All my life I've been told that before you can love someone else, you must first love yourself. As someone who has struggled with depression, I feared that meant I would never find love. That in turn made me love myself less and less. Throughout middle and high school, if I was shown the slightest bit of affection, I would cling to it like it was all I would ever receive. Which, in my mind, was completely possible. But after years of heartbreaks and self-loathing, I finally realized something important. You can love someone else first, because doing so teaches you a thousand ways to love yourself.

Many people seek out a relationship to fill the gaps in their self-confidence. Unfortunately, doing so often leads to a less than balanced and probably unhealthy relationship. That I suppose is what the saying is referring to. But when you're well and truly in love, you are inspired to be better. I have never liked the phrase "you make me a better person," which crops up in many romantic movies. It makes it sound as if one party is forcing the other to be a certain way, and if the relationship were to fall apart, so would that improvement of oneself. You should want to be a better person. Because you want to be strong for them, so they don't have to be your crutch and you can be there for them when needed. And of course nothing feels better than knowing there's someone there for when you truly need it.

And yes, it is possible to love someone even if you don't fully love yourself. As you fall deeper and deeper in love with someone, you start to see them differently. Not in the sense that you are blind to all their flaws. The flaws are still there, they just don't matter. You don't care if they have a bad hair day or if their nose is a bit bigger than they would like. In fact, more often than not, you find those kinds of things endearing, for they make a person unique. And once you realize this, you start to see yourself the same way. When you're staring at the mirror hating what you see, you start to think about how much beauty you find in the person you love. You can't remember a day where they looked less than wonderful, because things like dark circles or a pesky zit matter not. Those little things on yourself stop bothering you because you understand they don't affect what truly makes you an amazing person. That butterfly feeling you get when your significant other's hair gets tousled by the wind gives you the confidence to feel attractive when you can't get your own hair quite right.

So never be afraid to love, and love deeply. While you should never rely on someone else as the source of your confidence, learning to love someone else can teach you how to love yourself. They say you don't know what love is until you're in it. So there's no shame in needing to learn what it's like to love every flaw and all the little quirks a person has. Because when you look at yourself through the eyes of someone who cares for you immensely, it's impossible not to fall in love with the face in the mirror as well.