The Love Was There. I wasn’t.
One of my favourite lines comes to mind here:
"Find me when you start liking yourself." — Bohemian Rhapsody
Being loved… deeply, consistently, beautifully. Yet, something still felt missing. Being loved and being able to receive love are not the same. If love and acceptance weren’t part of your environment during the most formative years of your life, sincere love can feel foreign, unfamiliar, and almost threatening. And it is that unfamiliarity that creates cracks in the exchange of one of the most powerful and healing energies on earth.
What happens when you don’t like yourself? Subconsciously, your inner dialogue whispers:
“I’m not enough.”
“If they really knew me…”
This narrative makes it impossible to receive love because every part of you insists that you are unworthy, undeserving, and unlovable. You start to question why someone loves you, what they don’t yet see, and whether their intentions are real.
Love is powerful, but it cannot heal the parts of you that you have not yet learned to love yourself. And love gets filtered through the lens of self-perception, and if that lens says “unworthy,” love is rejected. It is doubted, minimised, or even distrusted. Your inner voice says, “Once they see me truly, they’ll reject me, just like it happened to me before…” And in that moment, this becomes the only truth—a shield to protect you from pain. You simply cannot digest, receive, or process what you do not believe about yourself.
Even the most extraordinary bond, something that feels like “coming home”, can fracture. The unfamiliar becomes a threat; it brings uncertainty, loss of control, and so you pull away into the safety of yourself. You feel pressure to become who they see you as, because you do not see yourself that way, so it feels like you need to become someone else to sustain this love. Quiet resentment begins to grow: toward your partner, for loving you so fully, and toward yourself, for being unable to receive the love you have always needed. Shame, withdrawal, and subtle self-sabotage creep in, even toward the very thing that deserves your protection and gentleness the most.
The pain flows both ways. The one who loves you feels helpless, rejected, and confused. “Why can’t they see what I see? How can I love them differently so they can finally receive it?” The tension builds, creating distance. Overwhelmed, guilty, trapped… yet unable to leave, because how do you walk away from something that every cell in your body craves for?
Love keeps knocking against the wall of self-protection until it grows tired, hopeless, helpless. The love is still there—but the capacity to receive it has not been created.
Here lies the heartbreaking truth: even the most beautiful bond, the most powerful connection, can reach its breaking point—not because the love wasn’t real, but because it kept knocking on doors that never opened. Love without self-acceptance cannot survive. It cannot sustain.
So how do you break this cycle? How do you allow yourself to finally be free—to receive the love fully and to step into the magic of its existence?
The answer is deceptively simple, yet requires courage and commitment: do the work. Therapy, reflection, consistent self-practice. Start by creating the capacity for love within yourself:
· Sit with yourself. Particularly when you feel unsettled, triggered, or tempted to distract from discomfort. Place your hand on your heart. Breathe slowly and deeply.
· Accept what comes up without judgment. Don’t analyse; observe. Let your thoughts pass like a movie projected on a screen.
· Curiosity carries the cure. Notice what arises, without blame, without shame. Build an internal sanctuary through acceptance, curiosity, and awareness.
· Write it down if it helps. Name your emotions, explore what they mean, and see how they relate to your life. By acknowledging them, you give them space to exist and be processed in a healthy way instead of pushing them away, which keeps you stuck.
Step by step, moment by moment, you create a safe space within yourself—a space where love can finally land. And when that happens, the love that is already in your life, deep, consistent, beautiful, finally finds its home: not outside, but within you and all around you.
Empathetically Yours,
Daria Kozhukhar
