Self-love versus self-obsession

The following is an excerpt from a samvaad (dialogue) session with Acharya Prashant.

Questioner (Q): Acharya Ji, Pranam! We have been taught not to be selfish. If we start to love ourselves, where to draw a line before we get self-obsessed? Or is self-love the same as self-obsession?

Acharya Prashant (AP): Self-love is a wonderful thing. But one has to really know what love means. Isn’t there a difference between pleasing someone and helping someone? Is there, or is there not?

You have a child in your home. And he keeps asking for sweets. He doesn’t merely have a sweet tooth, his entire jaw is sweet. All he wants is sweets. What would please him? Lots of sweets. What would help him?- “No more sweets! You are already so fat.”

Now tell me what is love? — To give sweets to the child, gratify him, please him, make him happy, make him feel at least momentarily satisfied, make him your great admirer; you offer him, sweets, you know, Or keep him away from the sweets even if it peeves him a little, even if it puts the relationship in a bit of strain, even if it makes him drift a little away from you. Where is love?

The child that I am talking of is the self. Now is self-love, self-gratification, or self-help? In love, must you gratify the other or must you elevate the other? And there is a…