The essence of Staying alive is having compassion for yourself

I learned this when my narcissism was killing me between 18 and 25. However, then compassion for my parents and relatives and friends kept me alive so I didn't end my life. I couldn't do this to them even though I didn't want to be alive at the time. Life was just too difficult I thought then to keep trying. It just didn't seem worth it to suffer that much unless you had a good reason to do it.

So, meeting my first wife and her getting pregnant finally gave me a reason to go on living then at age 25 and then my son was born when I was 26 years old. He is now 51 years old.

So, in some ways it doesn't matter whether your compassion is for others or yourself because in some ways it is the same thing simply because there is no real way to separate yourself from all life in the Universe including your parents, your relatives and your friends around the world.

So, the essence of staying alive is having compassion for yourself enough to stay alive in the first place. Then  compassion for the rest of life in the entire universe can come next.

However, some people start with compassion for others like I did which  then kept me alive until I could also have compassion for myself.

Just because you start hating yourself doesn't mean it's true.

Most hate is taught by others which has nothing really to do with you at all.

Understanding this is a major realization in everyone's life if they survive long enough to have this realization.

Unless you live for what makes you happy and want to be alive then you aren't living anyway and then I can see why so many kill themselves.

You have to learn to have compassion for yourself and have integrity with yourself to want to stay alive and be a good person.

Otherwise, you are soon gone. 

This is just the reality of life for everyone on earth.

By God's Grace we all live or die in any given moment.