Aristotelian love

It has been said that we cannot love another until we learn to love ourselves; it’ is the kind of love that ensures that we take care of ourselves first before we take care of our family and friends. The first condition for the highest form Aristotelian love is that a man loves himself. Without an egoistic basis, he cannot extend sympathy and affection to others. Such self-love is not hedonistic, or glorified, depending on the pursuit of immediate pleasures or the adulation of the crowd; instead, it is a reflection of his pursuit of the noble and virtuous, which culminate in the pursuit of the reflective life.

"Love grows by giving. The love we give away is the only love we keep. The only way to retain love is to give it away."
-Elbert Hubbard writer and publisher

You cannot be lonely if you like the person you’re alone with.

"Guard within yourself that treasure, kindness. Know how to give without hesitation, how to lose without regret, how to acquire without meanness; know how to replace in your heart, by the happiness of those you love, the happiness that may be wanting to yourself ."
-George Sand, writer

"You yourself, as much as anyody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection ."
-Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, religious figure

"Love can be understood only “from the inside,” as a language can be understood only by someone who speaks it, as a world can be understood only by someone who lives it."
-Robert C. Solomon, philosopher