If You Can't Love Yourself

When you live in a city as big and as dynamic as New York City, you can't help to notice the homeless problem. Homeless people are everywhere, in street alleys, on the subway, even in the lobby areas of 24-hour restaurants. They carry around small cups, buckets, or upside down baseball caps that contain loose change that they jiggle around like Christmas bells. These people are secretly hoping that others will be in the "giving mood" and slip them a dollar or two. Some walk around with numerous bags, or just one single carrying case. They look disheveled, dirty, desolate, and completely hopeless. "As if they have been cheated by fate." The sad truth of the matter is, they have. We are cheated by fate when we don't understand our value or purpose in life.

It is still the American dream to own a huge house, maybe a mini mansion with a two-car garage and backyard that is as big as a baseball field. Homeownership is important to a lot of people because it not only offers a sense of security, but it is a reflection of our accomplishments and wealth. A huge portion of people's income actually goes towards their mortgage payment, repairs, expansions, and maintenance of their house. Why is this? Because people understand the value of attaining wealth, of purchasing a property that is "supposed to" appreciate in value.

I mentioned before that the physical world actually mirrors the spiritual world. Only in the spiritual world, our house is represented by our stability, security, confidence, and love that we have for ourselves. Our self -love is a measurement of what we have accomplished spiritually. With this said, the more work we put into ourselves, the more we should appreciate in value. All religions preach about self-love, for it works as a foundation for all facets of development. How many times have we heard the phrase, you can't love anybody if you don't love yourself? This saying is very true, for your self-love is a representation of your inner wealth.

In Ifa, we stress the concept of reciprocity because everything in nature is an exchange. But if you don't have self-love, there is no exchange. You become a beggar, a vagabond who drifts through life with no real direction or purpose. People don't like you, or respect you, and treat you like the trash you smell like, because you have nothing to give. You are a beggar, and you have defied all the rules of nature. Because you want to receive something without giving, you want to get more than what you put in. You want to cheat the system, but in the end, you're just being cheated by a bigger system called fate.