The Art of Loving by Erich Fromm

The theory and practice of mastering unconditional love for ourselves and for humanity as a whole

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Erich Fromm is one of my favourite philosophers who drew on a range of disciplines for his work with an underlying theme of humanism in a genuine attempt to seek the meaning of life in a modern age of alienation. Born in Frankfurt, Germany on 23 March 1990, Erich gave up his religious convictions and practices in his twenties as he did not want to participate in any division of the human race.

At once a sociologist, philosopher, historian, psychoanalyst, economist and anthropologist, as well as a lover of human life and poetry, Erich had no medical training which helps to explain his eclectic, innovative approach to psychology. He wrote a plethora of books, several of which I have studied in my endeavour to inform and enhance my understanding of the nature of culture and the psychology of human beings.

Social and Economic Factors

An important force in twentieth-century pshychology, Erich endeavoured to formulate a system better suited than Sigmund Freud’s dualistic approach to the problems of contemporary life in terms of human consciousness. He believed that social and economic factors, rather than innate drives, have a significant effect on human behaviour.

In his book Escape from Freedom [1941], Erich suggests that modern man, afraid of freedom, escapes into authoritarianism, conformism and destructiveness. This divergence from Freudian theory identifies neurosis as the moral problem of a repressive society as opposed to the result of behavioral or psychosomatic symptoms caused by repression.

This is confirmed in Erich’s famous book To Have or to Be [1976] which accurately predicts the harmful trajectory of materialism and consumerism that has led us to where we are today. In this book, The Art of Loving, Erich explores the dichotomy of separation in a culture that rewards narcissism and the importance of loving oneself as one would love thy neighbour in a bid to overcome the impediments that have been built not only by one’s relationship to one’s parents but also those caused by society.

Respect for Self and Others

The key message of The Art of Loving is that love is not a sentiment that can be easily indulged in by anyone and that satisfaction in individual love cannot be attained without the capacity to love one’s neighbour with true humilty, courage, faith and discipline.

This ties in most importantly with the concept of self-love which, contrary to Sigmund Freud’s value judgment that this is the same as narcissism, Erich sees as a virtue whereby love of my own self is inseparably connected with the love for any other being.

As expressed in the above mentioned biblical love thy neighbour as thyself, Erich implies that respect for one’s own integrity and uniqueness, love for and understanding of one’s own self, cannot be separated from love and understanding for another individual.

Further, an attitude of love towards oneself will be found in all those who are capable of loving others in the sense that genuine love is an expression of productiveness and implies care, respect, responsibiity and knowledge. It is not, therefore, an affect in the sense of being affected by someone. It is, rather, an active striving for growth and happiness of the loved person, rooted in one’s capacity to love.

Love as an Art Form

To love unconditionally with so much working against us is therefore elevated by Erich into an art form which requires knowledge and effort whereby the process of learning an art requires mastering the theory and the practice.

The Art of Loving explores the theory of love and its practical implications, presented as the answer to the problem of human existence. Various aspects of love (and loving) are explored including the love between parent and child, motherly love, brotherly love, exotic love, self-love and the love of God.

The theory of love begins with the theory of man and human existence. Having emerged from instinctive adaptation to transcend Nature, the truth is that man never leaves it as he is part of it. Therefore, man can only go forward by developing his reason, by finding harmony as part of the human race as well as an individual.

The gift of reasoning brings about an awareness of self as a separate entity, an awareness of being alone and helpless before the foces of Nature and society which become the source of all anxiety. Hence the dilhema we face where the question becomes how to overcome separateness, how to achieve union, how to transcend one’s own individual life and find at-oneness.

The Practice of Love

I think we all know that loving ourselves and others unconditionally does not come easy. Mastering the art of love requires discipline, concentration, patience and practice. It requires the overcoming of one’s narcissism which requires objectivity and the ability to see people and things as they really are.

There are no prescriptions of how to do it yourself. What the discussion of the practice of love can do is to suggest the premises and approaches to the art of loving, and the practice of these premises and approaches. As Erich so rightly says, the steps toward the goal can be practiced only by oneself, and discussion ends before the decisive step is taken.

Just as it was when Erich wrote this remarkable book, we find outselves in the same situation whereby the lack of objectivity, as far as foreign nations are concerned, is notorious. From one day to another, another nation is made out the be utterly depraved and fiendish, while one’s own nation stands for everything that is good and noble.

It follows that the principle of capitalistic society and the principle of love are incompatible. It means that those who are seriously concerned with love as the only rational answer to the problem of human existence must then, arrive at the conclusion that important and radical changes in our social structure are necessary, if love is to become a social and not a highly individualistic, marginal phenomenon.

The Importance of Humility

The only answer then, is for us to think objectively, to be able to reason with each other and with ourselves. The emotional attitude behind reason is that of humility. To be objective, to use one’s reason, is possible only if one has achieved an attitude of humility. Humility and objectivity are indivisible, just as love is.

This is not easy in a society run by a management bureaucracy, by professional politicians whre people are motivated by mass suggestion. Their aim is producing more and consuming more to achieve economic goals, means have become ends; man is an automation - well fed, well clad, but without any ultimate concern for that which is his peculiarly human quality and function.

In conclusion, Erich states that to speak of love is not preaching rather it means to speak of the ultimate and real need in every human being. That this need has been obscured does not mean that it does not exist. To have faith, therefore, in the possibility of love as a social and not only exceptional-individual phenomenon, is a rational faith based on the insight into the very nature of man.

I hope this book, the contents of which are as relevant today as when it was written, provides us all with food for thought in our quest to co-create our new and loving world.

Thank you for reading and I look forward to seeing you again soon.

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The Art of Loving by Erich Fromm

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