The Art of Loving
This week’s Saturday meditation is from Erich Fromm’s book The Art of Loving. Fromm (1900—1980) was a German-born American psychoanalyst and social philosopher who explored the interaction between psychology and society. This particular passage is one we discussed in a previous Reading & the Good Life meetup. According to Fromm,
Love is not primarily a relationship to a specific person; it is an attitude, an orientation of character 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 men, 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.
Fromm asked, “Is love an art? Then it requires knowledge and effort. Or is love a pleasant sensation, which to experience is a matter of chance, something one ‘falls into’ if one is lucky?”
Contemplation Questions (Pick one or create your own!):
What is love?
How does our meaning of love shape how we live?
This Week’s Meditations…
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Thank you for reading this week; I hope you found something useful.
Until next time, be wise and be well,
P.S. Feel free to comment, ask questions, or make suggestions!