Can we really LOVE ourselves?

Just this morning i was talking to my friend, telling her about my acne condition and how everywhere i go, people ask me about my condition first thing, forget greetings and all, and how i have been working on treating it for quite some time, but today in the morning someone again commented, sharing their 'wisdom' on what not to eat and what all to do to treat it, like i wasn't doing enough already? So, i was quite upset and fed up of all this, and broke down, telling my friend how i hated my life and my face, and how i am doing so much and i don't want to be this way. And two things that she said really got me thinking, i kept pondering over it in my room, with loud music playing, shutting myself from the world existing outside, and kept thinking till i started writing this post. So, it's late in the afternoon and i'm still trying to figure out the depth of the two things that she said.
She simply said, 'LOVE yourself, and just who you are and forget what people say' AND 'We all have issues and problems but we try to work them out and move on right?'
And that was the end of the conversation with her, and i told her i'll talk to her later, i need some time.
And THAT moment to NOW, these things said by her are all i can think of and try and make sense of. Although, I've heard this stuff a lot of times and even told people about how they need to start loving who they are and not care about the world and just look ahead and move on, but you know what they say, 'it's easier said, than done.'
So, now that i am facing a similar circumstance as most teenagers, looks, shape, size, all that takes over the minds of teenagers, but for me, this  holds a bigger and deeper significance in life.
'LOVE yourself for just who you are and forget what people say'.
P!NK's song, Don't let me get me, {http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asaCQOZpqUQ}  is  the perfect song that expresses our insecurities about ourselves, fights with ourselves, and how we pray we were someone else, living someone's else's life. Love, was never said or told to be easy. Loving a person, passion, or anything for that matter, requires lots of patience and tolerance and is not an easy job. Love is never happily ever after, there are always times when one hates it, feels like giving up on it, feels hurt, depressed, but there are also times when one feels genuinely happy, on cloud 9, blissful, like everything in the world is beautiful again. But how do we know when love is happy, beautiful and blissful?
We know it when we have felt hatred, depression, hurt, and it is when we have sensed these emotions that when we experience the opposite, we know that it is happiness, that the world is beautiful and blissful. So, i guess to feel one emotion, knowing what the opposite feels like is necessary. A single way hardly ever works, fries need to be made with salt, pizza needs oregano and chilly flakes, a drink needs ice etc. Similarly, even love is a two way process. we can't expect anyone to love us and accept us, if we can't love ourselves. It's pretty simple, if a person is trying to impress someone and is trying to be like a third person, in looks, shape, size, success etc, it really doesn't make sense, because then, instead of being with the person who's trying to impress the other by imitating the third person, one might as well just go and be with the third person directly. Why go through the pain of being with someone not confident enough and wasting all the energy on trying to be someone else?
Each individual in itself is different and that's what sets each one of us apart from the other. True, loving oneself is not easy, because LOVE is not easy, but as another song by P!NK says 'Try Try Try' {http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTCDVfMz15M} so, i guess our best shot is to try and love ourselves just the way we are, because that's what's different about us and that's what people will love. YOU. Not who you're trying to be.

'We all have issues and problems but we try to work them out and move on right?'
In the end when i though about this, i actually laughed at myself and felt disappointed in myself. ALL, each and every one of us in this world is currently dealing with some or the other issue. Someone's worried about the next meal for his family, someone is dealing with a deadly disease, someone must be worried about an accident that took place and whether the person is gonna make it or not and so much more. And what am i worried about? A few zits on my face. Now that I've explained it, i'm sure the one reading it, feels like laughing as well, and might think how immature of me to let something like this bother me, right?
True. These are very little, time wasting issues, and after counting one's blessings and looking at the suffering around, one feels contented with where they are. And one must be in a happy place, for we all deserve it, we try and work out our issues, if solved Great!, but if not, well, then i guess it's just time to move on.
Sleeping and dying are quite similar situations. When one is in deep sleep, it's just you, and your dreams and nightmares, which are all yours, no one knows, no one peeks. It's just you, alone in paradise. And when one dies, the place where one goes to, is all yours. No one to interrupt or disturb what you do or where you go. One can go to that far far away land.
So, i guess in this world, even while existing on this earth with billions of people around, we need to go into that trance, where we do just what we want, be who we are, and just Forget what people say, because the bored people in life need some entertainment and someone to share their 'wisdom' with, which otherwise got them nowhere, and hence, they wish to 'enrich' us with their thoughts. But we know just what we need, so i guess we can choose to separate out all that we hear into 'trash' and 'sense', and just move on and be in that happy place in life, because Lord knows,
We Deserve to Love Ourselves.

When being selfish becomes a good thing..

SELFISH, a term defined by wikipedia as  'Lacking consideration for others; concerned chiefly with one's own personal profit or pleasure', is usually considered as a negative aspect of one's personality, but you know what they say, "Everything has it's pros and cons' and i agree. I say being selfish has some really great benefits and every now and then we all need to be selfish for ourselves and for the people around us, saving them the misery of looking at a sulky face everyday. Taking out time for oneself, pampering oneself, doing something on your own that you don't want anyone else to know you did, turning a blind eye to people's concern for one day won't kill them. Just caring about yourself for once, it feels great. There are two extremes to this notion of being selfish once  awhile. One can go to the absolute extreme of being selfish and caring about oneself at the cost of hurting others, which definitely is not what i mean here. My blog entry, dated 20th August 2013, titled, 'My Time, My Space',  is somewhat along the same lines as this one. It's about taking that time out just for yourself, it may be at the expense of cancelling a plan with your best friend, or dinner with your family, but this little time is about saying HELLO to yourself, while the whole week you may have helped a friend through a tough time and heard all her miseries, it's time for you to listen to yours, your issues, your miseries and search deep within for solutions to those issues and problems, for it is the human itself, who can solve it's own problems, be it any kind. The strength to face a challenge comes from within, as self motivation. In this big competitive world, we often find ourselves lost, and we don't realise what we may be turning into, the slaves of gadgets, and documents and desk jobs which demand our attention almost 24*7. Even when we go to sleep at night, it is to wake up to the sound of the alarm to start our structured day, which begins with us offering our labor for money. We are so surrounded by activities for money, that we often find the humanity inside us, lost, and before it's lost forever, we need to be selfish and go against what the world demands and just sit for a cup of coffee with ourselves. Rediscover, rejuvenate, not care about the amount of work that awaits, or the boss' mail that requires urgent reply, because we all know, that until and unless it's  the question of life and death, nothing is going to change in a few minutes or even hours for that matter. Taking out that little selfish time once a while, is very important, because it tells your soul that you know it exists, it reassures your soul and conscience that you matter, that you know who you are. Before being an employee, student, wife, mother, husband, friend, any relation and role, you are YOU. YOU is what defines all the other relations and roles in this world. So, don't immerse in these roles and relationships so much that one looses themselves. YOU, I, ME is very important for a peaceful, happy and contented living. As one of my lecturers often tells us, "We need to stop existing, and start living". 8 words, but they have defined the way one must live each day. Each day should be a memory well lived, and that starts when you're a happy person, doing what you like, and being with yourself as well, being a little selfish, just for little sweet memory of you, with yourself. My roommate once told me that the best birthday that she had was when she was at her new job, didn't know many people, she booked herself a hotel room, left her phone at home, spent the whole day and night at the hotel, all by herself, enjoying the spa, the massages, dinner, she was a happy person when she woke up the next day. It was a day well spent with just herself, and it is the best birthday memory she has. So, yes, maybe few of her friends, colleagues, family wanted to celebrate with her, but she celebrated herself, and those friends and family are still here to stay. So, a little time for yourself, a little selfish attitude and a little YOU,  never hurt no one. :)
Cheers