On Divine Love and "Self-Esteem"

In all its relevance, it seems to me, Western theology narcissistically gazes at its own reflection. Christianity of today has become so modern and 'relevant' to the times, that is has lost it's unique ability to heal as it once did for the millions of believers who held fast to it's precepts. Spiritually unfulfilled people of today are being told to learn to love and re-parent themselves. From the talk show to the therapist and even from the pulpit, the message is that we are victims of 'dysfunction'. Some say that self-hatred is at the core of our neurosis. My question is simple, are there any parallels to this new teaching among the Patristic writings of the Holy Fathers of antiquity? How was this dilemna treated by the spiritual healers of old?
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Self-Esteem or Divine Love
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"I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and darn it, people like me!" (Stuart Smalley on Saturday Night Live)
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The difference in these opposing perspectives between the science of modern or 'pop' Psychology and the teaching of the early Church Fathers is exemplified clearest when comparing the terminology used by them. The objective truth is that only a heart full of love can give love. In the humanist approach to this truth, divine love becomes self-love. The Fathers, on the other hand, are often reminding us to accept God’s love for mankind, and it is of this synergistic cooperation between God and man that is has been said that "the Son of God became man so that we might become God" (St. Athanasios) It does take faith and work (St. James). So while a popular Psychologist might call what one needs "self love" with the absence of God at the center of his ideology, the Church Fathers refer to as Divine Love, with God in his rightful place. But how is a Christian to hold his head up, yet still be mindful of his sinful unworthiness? We do this by loving God and accepting His Divine love for us, always "mindful of our many sins", as St. Augustine writes: "not because I love them, but that I may love thee, my God."
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Hating Iniquity – No Sell Out
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Jesus said: "If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple." (Luke 14:26) St. Paul clarifies just what this hatred is in the Epistle to the Romans: "For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do I know not: for not what I would, that do I practise; but what I hate, that I do. But if what I would not, that I do, I consent unto the law that it is good. So now it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwelleth in me. For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me, but to do that which is good is not. For the good which I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I practise. But if what I would not, that I do, it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwelleth in me".(7:14-20) This spiritual law is the high standard Christians are called to. Yet we are by our very nature full of the sinful desire we inherited from Adam, who sold out to sin. Through Christ Jesus we are "bought with a price" (1 Corinthians 6:20) and can be made whole through His Church "which he hath purchased with his own blood."(Acts 20:28) "But he who is sold is not a slave by nature. And again – note that he doesn’t say the flesh is evil, but what inhabits it" (St. Gregory of Palamas) So as we recognize all good things come from God, we become aware of our fallen nature, and will "hate all sin that dwelleth in us". Through repentance, reconciliation and communion with God we accept his grace, and willingly receive his divine love. As Saint John of the Ladder wrote: "Repentance is the daughter of hope and the refusal to despair. (The penitent stands guilty-but undisgraced.) Repentance is reconciliation with the Lord by the performance of good deeds which are the opposite of one’s sins."
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A Higher Love
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So the Holy Fathers differentiate between the different forms of love. They have taught us that the love in one person, by himself, is not love but self love, selfishness, vanity and pride. In Jesus Christ the Son of God is revealed to us as love that "passeth all understanding….In this was manifested the love of God toward us because God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we may live through Him. Herein is love, not that we loved God but that He loved us, and sent his Son to be a propitiation for our sins. If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His love is perfected in us."(1 John 4:9, 4:10, 4:12) Christian love is a higher love, a love that is "not of this world" and that can only be perfected in us by the process of learning to love others and accepting the truth of God’s love for us. Learning to love is definitely the answer to healing the human condition, but the choice lies with us to re-parent ourselves, or to accept our inheritance as right believing Christians with God as Our Father, together with the Son and Holy Spirit, both now and forever and unto time eternal.