Self improvement is the Highest Form of Self Love

Self Love

In Matthew 22:36–40, Jesus is asked which commandment is the greatest. His answer is direct and uncompromising: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.” He then adds that the second is like it: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Out of the 613 commandments, these two stand above all others.

What has always struck me, however, is what Jesus does not explain. He is very clear about how we are to love God, yet he never tells us how to love ourselves. Many assume self-love is implied—automatic, natural, unquestioned. But if self-love were truly assumed, the world would look very different than it does.

Self-love is not assumed. It is missing.

Self-love begins with self-respect. What does substance abuse say about the way we value ourselves? What does chronic overeating, neglecting our health, or abusing the body entrusted to us say about our reverence for life? If our bodies are temples, then how we treat them is a reflection of how we honor what God has given us.

Self-love also assumes self-worth. What does the relentless need to alter our appearance, to adorn and reshape our bodies in pursuit of approval, say about how we see ourselves? These questions are not meant to condemn, but to reveal. A lack of self-love often hides beneath behaviors we have normalized.

We could debate all day whether self-love should be assumed, but the evidence is all around us. I see far more expressions of self-rejection than genuine self-love—in myself and in others.

My understanding of loving “thyself” may differ from traditional interpretations. I wonder if Jesus was pointing beyond the ego and toward the I AM revealed in Exodus. I believe we are spiritual beings having a human experience. I believe our spirit not only belongs to God, but is of God—God dwelling within us.

Jesus echoes this in Luke 17:20–21 when he says that the Kingdom of God is not something to be observed or awaited, because the Kingdom of God is within you.

It may sound unconventional, but it makes sense to me that Jesus carefully explains how to love God, then commands us to love our neighbor as ourselves without defining self-love at all. Perhaps he assumed that loving ourselves meant loving the divine presence within us—the same presence we are commanded to love with our whole heart, soul, and mind.

In other words, we are called to love our neighbors in the same way we are meant to love the God within us.

Jesus speaks often—and urgently—about loving our neighbors, and it is here that many of us fall short in everyday life. We violate this commandment in ways so subtle they barely register. In traffic, through irritation and impatience. In public spaces, through contempt for those who move too slowly or inconvenience us. Toward service workers who had nothing to do with our delayed flight or disrupted plans.

We fail to love our neighbors through jealousy of what they have, lust for what is not ours, and quiet efforts to make others look smaller so we can feel larger. These moments may seem insignificant, but they accumulate into a posture of separation rather than love.

In Matthew 7, Jesus reminds us to practice discernment through self-examination. He warns us to remove the log from our own eye before pointing out the speck in our brother’s. This is not merely a moral instruction—it is an invitation to humility. And if we are honest, we fail to love our neighbors far more often than we would like to admit.

This is why understanding self-love is not optional. We cannot love our neighbors well if we do not understand how to love ourselves. And we cannot love ourselves fully without understanding what love actually is.

First Corinthians 13 defines love not as a feeling, but as a way of being: patient, kind, humble, enduring. Love does not envy, boast, or insist on its own way. It is not rude or self-seeking. It rejoices in truth and bears all things.

The question then becomes uncomfortable—but necessary.

Do we extend this kind of love toward ourselves?
Do we speak to ourselves with patience and kindness?
Do we forgive ourselves?
Do we endure with ourselves in truth?

If self-improvement is indeed the highest form of self-love, then we must begin by clearly defining what self-love actually means. Only then can we intentionally grow into it—both for our own healing and for the love we bring into the world.