Like. Admire. Love. Adore.
I close my eyes. My sight is darkened. My mind is blank. My heart is adequate. My soul is at peace.
—
They say love is the purest and finest feeling to feel. They say when you meet a partner, who loves, adores, and respects you, you have one of life’s greatest gifts. While this might be true - in most cases - the greatest form of love one can acquire is the love of oneself.
“Learning to love yourself; it is the greatest love of all.” Whitney Houston.
When I was in middle school, my sister’s WhatsApp status was ‘Love Yourself First.’ For the longest. I thought the quote was cute for a caption or status note. But it wasn’t for a caption. It was a message.
Acquiring self love must be a skill everyone knows of. But very few have the ability to acquire. This is something that should have been introduced to us from when we were learning to understand people and us trying to make people understand us, yet in most cases, we learn this on our own.
We all grew up in different societies, different families and different cultures. The family and community one grows up in has quite a lot to do with how one sees oneself. Family most especially. My brother said, about a little girl, “her sense of self is influenced by how society presents her with what is and what isn’t. In this case, society is the people closest to her.”
There are homes in which one is belittled, made to feel insufficient, dumb, untalented and sometimes ugly. I don’t have to write it for you to know if the negative impact these would have in his or her life. Shyness. Lack of self confidence. Inability to share his or her thoughts or views. Numbness.
A woman, however, is a different case. As a society, we have an unspoken but omnipresent belief that a woman alone is an outcast, inherently flawed in some way. So she’ll tend to seek love or companionship in a man. To appear sufficient, to appear whole. To appear as a woman, to society. Even if the love the man provides is inadequate for a soul like hers.
I’ve read and watched, how women, over numerous generations were objectified. Sometimes, even in the Muslim communities. In ancient ages, (based on what I’ve read and watched) when a female child is born, the celebration is less than that of when a male child is born. And as she grows older, she is expected to spend time with her mother, helping out in the kitchen and learning the basics that a daughter and a future wife needs. No older than when the age of puberty reaches her, she is married off to a man, sometimes unknown to her. There, she is expected to be a good and obedient wife, submissive to her husband’s wishes and desires, mother her children and set an example for her daughters.
But should she be ‘cursed’ with being barren, she is deemed inadequate. Should she be a unable to cook, she is deemed skill-less. And should she be unable to please her husband, she is deemed ‘worthless.’
“God, when will you create a woman who will be fulfilled in herself, a full human being, not anybody's appendage?” Excerpt from Joys of Motherhood, Buchi Emecheta.
In the 21st century, I’ve read about the strongest of women, came across women with the most beautiful minds and watched the bravest of them.
But even in today’s 21st century, we still have women, unloved by themselves. We still have women, who seek fulfillment in men. We still have those women who are scared of what society would have to say, should she leave her marriage, with or without children. There are still a few of us women who are unable to imagine a life without a man.
And this, aches my heart everyday it crosses my mind.
But what is there to tell them when they were raised with these mentalities that belittle their existence?
So when the sea waves appear white in the darkness of 22:44 hours of the night,
And my feet are wet by the water at the shore of the beach,
I pray God shows you the power He has implanted in you, long before you were of existence, in the rising of the sun at dawn.