“Many of us have the mote and beam problem (see Matt. 7:3–5)—that is, we can easily see the faults of others, but not our own. So before we start holding others up to scrutiny to see if they are worthy of us, maybe we ought to work first on becoming a “right person” for someone else. Elder Neal A. Maxwell of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles offered this counsel: “If the choice is between reforming other Church members [including fiancés, spouses, and children] or ourselves, is there really any question about where we should begin? The key is to have our eyes wide open to our own faults and partially closed to the faults of others—not the other way around! The imperfections of others never release us from the need to work on our own shortcomings.” 5 Therefore, when we focus on finding the right person, we should also focus on becoming the right person for someone else. The strengths we bring to a marriage will undoubtedly contribute to the success of the marriage.”

“It is therefore of supreme importance that we consent to live not for ourselves but for others. When we do this we will be able first of all to face and accept our own limitations. As long as we secretly adore ourselves, our own deficiencies will remain to torture us with an apparent defilement. But if we live for others, we will gradually discover that no expects us to be 'as gods'. We will see that we are human, like everyone else, that we all have weaknesses and deficiencies, and that these limitations of ours play a most important part in all our lives. It is because of them that we need others and others need us. We are not all weak in the same spots, and so we supplement and complete one another, each one making up in himself for the lack in another.”

“When we search for "ourselves" in the eyes of others, we have imprisoned our own-selves in believing that our self-worth is nothing unless others validate who we are. Unless we approve of whom we are, what we are, and what we are capable of doing as an individual, only then we will have released "ourselves" from our own imprisonment. We are in charge of our own life's destiny and what we do and become can only be validated by our accomplishments and failures; not by what others may think of us.”

“Had we not faults of our own, we should take less pleasure in complaining of others.”

“Most of us are not raised to actively encounter our destiny. We may not know that we have one. As children, we are seldom told we have a place in life that is uniquely ours alone. Instead, we are encouraged to believe that our life should somehow fulfill the expectations of others, that we will (or should) find our satisfactions as they have found theirs. Rather than being taugh to ask ourselves who we are, we are schooled to ask others. We are, in effect, trained to listen to others' versions of ourselves. We are brought up in our life as told to us by someone else! When we survey our lives, seeking to fulfill our creativity, we often see we had a dream that went glimmering because we believed, and those around us believed, that the dream was beyond our reach. Many of us would have been, or at least might have been, done, tried something, if...If we had known who we really were.”

“The in-love experience does not focus on our own growth or on the growth and development of the other person. Rather, it gives us the sense that we have arrived and that we do not need further growth.”

“There are two different ways of being a person. One of these precedes the change of heart, and the other follows it. The first is fearful, anxious, resentful, and alienated from other people; the second, open resonant with others, buoyant, straightforward, and secure.To the extent that we live the second way, we care about others. We do not see them merely in terms of our own interests, as helping or hindering us. They are real to us; we are as sensitive to their feelings and hopes and needs as we are to our own.On the other hand, when we feel alienated, we engross ourselves in our own agenda. We pursue wealth, power, personal perfection, pleasure, distraction, or some other protection from emotional pain. We divide people into two categories-- those who will help us in our self-seeking projects and those who won't, and the latter we fear or hate as our rivals or enemies. We use people or abuse them. We look at people guardedly and stand ready to resent them whenever they cross us. Their own hopes and needs aren't real to us.”