each member of the Godhead has been eternally focused on the other in an infinite dynamic that we call love. This gives God self-awareness, the ability to create ex nihilo, and defeats any notion of dualism whereby the Creator’s existence or self-awareness is dependent upon the creation.

There still might be some scriptural questions about the meaning of the opening sentence. Let me address that by pointing to another scripture first. Romans 12:10 closely associates being devoted in brotherly love with showing preference and deference to “the other.” But if we love ourselves first and foremost, it seems that this passage would make little sense. When the Bible says to love our neighbors as we love ourselves, I think that the point it is trying to make is this: everyone one loves his or her self; this is a common (even fallen) human trait. We are innately selfish, so the passage is using a literary device to make a point. I don’t think it’s trying to create a strict, linear theological formula here. The point is that, just like we love ourselves (not that this comes first), we should also deeply love our neighbors. I think this is something that resonated loudly with those that heard it. They understood the point. They did not take it as some formula.

What is more, I believe that we best love ourselves by loving other people. When we love others, it transforms them and makes them better individuals. In return, these transformed people project better perceptions about us through which we in turn internalize and define ourselves. Also, by preferring others, by always putting the needs of others ahead of our own selfish desires, we make the world a better place. And this better place is one of the best ways we can show love for ourselves by virtue of it creating a better environment in which we can live. Could you imagine what would happen if everyone chose to put the interest of the other above his or her own interest? We would all share. Starvation would be virtually eliminated. Crime would cease.

Of course people could abuse this proposition. But those abusing it would be abusing it because they failed to put the other first; they failed to love. And in a situation like that, perhaps one of the most loving things a person could do is to not enable this self-destructive behavior. This caveat guards against someone allowing another to abuse him or her. There must be a balance between longsuffering love that is willing to sacrifice and wisdom that will not allow an abuser to abuse his or her self by abusing others.

Now I am not so naïve as to believe that this can occur apart from the grace of God. I also don’t believe that it will happen in this system we call the World. It will happen when God’s redemption in Christ if fully realized, when we see Him and we are like He is. Still, this is an ideal for which we must all strive, regardless of how ultimately obtainable it will be in this lifetime.

Let me leave the above discussion behind for now. A lot more could be said to make the point, but that is well beyond the scope of what I am trying to do. Really, what I wanted to achieve in laying that earlier groundwork is simply this: I want us on the same page when I explain some things I am feeling.

*******

I am a very selfish person. The longer I live, the more I am aware of this shameful fact. I’d like to think that I am fairly selfless, that I am only self-concerned (a good thing) without being self-centered. But that is just not the case. Despite my knowledge of this, I still try to live my life in a way that is otherly-focused. Unfortunately, one of the things I “love” the most is tainted with a very distinct selfishness. I actually prefer holding on to this “love” rather than relinquishing it and suffering the loss.

Sure I could find many good reasons for holding on to it. I know that there are many benefits in my being involved with it. Yet, ultimately, I know in my heart that regardless of how many benefits I can enumerate, at the root of it there is a selfishness that cannot be ignored. Shame and pain do not allow me to fix my eyes on it directly. The prospect of loss and the vacuous feeling tearing at the hub of my heart cause me to defer dealing with it rather than show loving deference to “the others” I am hurting, not the least of which is God. And I am certainly not truly loving myself. If I were, I would not be hurting those I love so much. Their painful perceptions of me only reinforce a negative sense of self in me.

I know that the “Other” I should be focused on is Jesus. When we are fully focused on this Other, and when we rightly interpret His perception of us – His utter love for us – we are transformed and our self-perception changes for the better. Our true self begins to materialize, a reflection of the One who brought us into being.

But right now I cannot stand uprightly to peer directly into his eyes. Instead, sin and selfishness have me bowed over like an old man suffering from osteoporosis, only able to stare at myself. In fact, I began the unnatural curvature long ago when I refused to take my eyes off of myself. As time moves forward, my stature moves downward.

Christianne’s recent post has brought some light and liberation to my dismal state though. I cannot say that I can gaze on Him yet, certainly not eye-to-eye. But I am more likely to take a fleeting glance because I am more aware of His patience. And this loving revelation was received by simply being otherly-focused long enough to read an-other’s description of a similar journey.

We need each other. We need each other in order to know our selves, in order to help our selves. We need each other in order to love our selves. But we must first love others and the Other so that we can experience this love for ourselves.