Your foremost purpose in life is to love your God with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul, and all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.  For this you were born and for this you live.  Make all other purposes subordinate to this. God is love and you are love.

You have been taught that to love yourself is tantamount to narcissism, to think of yourself is selfish, and to take care of yourself before others is self-centered and egotistical.  This is tragic. In fact, the opposite is true…Just as it is impossible to offer another a drink unless you fist fill your cup, it is impossible to offer your love to another if you have not first loved yourself. 

Unless you love yourself as God loves you, you cannot really love others. The quality of the love you experience for others is tied to the quality of love you have for yourself.  Therefore, begin by receiving God’s total and unconditional love for you, through you. Then love God back with all your heart and soul, mind and strength. From that union comes your love for those around you. By loving them, you love yourself and God, and the circle of love continues.

Your worth is incalculable, your importance without measure. Yet this is not a reason to love yourself. The love God has for you is not contingent on worth or importance.  God loves you because you are you and that love remains constant and unconditional.  Love yourself in the same way without condition and without reservation.  Treat yourself, then, just as God treats you.

Selected passages from chapter two of  Adolfo Quesada’s book, Loving Yourself for God’s Sake