My wife and I have a practice where we agree on a question, then we take 10 minutes to write each other a letter answering that question. After we write our letters, we exchange, read and discuss them. It is a great practice for married couples. I may write a blog about it sometime, but not today.
Instead, I want to write about one of the questions we had a few days ago. The question was, “How am I life-giving to you?” Wow, what a question! My answer? “I believe my positive self-image dramatically affects how life-giving I am.” Obviously, I wrote more in the letter over the course of 10 minutes. I am not sharing all the intimacies of the love letter I wrote my wife. But I did want to share the main point of my letter.
A person must love themselves before they can fully love others. Love is life-giving and I cannot give my wife or anyone else my love if I have no love for myself to give. Jesus said it this way, “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:30-31, NIV). There is a connection between how much we love ourselves and how much we are capable of loving others. You can only love others to the level you love yourself.
Most of the time, if not all of the time, we find that people are negative toward others because they have little to no love for themselves. Typically, only hurting people hurt people. The people who love themselves the most are the same people that others like to be around the most.
So, the more we love ourselves; and love God who is the ultimate lover and life-giver; the more we can love other people and therefore be more life-giving. If for some reason we have less love for ourselves then we have less love to give. It is almost like Jesus knew what he was talking about.
If you want to be someone who adds life to people instead of draining life from people, then learn to love yourself. Jesus loves you, other people love you. Learn to love yourself so you can pass on that love to others. One way to fuel our enthusiasm is to love ourselves in a way that flows into other people’s lives.
Never settle, live with enthusiasm, and turn the world upside down by loving yourself so much that you cannot help but love others in a life giving way!
Fuel Your Enthusiasm!
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Tommy Lanham is a dynamic, award-winning speaker who has been training individuals and organizations to ignite their God-given potential for 25 years. With a unique blend of Ziglar motivation and ragamuffin faith, Tommy delivers powerful, life-changing messages filled with humor, hope, and enthusiasm.
Tommy will empower, entertain and energize audiences to achieve extraordinary results and live a life beyond what they ever dreamed possible.
Tommy is dedicated to helping you make your next event the best you’ll ever experience. Your audience will laugh, learn and be inspired as he mixes enthusiasm and humor with motivational stories to deliver a high content message. You will look like a rockstar for hiring Tommy Lanham!
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