The Google Trend shows that “self-love” is on the rise for the past five years. Probably, self-love gets popular as people become more aware of the importance of mental health. The increasing discussion on self-love happens widely on social media, too, as we have more resources promoting self-love online. But if we wish to run further, we need to admit that loving ourselves can’t be the panacea for all the discomfort that we feel.
Before we jump into the reason, let’s take a moment to reflect who influence how we view ourselves. This reflection might give us a clue on why and how we learn about ourselves. I found that the explanation for this question goes back to one of our key characteristics: that we’re not called social animal for no reason.
Humans always have this urge to understand themselves and to understand their surroundings. The process of learning oneself can affect the understanding of surroundings and vice versa. Therefore, it’s important to remember that how we view ourselves is a result of many interactions with external parties — our family, teachers, friends, work, the media, and many other parties, including the systems we build. In 1902, Charles Cooley used the term ‘looking-glass self’ to refer to how others view us can influence how we see ourselves. Cooley argues that we didn’t “invent” ourselves in isolation but rather in the social setting. We use our prediction about other people’s views as a clue to recognize ourselves.
But being a social creature at heart, our species didn’t stop there. We also compare. Yep, even though we said comparing ourselves with others can be destructive (and to some extent, this is true but I won’t talk further about it in this article), we’re not wired to ignore what others are doing. We can’t stop comparing because that’s the way we learn our position in the group. However, to see its function, we should look at the (oversimplified) process of comparing for a while. When we compare, we assess both ourselves and others. It helps us to identify our skills or abilities. Comparison helps us to adjust to the rules and identify roles we should play in a group. This process nudges us to build our understanding of self, too. That is why we could say “I’m a perfectionist” because we’ve seen people behaving differently.
However, many of these self-love how-tos put “don’t compare yourself” as part of its tips. We know this is almost impossible. Humans can’t stop comparing themselves because comparing is part of learning. But we surely can change the way we compare and use the information.
As much as we learn about differences, we also consider what makes us similar to others. Examining our similarities with others allows us to identify to which group we belong, starting from ‘relationship’ (a parent, a sister) to interest (reading, playing games, doing sport). We call these variations social identities (Deaux et al, 1995). Recognizing the group also contributes to our learning process on how we should act as part of the group. It takes part as our identity, too. That’s why there comes pride or esteem when we feel that we belong to a specific group (especially when we think that this group is highly relevant or connected with us — because we don’t feel the same depth of connection across the groups). However, to feel that we belong to a group is a challenge in this (both modern and post-modern) era. We’ve long learned to cut our ties to whatever told us who we are and what we should as a consequence of individuation process. As we taste much of freedom, we also become lonelier.
Interestingly, in the age of information and intensive access to social media, our audience has increasing influence over our views. We start to consider our audience’s judgment to determine how we should behave. I assume we have this intention to be seen in certain ways, so we imagine what we should say or show to express the intention. For example, we didn’t want people to think that we offended someone (or the opposite, we indeed wanted people to know that we offended someone). If we act consistently for a longer period, we can say we are building a reputation. Building reputation is a thing we do every day — and that also shapes the way we (and others) see ourselves. Building reputation is something that our ancestors also did to ensure that they deserve the status or deserve to be part of the group.
The last party on the list is the system. The system — although abstract — shapes not only the individual’s view but also the whole society’s view. The most direct example of how the system can influence our views is gender (in)equality. Women are expected to act in certain ways and agree to what people choose for them. It’s no surprise that women and people from vulnerable groups are more prone to impostor syndrome — because the system said that no matter how hard you try, you’ll never be good enough to fit in.
So, we have this list of factors that influence how we see ourselves. We know that our experience with these parties is not always flowers and butterflies. People who matter the most for us may have ever said something that pierced our hearts (even until now), and we believed thus adopted it. Not to mention that mental health awareness on the previous generations is low. We’re also taught the norms and standards (which some of them desperately need refinement). We internalized the advertising slogan and representation of what could be called decent. We let the market tell us how we should value ourselves as an individual — which gradually leads to a massive reduction on many aspect of self. We could keep pointing out what has been wrong the whole time. These are the symptoms of the broken relationships with others, our work, things bigger than us, nature, and eventually — with ourselves. No wonder we finally think and act harshly towards ourselves and each other.
The self-love movement helps to detect lies we’ve been told about ourselves, but it doesn’t automatically provide the truth. It feels like we’ve figured out the wrong answer yet when we look around we still can’t spot what’s right — because there’s only a little change happening on those abovementioned factors. It’s the same as going to a doctor to cure your disease just to find another poisonous food at the shop on the next day because that’s the only thing available — or at least, the most ubiquitous one — so we conclude it must be the only option that we have. We eat it because it feels better than starving to death.
We, humans, are the outcomes of many interactions and systems. Being a collective creature helps us to survive. It’s worth questioning whether our current systems enable us to love ourselves or not. We can’t achieve the true freedom to express our love towards many things, including ourselves, until the changes also happen in other aspects: the way we interact with our family, learn at school, treat people from different groups, produce-share-consume the information, shape our working culture, establish the system, etc. There is no doubt that we find satisfaction in talking about or focusing on ourselves, but if we wish to improve the situation for the longer term, we need to change our point of view.
To restore our point of view means to challenge and change what influences it. It also means we need to admit that we can’t do this alone. We need help. We need to help each other. Perhaps, removing some pressure we put on ourselves — that we must master how to do self-love no matter what — and starting to challenge our surroundings to find the pieces of truth that have been hidden, is also an act of love on its sense.
