Back to the Garden Part 3: Self-Love: The War Between the Ego and the Higher Self

by Curtis Lang		print version
		print version (graphics)

The importance of Self-love as a lasting foundation for a successful love relationship cannot be overstated. Without true love of self, you have nothing to share with another but your own poverty of spirit.

According to the great ancient law of resonance and attraction, like attracts like.

To attract a great love in your life, you must have great love to share and that love must first of all be true Self-love, not egoistic love.

If you have not yet attained Self-love, by that same law of resonance and attraction, you will

Peony by J.Sherry

attract an egoistic lover who, like yourself, must work to overcome social and cultural conditioning, egotistical self-centered behavior, character flaws, mental misconceptions, emotional wounds, energy attachments and karmic limitations.

Self-love is the necessary prerequisite for all successful sexual relations.

Self-love is the first step up the ladder of love for any individual.

The second step is love for another individual human being, a spouse, a lover, or an intimate friend, a teacher, a brother or sister or child.

The third step is love for humanity, manifest as compassionate actions in the world.

The fourth step is a universal love that is beyond description, a mystical Unity with the Source of all creation.

This universal love allows us to be One with Mother nature, plants, animals, and humans, the greater Universe around us, and with sentient beings dwelling in the spiritual world, including the hierarchy of angels, Guides and teachers, great Saints, Ascended beings such as Buddhas, gods and goddesses, Devas and nature spirits.

We become consciously one with the source of creation -- the Zero-Point field of energy that lies behind and sustains all that exists.

So if you wish to learn to love others, and to love God fully, first love yourself. Love is giving. By giving love to yourself, you give yourself permission to love others, and to be loved.

Western religious traditions tend to emphasize the sinful nature of the human personality, the human ego, and so most of us growing up in the West did not receive many teachings on the importance of self-love.

In the West self-love tends to be equated with pride, vanity and selfishness.

Photo by J.Sherry

These are characteristics of self-love as experienced by the undeveloped personality or egoistic self, disconnected from the Higher Self.

The Higher Self is often called Christ Consciousness by Western mystics or Krishna Consciousness or Buddha mind in the East. Self-love as experienced by the Higher Self is Nirvana.

For the Christ within us to become the dominant aspect of our identity, the egoistic self must be subordinated to the Higher Self, according to mystical traditions of both East and West.

Only then can the Higher Self come to life. Only then will Christ be born within our hearts and minds. Only then will we see clearly, open our hearts and become one with Buddha mind in perceiving the true nature of reality.

It is equally important to strengthen our identification with the Higher Self, with Christ Consciousness, with Buddha mind. In loving that essential part of yourself that transcends the ego, you put yourself more fully in touch with the beauty of Nature that surrounds you on Earth and the sublime harmonies of the stars above.

The Higher Self is the doorway to all that is Divine, and love is the key that opens the door. In the next article in this series, Meditations on Self Love, you'll learn a meditation designed to help you release the ego's grip and bring you into closer contact with your Higher Self and all its Divine qualities.