The Importance of Saying "I Love You"

DR JOHN DEMARTINI   -   Updated 2 years ago

Dr John Demartini discusses why it is wise and fulfilling to make a list of the people who have contributed to your life, so that you take the opportunity to transcend your judgments of superiority or inferiority, and say, ‘Thank you. I love you.” to the people you share your life with.

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DR JOHN DEMARTINI - Updated 2 years ago

For over 30 years, I have presented a two-day program called The Breakthrough Experience. One of the questions I ask the attendees to answer is: “If you had only 24 hours to live, what would you do?”

Almost every individual, in every country in the world that I’ve presented in, have said that they would visit the various individuals who have contributed to their life and say, “Thank you. I LOVE YOU.”

I would then ask, “Since you don’t know when your last 24 hours will be, what are you waiting for?”

 

Every human being wants to be loved and appreciated for who they are.

 

I can’t think of anyone I know who doesn’t appreciate being told, “I love you”, when it’s sincere and from the heart.

Most people feel a yearning to share their love and appreciation with the people who have contributed to their lives too.

So, what is it that stops us from doing just that or makes us afraid or uncertain of fully loving others and unconditionally loving ourselves?

I believe it to be our judgments.

It was Empedocles, the Greek philosopher, who said that there are two conscious forces of the universe.

  • One is integrative love, where you love unconditionally and can be fully present with someone.
  • The other is disintegrative strife that takes place when you judge someone.

I have often said in my seminars that:

  • At the level of the essence of the soul (your authentic self), the state of unconditional love, nothing is missing, and you have fulfillment.
  • At the level of the existence of the senses, things appear to be missing, which is when you are most likely to judge.

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The things that appear to be missing are when you’re too proud or too humble to admit that what you see in others is also inside you.

In other words, if you look up to someone, minimize yourself, and you are too humble to admit what you see in them is also inside of you, you are likely to create a disowned part. This then results in a perception of emptiness, frustration and unfulfillment.

Suppose you exaggerate yourself and look down on or resent someone. In that case, you are too proud to admit that what you see in them is also inside you. This will lead you to also likely create a disowned part – a void.

This is a void of unfulfillment because you can’t judge without having such unfulfillment.

It is, therefore, wise to ask yourself a new set of questions: “Whatever I perceive in them that I look up to or down on, where do I display that behavior equally?”

By answering this question fully, you OWN and EMBRACE the parts you have disowned - your hero and your villain, the things you like and dislike – you embrace all aspects of yourself.

 

True Intimacy

 

If you’re constantly trying to get rid of half of yourself, how are you going to love yourself?

However, if you embrace all parts of yourself, you are most likely to feel fulfilled.

When you have a balanced orientation and you are eye to eye with them instead of looking up at them or down at them, you have a caring relationship made out of love.

I’ve defined love as the synthesis and synchronicity of complementary opposites.

When you’re too humble or too proud to admit that what you see in others is also inside you, you disown parts of yourself. However, when you’re not too proud or humble, and you have reflective consciousness, you tend to be your most authentic self.

I’ve asked millions of people the question, “How many of you want to be loved and appreciated for you are?” Every hand goes up. Yet how are you going to be loved for who you are if you’re not being who you are?

Whenever you exaggerate yourself and look down on someone, or minimize yourself and look up to someone, you’re not being yourself and are likely to create disowned parts. Those disowned parts prevent you from having true intimacy.

True Intimacy is a perfect reflective awareness that whatever you see in others, you also see in yourself. In other words, you own ALL your parts and are in an unconditional love state.

This is when you are at the level of the soul – the authentic and inspired you.

I rarely ever do a presentation or write an article without talking about values. Each person has a unique hierarchy of values, a set of priorities that you live your life by, things that are most important to least important to you.

When you live in alignment or congruently with your highest priorities - your most important values, the thing that’s important to you in your life - your blood, glucose and oxygen go into the forebrain and wakes up your executive centre.

As a result, you will tend to be more objective, neutral and/or balanced in your orientation instead of being subjectively biased with judgment.

In that state, you have the highest probability of being loving and grateful.

 

Quality Questions and Gratitude

 

The executive centre is also called the gratitude centre. So, every moment you live in alignment with your highest priorities, you increase the probability of having more love for your life, yourself and for others.

You’re also likely to be more resilient, adaptable, and grateful; and more likely to say, “I love you”, both to yourself and others.

On the other hand, if you puff yourself up with pride or minimize yourself with shame, you are likely to live in alignment with your lower values. Then, instead of your blood going into your executive centre, it will tend to go into your amygdala, or desire centre, where you avoid pain, seek pleasure, and go into judgment.

In this survival (as opposed to thrival) mode, you are far less likely to say, “I love you”. Instead, you tend to want to change OTHERS relative to you or change YOU relative to others – both of which are futile.

  • When you look down on people, you tend to want them to be more like you and live in your higher values.
  • When you look up to people, you want to be more like them and live in their higher values.

Anytime you try to be someone other than yourself or get others to be someone other than themselves, you’ll tend to experience feelings of futility and ingratitude.

When you’re grateful and feel love in your heart, you are not likely to want to fix or change anything because you perceive that nothing is missing. Instead, you can be more present with people and experience the magic of life as it is.

Permitting yourself to be present and inspired by what’s important to you in your life is wise if you’d love to have more mastery in your life.

For this reason, it is wise to ask yourself a set of questions when you perceive that you are not balanced and objective in your view of others.

  • “What exactly is it that I like or admire about them?” or
  • “What specific trait, action, or inaction do I perceive this individual displaying or demonstrating that I admire the most?”
  • “What exactly is it that I dislike or resent about them?” or
  • “What specific trait, action, or inaction do I perceive this individual displaying or demonstrating that I resent the most?”

In other words, first, identify what it is that you think they have that you are too humble or too proud to admit that you have.

Then ask the question, “Go to a moment where and when you perceived yourself displaying or demonstrating that same or similar specific trait, action, or inaction that you admired or despised in them. Look at where you’ve done it, when you’ve done it, who you’ve done it to, and who perceives you that way”. That way you’ll own the traits that you admire or resent in others.

In my signature program, The Breakthrough Experience, I teach people how to be able to love and appreciate themselves, how to love and appreciate others, and how to do what they love and love what they do so they’re inspired by their lives, living by priority, and doing something extraordinary with their lives where they are contributing resiliently and adaptively with objectivity instead of subjective biases.

 

The Importance of Knowing Your Values

 

It’s the subjective biases of survival that waken your amygdala, which most often results in judgment instead of love because you’re attempting to temporarily live in alignment with your lower values.

It’s for this reason that it is wise to identify what is truly most important to you.

Suppose you haven’t already been through the free Value Determination Process on my website. In that case, it may be incredibly valuable for you to do so.

The 13-step process will help you identify what your life already demonstrates is truly important to you instead of what you may perceive you “should” or “ought” to prioritize.

Once you begin living consciously in alignment with your highest priorities, you will tend to have more resilience, objectivity, and adaptability; while also appreciating both the people around you and yourself more than before.

I’m sure you can think of a day when you have accomplished your highest priority tasks and have returned home feeling on top of the world. You may also remember days when you’ve hit the ground running and put out fires all day instead of mastering your priorities and have returned home like a bear with a sore head.

That’s why I teach my students about the importance and applications of values and why attending The Breakthrough Experience to learn how to apply the Demartini Method to balance your emotions can help you have more appreciation and love in your life.

If you can’t see and/or appreciate what your spouse, children, friends, and colleagues are dedicated to - their highest value, what’s most important in their life, and how it helps you fulfill what’s most important in your life – you’ll tend to want to fix them and change them relative to you.

In the same way, if you can’t see how what you’re dedicated to will help them fulfill what they want in life and you’re putting them on a pedestal, you’ll tend to want to fix and change you relative to them.

  • Anytime you want to change them or change you, you set yourself up for feelings of frustration and futility.
  • Anytime you appreciate them and love them for who they are, you have utility, reflective awareness and true intimacy.

It is, therefore, wise to give yourself permission to do something extraordinary by paying close attention to what you value and what other people value most.

 

Dissolving Your Judgements

 

You tend to only resent things in other people that remind you of something you unconsciously feel ashamed of that you’re consciously too proud to admit you have.

You tend only to admire things in other people that you’re too humble to admit you have.

There’s nothing that you can see in the outer world that you can’t see inside you in your own unique form of expression.

I went through an Oxford dictionary many years ago and identified 4,628 different individual traits that a human being can display. I found each and every one of them in my life.

When I realized that I had everything I saw in other people, the buttons of disowned parts were lessened as a result. True reflective awareness and owning all our disowned parts is what allows us to have true love and intimacy.

You desire to be loved for who you are. Who you are is an expression of the most soulful authentic you.

I learned a long time ago that I don’t need to get rid of any part of myself to love myself. I also don’t need to gain some part of myself to love myself.

Many times, you may think something is missing in you, but it’s not. It’s in a form you haven’t yet honored.

In my signature program titled The Breakthrough Experience, I show people how to discover where they have what they see in others, so they’re not under the illusion that they are missing anything. The reason being, that if you’re coming from a state of lack instead of abundance of your own love for yourself, you’ll tend to see the world as something you need to fix and change instead of something to love and appreciate.

Again, suppose you had only 24 hours to live. In that case, you’d likely get past the trivial judgments and get onto what’s really a priority, which is to say, “Thank you. I love you.”

I believe that if you go and do what you love, and if you love what you do every day, and do it with the people you love, you will have a more fulfilling life than if you spend your days judging.

Any time you compare your current reality to fantasies about how it “should be”, you’re likely to falsely label your life a nightmare. However, when you love things as they are, they turn into what and who you love.

You don’t know when your last 24 hours is, so what are you waiting for? Go out there and say, “Thank you. I love you.”

 

Conclusion

 

  • Every human being wants to be loved and appreciated for who they are.
  • If you’re constantly trying to get rid of half of yourself, how are you going to love yourself?
  • How will you be loved for who you are if you’re not being who you are?
  • You want to be loved for who you are. Who you are is an expression of the most authentic and higher valued you.
  • Anytime you try to be someone other than yourself or get others to be someone other than themselves, you tend to have futility and ingratitude.
  • Permitting yourself to be present and inspired by what’s really important to you in your life is crucial to fulfillment.
  • If you can’t see what your spouse, children, friends, and colleagues are dedicated to - their highest value, what’s most important in their life, and how it helps you fulfill what’s most important in your life – you’ll tend to want to fix them and change them.
  • Intimacy is a perfect reflective awareness that whatever you see in others, you also see in yourself. In other words, you own ALL your parts and are in an unconditional love state.
  • It is wise to make a list of the people who have contributed to your life. Transcend the triviality of any judgments of superiority or inferiority and say, ‘Thank you. I love you.” See what might happen!
  • You don’t know when your last 24 hours on earth will be. What are you waiting for?

 

Are you ready for the NEXT STEP?

If you’re seriously committed to your own growth, if you’re ready to make a change now and you’d love some help doing so, then book a FREE Discovery call with a member of the Demartini Team so we can take you through your mini power assessment session.

You’ll come away with a 3-step action plan and the foundation to empower your life.

 

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