How Love Results in Self Confidence:
Expanding a Network of Love
“Nothing can make up for the absence of someone whom we love, and it would be wrong to try to find a substitute. … It is nonsense to say that God fills the gap, he does not fill in, but on the contrary, he keeps it empty and so helps us to keep alive our former communion with each other, even at the cost of pain.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer
At times I ask people if they’re in any important relationship.
“Are you in love, or do you have some good friendships?”
“No,” the person frequently responds, “I’m not yet prepared for that. I want to get my personality straightened out, then perhaps I’ll be ready to seek some intimate relationships.”
On the contrary, that is like a grown-up man delaying exercise till he is in shape. Individuality and relationship must take place hand in hand.
The belief that a positive personality must certainly go before any positive relationship is one of the bromides of present self-help literature. Several books and seminars point out that one should not rely on others for support. It should all come from the inside, they say.
However it is a chicken-or-the-egg question. It is a fact that the greater our self-confidence, the better we will interact to other people, but healthy self-regard is not exposed on some land mass where we gaze at our navels. We are identified partly by the people that surround us, and personality is largely improved by society. Thus one of the most certain ways to increase confidence is to ensure you have a lot of love in your life, to take the needed steps to build a network of supportive relationships.
One way that love results in self-confidence is when you: Nurture People Who Help You Grow.
Let me give a simple example. I have met a woman on her thirties. My personal feeling of sorrow is nothing compared to her. Her scenario is like this: she lives in a huge residence house. Every morning, she eats her breakfast alone, goes down to her parking garage, drives out onto the expressway, and parks in another underground parking lot beneath her office building. There she starts to work in a small workplace, working alone, with not much communication with the people whose workspace surrounds her. She frequently eats her lunch alone, and at the end of the day, drives back to her residence house and goes into her empty house, where she more or less never worries to cook herself a hot meal, instead eats while standing at the sink. Then at around 7:00 or 8:00 p.m. she goes to bed, thinking that she can fall asleep, “because,” according to her, “those 11 or 12 hours are the only respite I have from this terrible solitude.”
It is no doubt that this woman has to be hospitalized four times and that she has been in and out of therapy all her adult life. The ancient rabbis were correct when they said: “Anyone who goes too far alone goes mad.”
It is simple to look at such a confused individual and dismiss her lack of friends as a consequence of an abrasive self-image. There maybe some truth to that, for sure. Although she dreadfully yearns for friendship – and particularly for romantic love – she does plenty of things to scare away anyone who draws close to her, and these rough limits to her self-image require lots of work. Therefore it will not do, as some counselors have it, to focus on getting her personality repaired, and then turn her loose to interact in the world. We should cope with her interpersonal difficulties one at a time, and she and I should persist till some camaraderie start to come together. I must be there to help her pick up the pieces when her relationships break, to help her work out what she did wrong, and to take remedial measures to make sure of more success next time.
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