{"ops":[{"insert":"On this Valentine’s Day, I revisit Erich Fromm’s classic, "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"The Art of Loving"},{"insert":", for a reminder of a deep and abiding concept of love.\n\nIn focusing on the problem that love answers, Fromm says:\n\nThe deepest need of man… is the need to overcome his separateness, to leave the prison of his aloneness… (p.9)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n\n"},{"insert":"...the experience of separateness arouses anxiety (p. 8)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nIn a section focused on brotherly love, which is largely missing from today’s perspective, Fromm says:\n\nLove is not primarily a relationship to a specific person; it is an "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"attitude"},{"insert":", and "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"orientation of character"},{"insert":" which determines the relatedness of a person to the world as a whole, not toward one “object” of love. If a person loves only one other person and is indifferent to the rest of his fellow man, his love is not love but a symbiotic attachment, or an enlarged egotism. Yet, most people believe that love is constituted by the object, not by the faculty… because one does not see that love is an activity, a power of the soul, one believes that all that is necessary to find is the right object–and that everything goes by itself afterward (p. 43)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n\n"},{"insert":"The most fundamental kind of love, which underlies all types of love, is "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"brotherly love"},{"insert":". By this I mean the sense of responsibility, care, respect, knowledge of any other human being, the wish to further his life… brotherly love is love for all human beings… in brotherly love there is the experience of union with all men, of human solidarity… Brotherly love is based on experience that we are all one… The differences in talents, intelligence, knowledge are negligible in comparison with the identity of the human core common to all men. In order to experience this identity it is necessary to penetrate from the periphery to the core. If I perceive in another person mainly the surface, I perceive mainly the differences, that which separates us. If I penetrate to the core, I perceive our identity, the fact of our brotherhood (pp. 43-44)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n\n"},{"insert":"Brotherly love is love between equals: but, indeed, even as equals we are not always “equal”; inasmuch as we are human, we are all in need of help. Today I, tomorrow you. But this need of help does not mean that one is helpless, the other powerful. Helplessness is a transitory condition; the ability to stand and walk on one’s own feet is the permanent and common one (p. 44)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n\n"},{"insert":"Yet, love of the helpless one, love of the poor and the stranger, are the beginning of brotherly love. To love one’s flesh and blood is no achievement. The animal loves its young and cares for them. The helpless one loves his master, since his life depends on him; the child loves his parents, since he needs them. Only in the love of those who do not serve a purpose, love begins to unfold (p. 45)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n\n"},{"insert":"The affirmation of "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"one’s own life, happiness, growth, freedom is rooted in one’s capacity to love"},{"insert":", i.e., in care, respect, responsibility, and knowledge (pp. 55-56)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n\n"},{"insert":"The "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"selfish"},{"insert":" person is interested only in himself, wants everything for himself, feels no pleasure in giving, but only in taking. The world outside is looked at only from the standpoint of what he can get out of it; he lacks interest in the needs of others and respect for their dignity and integrity (p. 56)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nThe realm of love, reasoning, and justice exists as a reality only because, and in so much as, man has been able to develop these powers in himself throughout the process of his evolution. In this view there is no meaning to life, except the meaning man himself gives to it; man is utterly alone except insomuch as he helps another (p. 67)."},{"attributes":{"indent":1},"insert":"\n"},{"insert":"\nQuotes for this blog are taken from Fromm, E. (1956; 2006). "},{"attributes":{"italic":true},"insert":"The Art of Loving"},{"insert":". (NY: HarperPerennial Modern Classics).\n"}]}