What is easier?

[Justin]

Wow, great discussion and many good points. To answer the original post,

Originally Posted by BRbeliever

What do you think is easier: to love yourself, or to love someone else? And why?

This to me is like a double edged sword. I spent most a lifetime disliking or not loving myself and thought it was much easier to love someone else. As I've aged and grown though this has changed.

For me, I think that in order to actually show love to someone else, it's almost imparitive to love oneself. Seems like without that feeling of love within myself, it's a fallacy to think that I can love someone else. Love is something more than just a word or expression that you can sticky-note someone with. I'm learning that love impressed internally will express itself externally and that expression of such will radiate from the person who loves themselves in the light of loving others.

True love in my opinion, cannot be given unless it's accepted first. You cannot give that which you don't know or haven't accepted within.

Loving oneself, I believe is the hardest thing to do. Yet, loving yourself will reflect love into our work, our play, our fellow man and everything else in our lives. When love is reflected into the Universal mirror, love is reflected back.

Originally Posted by BRbeliever

Also, do you think it is easier to love someone close to you, or to love someone distant? Why?

Again, this is a difficult answer. Love is much more and much deeper than I had ever known. Love isn't easy at all... lol. I think love is an energy that's generated within oneself and expressed in vibrations externally. So whether far or near, real love, (in my understanding) is an energy that has no boundaries of either time or space. It simply is.

Originally Posted by BRbeliever

Do you think your awnsers differ from what you think 'most people' will awnser?

Yeah. I think all our answers will differ based on our own individuality.

[Blue7Dreamer]

Hi! Whether or not loving oneself is a task one can achieve with ease depends on an individuals values and their perception of themselves. By following and recognising the positive attributes of oneself, it is possible to learn to love oneself. In this sense, it is also possible to love anyone else or indeed any other thing.

However there are differences between the definition of love in terms of loving oneself and loving another. The inherent difference being our ability to make changes in regard to our own thought processes, actions and choices in order to effectively attain the values we consider important.

In order for a person to love another whose choices conflict with our own values, one would need to sacrifice their own values, or be capable of overlooking the values one considers bad in another. This is on the presumption that love can be based on reason and can be learnt.

However when one speaks of loving another, it generally refers to the unchosen emotional elation which is a precursor to love, and therefore cannot be learnt.

[kennethamy]

Originally Posted by BRbeliever

What do you think is easier: to love yourself, or to love someone else? And why?

Also, do you think it is easier to love someone close to you, or to love someone distant? Why?

Do you think your awnsers differ from what you think 'most people' will awnser?

I think someone (Confucius?) once said that he who loves himself need not worry about having any rivals.

[Aristoddler]

I think it's easier just to love everyone equally and not try to separate them into categories.
Once you have found that you can truly love yourself, then loving others comes natural and that is when anger and hatred become emotions of the past.
Yes Kenneth, it was Confucius that you quoted.

[Nem]

Originally Posted by BRbeliever
What do you think is easier: to love yourself, or to love someone else? And why?

Also, do you think it is easier to love someone close to you, or to love someone distant? Why?

Do you think your awnsers differ from what you think 'most people' will awnser?

I would say loving someone else is easier because you accept them with all their faults. Whereas, if the same faults were in you, that will be harder to accept because you are responsible for yourself.

I think it is easier to love someone distant because in this case, you won't have to see the flaws in their character everyday. You will create a mental picture of all the positive things about them and keep loving them for that perfect picture. However, this type may dissipate quickly because there is lesser reinforcement present. But then that is not your question.

For the last question, I'd say my answers will differ from other people because I think most people find it easier to forgive themselves.

[philosopherqueen]

I believe it's easier to love others because loving yourself means that you have to accept everything about yourself, which can be one of the hardest things to do. When you have to change yourself constantly then you don't love yourself, your just trying to find someone in yourself that's easier to love.

I believe that it's easier to love someone close to you because those are the people who know you. They are someone you trust. I wouldn't just trust anyone in the world. I mean some people might not need people to talk to about problems, but I do, and I want to talk to someone where I don't have to go over all the details.

I'm not sure if my answer will differ from other's but some that I've read here confused me. I won't point them out, but some of you need to reread your responses and re think these things.

Love I believe is an unconditional feeling of trust and so much more. It's really hard to define.

[Doobah47]

I think we would find the beginning of emotional love (as opposed to attachment) in the mind and body of somebody in the throes of puberty. I think it is there that the love of people is strongest, that emotional feeling that overcomes the mind and causes such psychosematic stimulation. However, I think that alot of love is confused with romantic or platonic attachment - like the attachment to one's family, or to a wife.

I would first say that foremost in the mind of a teenager is the attraction to somebody whom they barely know, yet have developed a lust for, this lust becomes a form of love when the relationship begins to intertwine and the two start to affect each others development and form agreements through conversation and unified beliefs or activity.

Secondly, I would say that it is possibly easier to love somebody with whom one has minimal contact - the love of a memory of somebody; if that person had some kind of influence that you begin to admire or adore, then one can fall in love with the concept of a person, the actual person simply being a target and influence for one's imagination. When dealing with relationships one a regular or daily basis, it is easier for disagreements and dislike to occur, yet one somebody is distant and only really known in the imagination, then love can be formed in a much more idealistic way, and one could even continue loving the person when in a consistent relationship with them, having formed the bond through imagination.

[de_budding]

Love for me; is dutiful, a disciplined promise, sex plays no major part but child birth does.

We make our choices the right ones with our follow through, there's no excuses when it comes to love.
Dan.

[Drewry]

I think it is easier for us to think that we love rather than actual loving. It is far easier to love someone distant as they are an idea and an idea is absolute in our minds--it is either good or bad.