Artist

Artist

What people think: very sophisticated people who think highly of themselves or kids who do drugs, skip classes to smoke weed.

What it's actually like: A bunch of socially awkward kids who like to wear big sweaters and do not (or rarely) mention that they like drawing/painting/writing/ect.

My bro and I in vacation

My brother: Did you bring your phone?

Me: Yeah, why?

My brother: Can I see?

Me: (think of all the adult gay fanfiction/fanart that I like on tumblr) Nah

My brother: Why?

Me:

My brother:

Me: ...Porn?

The True Meaning Behind "Love Yourself": An Analysis

This is all just my opinion, please do not copy or reupload.

​Bangtan Sonyeondan, or BTS, is a popular South Korean boy band that has millions of fans all over the world.  However, unlike most boy bands, BTS focus their music on very important topics like politics, the struggle for millennials, prejudice, and the importance of loving one’s self.  In their recently completed album series, Love Yourself, they tell a story of a man who fallsin love.  Through each of the stages of the relationship, he finally realized how he had “lost himself” in the process and no longer knew who he was.  After analysis and a better understanding of this series, one thing can be concluded: the message that BTS is trying to convey is not just that one should love them self, but also about the importance of accepting one’s past and facing them self, so that they can “speak them self”.  There has been plenty of proof of this in many of their songs from the series.  But before explaining the theme of the album series, a better understanding of the story can help to further explain the argument.  

​The first album of the series is called Love Yourself: Her, this is considered the first stage of love.  In this album, the songs are all about what we normally think of as love.  They explain that they are in love with someone who they refer to as “her”, and how they want to spend the rest of their life with her.  They even say that they would do anything for her, which leads to the next album.  This next album is called Love Yourself: Tear.  This is where the story takes a turn.  In this album, they start to realize the struggle they have with loving her.  They gave everything for her and even changed themselves to fit her liking, but in the end they “lost themselves” and no longer knew who they were.  In the last album, Love Yourself: Answer, they finally realize that the one they should love is, themselves.  Rather than trying to focus on loving someone else, they should first learn to accept themselves as they are.

​As stated before, BTS is trying to convey the message that it is important to accept one’s past and face them self.  The album Love Yourself: Answer implies this message, because it is the “answer” to the problems they were facing with love, hence the name Love Yourself: Answer.  A song from this album, “Answer - Love Myself”, supports this statement.  In this song, the lyrics translate to, “The me of yesterday, the me of today, the me of tomorrow, with no exceptions, it’s all me” (“Answer - Love Myself”).  This implies that a person’s past, present, and future is important because they make up who that person is.  They are trying to explain that everyone should accept every part of them because it is an important step on the road to loving one’s self.

​In the previous album, Love Yourself: Tear, it was clear that they did not follow this rule of accepting them self.  This was the turning point in the stage of love where everything started to go downhill.  In the introduction song from the album, “Singularity”, one member of the group sings about how he hid himself, the old self that he thought was unlovable.  He uses the metaphor of a frozen lake to symbolize how he trapped himself under the ice and buried his voice, so no one could see who he truly was.  But even though he should be happy now that is old self is gone, for some reason, he still feels pain.  He sings, “I started to run to the lake, inside, I saw my face, please, don’t say anything, I hold out my hand to cover your mouth, but in the end, spring will come someday, the ice will melt away” (“Singularity”).  He starts to realize that hiding himself was a bad idea because the truth about him will be revealed eventually.  When he says, “spring will come”, he is referring to the time when his true self will show, and other’s will find out how he is not who they thought he was.  Consequently, towards the end of the song he says that he should not have buried his voice because he masked him true self and sheds tears underneath this mask.

​There is a repeated reference to masks in this album.  The masks are used to represent how they hid themselves so the one who they loved would love them back.  In the song, “The Truth Untold,” BTS sing about how they wear a mask when meeting the girl they love.  They sing, “You know that I can’t, show you me, give you me, I can’t show you my weakness, So I’m putting on a mask to go see you” (“The Truth Untold”).  They say that they do not want to show a broken-down side of themselves because they are afraid the they will be left alone in the end, so once again, they put on an act and become someone who they know she will love.  But when they wear these masks, they are not happy on the inside.  The album is called Love Yourself: Tearbecause beneath their masks, many tears are shed.  

​This theme of masks continues in another song on this album called “Fake Love”.  This song explains the feelings they have while wearing the masks.  They admit that they gave the world and changed everything just for her, but they lost themselves in the process.  This song is a bit more aggressive than the other, in attempt to show how they are angry about how they threw themselves away to gain her love.  They say, “You say I’m strange when I changed into the person you liked, you say I’m not the person you used to know, what do you mean? No, I’ve grown blind, what do you mean this is love, it’s all fake love” (“Fake Love”).  At this point, they realize that the love they had was all fake since it was not their true selves that they showed.  In the chorus they also state that they have “grown a flower that can’t be bloomed in a dream that can’t come true”.  In this quote, the flower represents themselves, saying that this new person (flower) that they “grew”, or created for her, cannot be “bloomed”, or become the real person they are.  The dream represents the fantasy that they had of being with her, and that this fantasy can never become true.  So, they are saying they created an unrealistic person in what could never become part of reality.  Therefore, these lyrics sum up how changing one’s self to fit someone else’s liking is just fake love.

​This leads to the song called “Epiphany” on Love Yourself: Answer.  The song is called Epiphany because it is when they literally have an epiphany and realize what they should have realized before: the one they should really love is themselves.  The member Seokjin sings about how he could no longer bear the storm that built up inside of him as he tried to live his life for her, so he finally takes off the smiling mask.  The lyrics say, “Why did I want to hide my precious self like this?  What was I so afraid of?  Why did I hide my true self?  I’m the one I should love in this world” (“Epiphany”).  It is as if he becomes aware of what he did as soon as he takes of the mask.  He knows that he hated himself in the past, and that is why he hid himself.  However, he has now learned that he should love himself, so he wants to accept what he did and continue living as the real him.  Rather than wearing a mask and continuing to get hurt, he attempts to find the part of himself that he lost in the past, so he can love himself, and speak confidently about who he truly is.

​In conclusion, BTS created the Love Yourself series in order to communicate not only the importance of loving one’s self, but also the importance of accepting one’s past and facing themselves so they can speak about who they are confidently.  The only way for one to walk forward is for them to accept their past.  They should understand that they made mistakes in the past and will make more mistakes in the future, but that should not stop them from loving themselves for who they are.  As the leader of BTS said at the United Nations Assembly in his speech this year on September 24th, “No matter who you are, where you’re from, your skin color, your gender identity, just speak yourself.  Find your name and your voice by speaking yourself” (Kim Namjoon 2018).  

Works Cited

Bangtan Sonyeondan. Love Yourself: Answer. BigHit Entertainment, 2018. CD.

Bangtan Sonyeondan. Love Yourself: Her. BigHit Entertainment, 2017. CD.

Bangtan Sonyeondan. Love Yourself: Tear. BigHit Entertainment, 2018. CD.

“BTS – Answer: Love Myself.” KLyrics, KLyrics, 24 August, 2018.

“BTS – Epiphany.” KLyrics, KLyrics, 24 August, 2018.

“BTS – Fake Love” KLyrics, KLyrics, 18 May, 2018.

“BTS – Singularity.” KLyrics, KLyrics, 18 May, 2018.

“BTS – The Truth Untold (Feat. Steve Aoki).” KLyrics, KLyrics, 18 May. 2018.

Kim, Namjoon. “Youth 2030: Working With and For Young People”. Generation Unlimited Campaign, Goodwill Ambassadors of UNICEF. United Nation Assembly, 24 September,2018, New York, NY.

Why are they like this

My friends: You and (crush name) would look so cute together!

My crush: Nah... we’re just friends

Me (crying from the inside): Y-yeah your right.

My friends( looking at me): You good fam?

Me: :’)

It was my father’s birthday yesterday and he have this very cute tradition.

In my family we spend at least one meal together to talk to each other. When it’s someone birthday they get to choose what we eat for that meal.

Every year, my father decide that we eat to this very vague Greek restaurant.

Now, let me get this straight. My father HATE Greek food more than anything and he doesn’t hate a lot of thing... BUT my mother LOVE it , like, she could eat it every day type of like. (I personally have nothing against it I’m just hungry )

So, every year, on HIS OWN BIRTHDAY he prefer to give that special meal to her and see her smile than eat something he really like.

...THAT’S FUCKING ADORABLE