So What Does it Mean to be Loved?

We are beings that need love to survive. Be it love from family, a friend, a spouse we all need to know love and to share our love. Love can look differently to different people. For some of us it means receiving gifts or someone doing something nice for us. For others it means conversation, reliability, companionship or even liking the same foods. We can usually identify love when we feel it and hope the other person reciprocates our feelings.

If you have lived any length of time, you also know that love can be heartbreaking and fleeting. Here one day and gone the next. Love is miraculous and cruel, surprising and constant. We ‘love’ pizza or an outfit, we ‘love’ a sports team or even a favorite meal. All of these things are love at different levels for different things.

We all know what I feels like to be deprived of love. We feel empty, unwanted, neglected or even invisible. When we go too long without feeling loved all sorts of things happen. We get cranky, self conscious or even begin to doubt other things in our life. It is like being thirsty and not being able to consume enough water to quench that thirst. Like air love is necessity for humans to survive. And we have all met that person who has gone so long without seeking love for fear of rejection or experiencing love because they have had a terrible past, we may not be able to name it right away yet it boils down to a basic need to experience love.

The best place to start feeling loved is within ourselves. People will love us they just may not always know how to express so that we understand it as love. So we need to look deep inside and know that we are worthy, special and capable of being love and sharing our love. We have to love ourselves before it is possible for others to share their love. Because if we do not love ourselves then why would anyone else?

So today take time to show love, give love, and spend a few moments reminding yourself that you are loved and loveable. To love another person – and yourself – is to see the face of God.