Couples in distress too often turn to solutions that can be summed up by ‘you do your thing and I’ll do my thing’ or ‘you take care of yourself and I’ll take care of myself.’ We hear pop psychology pronouncements such as ‘I’m not ready to be in a relationship’ and ‘you have to love yourself before anyone can love you.’ Is any of this true? Is it really possible to love yourself before someone ever loves you? Think about it. How could this be true? If it were true, babies would come into this world already self-loving or self-hating. And we know they don’t. In fact, human beings don’t start by thinking anything about themselves, good or bad. We learn to love ourselves precisely because we have experienced being loved by someone. We learn to take care of ourselves because somebody has taken care of us.