What is self-love anyway?

As an emerging business entering the ‘self-love market’ we thought it is time we explored self-love a little more, because it has been used to death, and often to sell beauty under the guise of health. 

The nature of love—how we should find it, traverse it and, yes, enjoy it—was the topic of many an ancient Greek bathhouse debate. In fact, long before Ru Paul asked “If you can’t love yourself, how the hell you gonna love somebody else?”, Aristotle proposed that “all friendly feelings for others are an extension of a man’s [ones] feelings for himself [them self]”. 

We know that if we self-love in a positive way, we not only feel better about ourselves but are able to love others more and better.

But today, the concept of ‘self-love’ is often invoked to justify all sorts of behaviours. Are the photos and updates we put on social media a proud expression of self-actualisation or a reflection of a self-image focused society? When we go shopping do we treat ourselves, or are we trying to buy our self-acceptance? Is self-love just a perpetuation of perfectionism? Esther Perel captures this tension beautifully: 

“Does a 'selfie' show the world our most empowered self or does it present a better-lit and maybe even slightly tweaked version of how we think we’d like to look? When people say 'love thyself,' I wonder, which one?”

In short, it is getting hard to distinguish between acts of self-care, simply looking after yourself, hedonism, unhealthy indulgence and self-obsession. Unfortunately we don't have a neat definition for you.

But the ancients might ask us to consider whether an act of ‘self-love’ is going to contribute to our self-esteem in an authentic, long-lasting way or will the instant gratification quickly fall away to burgeoning insecurities or an unrealistic sense of self-importance? We like the way the ancients thought, so often use this as a filter ourselves.

These are big and personal questions. But against the hurried landscape of 24/7 digital connection, we know that they are worth asking because the definitions are getting blurry.

So, below are some resources if you care to go deeper on this.

Resources To Go Deeper:

[Podcast] Bobo & Flex Podcast, "self love culture" could be why you hate yourself

[Article] Esther Perel, The Myth Of Self-Love (there are some great cues for personal reflection in this one) 

[Meditation] Kristen Neff, Self-Compassion/Loving-Kindness Meditation (20 minutes)

Words written in collaboration with Philosopher Eliana Horn.