The Great Temptation: Forgetting Myself in the Name of Love

Something That Looked Like Love

I want to share something that took me a long time to see, not because it was hidden, but because it was wearing something that looked very good. It looked like care, like generosity, like love. For a long time, I didn’t question it, because why would I? It was praised. It was encouraged. It was expected. Only later did I realize that what I thought was love was often mixed with something else, something quieter and heavier, something rooted in fear.

Being Oriented Toward Others All the Time

For much of my life, I lived with my attention turned outward. Being available. Being attentive. Being there. Remembering to call. Checking in. Anticipating needs. Feeling responsible for how others might feel if I didn’t show up in exactly the right way. At first glance, this looks like kindness. And in part, it is. I do care. That part is real. I’m touched by what people go through. Sometimes that touch hurts. That is also real.

The Background Guilt That Never Left

But alongside that care, there was always something else. A tightness. A sense of pressure. A quiet guilt that never fully disappeared. No matter how much I did, it felt like it wasn’t enough. I could have done more. Been more present. More supportive. More available. It was as if there was an internal rule saying: if someone is struggling, I should be there — and if I’m not, something is wrong with me.

How This Lived in My Body

This wasn’t a belief I chose consciously. It lived in my body. It showed up when I tried to rest. When I wanted time alone. When I wanted to walk by myself instead of inviting someone. When I was meditating and felt the impulse to interrupt myself because someone entered the room and I thought I should engage. Even moments that nourished me carried a subtle sense of wrongdoing, as if being with myself required justification.

When I Started Looking at Guilt Instead of Fighting It

At some point, I stopped trying to get rid of the guilt and began to look at it. I noticed that it appeared most strongly when I chose myself. When I slowed down. When I didn’t reach out. It was almost as if guilt was the signal that I had crossed an invisible line, one that said my role was to give, not to rest.

So I began asking simple questions, without accusation. What kind of love asks me to be exhausted? What kind of care requires me to be anxious, resentful, drained, or tense? I wasn’t judging myself. I was trying to see clearly.

When Caring Turned Into Carrying

What I saw was that my caring had become fused with responsibility. Caring didn’t just mean feeling warmth or concern. It meant carrying. Carrying emotions that weren’t mine. Carrying imagined scenarios about how others might feel. Carrying the fear of disappointing someone. Over time, that weight accumulated. My body responded through fatigue, sadness, frustration, and sometimes anger.

The Real Fear Beneath the Guilt

As I stayed with this inquiry, something more vulnerable revealed itself. Beneath the guilt was a very specific fear: the fear that others might think I don’t love them. The idea of being seen as uncaring, distant, or indifferent felt deeply threatening.

And when I looked even closer, I saw that this fear was inseparable from another one: the fear that they might not love me. Or that their love might depend on my effort, my availability, my proof. That if I didn’t show my love clearly enough, I might not be accepted as I am.

So I learned to demonstrate love. To make it visible. To make it unmistakable. Without realizing it, love became something I had to show, not something I could rest in.

How I Learned to Become Smaller

I also noticed how easily I would make myself smaller when I felt misunderstood. If my intentions weren’t seen, if I was perceived as distant or too much, I would contract. I would adjust. I would abandon parts of myself to restore connection. Not because I didn’t value myself, but because belonging felt more urgent than honesty.

Realizing the Pain I Felt Was Mine

Another important shift came when I looked at the pain I felt in response to others’ suffering. I had assumed that because the pain arose when someone else was hurting, it belonged to them. That I was feeling their pain. But when I looked closely, I saw that the pain moving through my body was mine — my sensitivity, my memories, my unresolved places being activated.

Understanding Mirrors Through Experience

This is where the idea of mirrors began to make sense, not as a concept, but as lived experience. When I see someone in pain, it often reflects something alive in me. That’s why it touches me. The reflection doesn’t mean their pain is my responsibility. It means something in me recognizes itself.

Before, I would add my own pain to theirs. I would suffer about their suffering. Pain meeting pain only made everything heavier.

Loving My Own Pain First

What changed things was learning to love my own pain first. Not to fix it or get rid of it, but to meet it. To stay with the fear of not being loved, the ache of wanting acceptance, the sadness of feeling unseen — and to bring that into light instead of acting it out through over-giving.

When I do that, the pain softens. It stops driving me. And then, when I encounter pain in others, I don’t need to add my suffering to theirs to care. I can see their pain through love instead of through my wound.

When Pain Meets Love Instead of More Pain

In that sense, I pray in love for pain — not by trying to remove it, but by not feeding it with more pain of my own. When pain meets pain, everything contracts. When pain meets love, something opens. The situation may be the same, but the tone is different. Less urgency. Less effort. More trust.

Loving Without Abandoning Myself

This doesn’t make me indifferent. I still care. I still feel. What’s different is that caring no longer requires me to abandon myself. I can love without proving. I can care without carrying. And I can allow the possibility that even if I’m misunderstood, love remains intact.

A Different Way of Being With Love

From here, life feels less like a performance and more like a conversation. Less like a test I need to pass and more like a space I’m learning to inhabit honestly. I don’t feel finished. I don’t feel resolved. What I feel is more space, more ease, and a quiet curiosity about what love looks like when it no longer has to be proven.

By Katiana