It really seems like we need to look a certain way to be loved. That’s why we, particularly women, suffer so much over how we look and put so much time and energy into trying to look a certain way. We really believe that how we look determines whether or not we are loved. This is a very deep-seated belief that needs to be examined.

Is this true? Does being loved depend on how we look? Only to the ego. If we want egos to love us, we may need to look a certain way. But if love depends on how we look, is this even love? This belief is one of the ego’s many untrue beliefs that causes so much suffering. It’s not that how we look doesn’t matter at all; it just doesn’t matter much or as much as we think it does.

If we examine the belief that we need to look other than the way we do to be loved or the idea that we will be loved more if we are more attractive, we can easily see that this isn’t true. Think of all the odd-looking characters you have known in your life or known through movies and TV that you felt love for. The more unusual they look, the more adorable they are—if they aren’t playing the villain but a lovable character.

When we love someone—when we recognize their goodness and how they are like us in the most essential and fundamental way—then we find them adorable no matter what they look like. People love us for our inherently lovable nature if that is what we show them. Unfortunately, if we are absorbed with how we look when we are with others, they won’t experience what is actually beautiful and adorable about us.

And I’m sure you can come up with lots of examples of beautiful or handsome people who were not the least bit lovable because of their behavior and perhaps even because they were so involved with caring about how they looked. Being focused on our appearance is not a quality that is very lovable. Being self-involved in this way is not attractive. What people find lovable is how we are with them and how we are in our life, not how we look. They care about whether we are kind and compassionate and easy to get along with. Others, especially those who already know and love us, don’t care about what we look like nearly as much as we do.

What makes someone lovable? Isn’t it the love they have inside them and the attentiveness and love they express to us? Isn’t it the twinkle in their eye and how their face lights up when they smile or laugh when they are with us? Could it really be that a simple thing like a smile makes someone lovable? Being loving is what makes us lovable! It is as simple as that. But the ego doesn’t want us to see this. It wants us to believe that love is something we have to get from others by looking a certain way or through our accomplishments.

“Love is all that matters” doesn’t mean that getting love is all that matters. If that is our approach to love, we will never get enough love from others to be happy. Others could love us intensely, and we still might not feel loved because love doesn’t come from others. Love is what we experience when we give it to others.

Why doesn’t the ego want us to see that we are already rich with love and that giving it is the secret to experiencing it, not trying to get it from others? Because love is the ego’s nemesis. The ego survives on the negative feelings it creates, and it disappears in love. The false self can’t survive in an atmosphere of love. It is made up solely of beliefs, which are the ego’s domain. Beliefs about what? Beliefs about what we and others lack, what is missing, and what “I” want and need to be happy.

If we didn’t believe we were lacking and needed fixing to be happy and loved, we could simply rest in what is, and love would flow from us, and we would experience no lack of anything! We would be done with all the drama, all the unnecessary suffering and trying to fix ourselves and others in order to be happy.

Being happy, after all, is what we all really want, isn’t it? Happiness is also what the ego is seeking. It’s just that the ego is looking for happiness in the wrong places, when happiness is already here, right now, in saying “yes” to this moment just as it is. By the way, saying “yes” to this moment is also very functional. The present moment is where life is unfolded by our true self, and our true self knows how to take care of whatever needs taking care of.