Part of me hoped to stick to light reading for a while. Reading two books in a few days was a nice break. Here I am though, reading The Art of Loving by Erich Fromm.

J and I spent a while today talking about how my identity is its own mountain; it doesn’t change between relationships. I commented on how I used to think of myself as a social chameleon when I was a teenager because I would move between social groups.

In the introduction to The Art of Loving, Peter D. Kramer writes, “Fromm was popular precisely because, in an age of ideologies, he was not an ideologue. He took what he needed – and enthusiastically – from Judaism, Marxism, psychoanalysis, and, later, Taoism and Zen Buddhism, but Fromm was finally a humanist.”

I wonder if I’ve ever really tried to join these social groups. Ultimately, I think I’ve taken what I’ve liked and left the rest. It wasn’t that I was pretending to be something I wasn’t, but rather that I approached them as an ally, and respected them even when another might argue I had little to learn from them.

Fromm begins, “Most people see the problem of love primarily as that of being loved, rather than that of loving, of one’s capacity to love. Hence the problem to them is how to be loved, how to be lovable. In the pursuit of this aim they follow several paths. One, which is especially used by men, is to be successful, to be as powerful and rich as the social margin of one’s position permits.” I’ve made my mark on some of the paths that seem designated as noble by our culture; a good work ethic, success, upward mobility, philanthropy and volunteering. Were they to be attractive? I doubt ever. Perhaps in spits of jealousy I’ve thought about my achievements, but not a motivating factor.

Fromm continues to discuss a culture “based on the appetite for buying, on the idea of a mutually favorable exchange.” He defines attractive as usually meaning “a nice package of qualities which are popular and sought after on the personality market.” However, my struggle over the realities of “M v M” is that I have not been attracted to those holding traits of emotional stability, seasoned communication, or social popularity, that one might think I should. I’ve dated women who, by what I can only speculate I’ve gathered from my culture, should be perfectly what I’m looking for in a partner. Yet, I’m not happy with the so called best I can afford. It isn’t plainly that I measure worth differently though. The working hypothesis has been that I’ve dated women whom I should have been friends with instead of lovers.

I continued to speak with K & J about this today. K echoed a discussion of oneness that Fromm is touching on early in his book when I bought up M’s issue with my public journaling of my loneliness. J seems to be allowing me to lead myself down a path that ends with allowing my irrational desires to lead me toward what will make me happy. The intrusive thoughts of my limerance for M has long settled, and I had accepted time ago on my love being unrequited, yet I’m still uncertain of its final form. It shifts from time to time based on how I feel and I’m still unable to shake the desire to support her. I spoke at length to J about this today, about how I feel I can finally explain this as not literally being a shoulder to cry on, but quite metaphorically, still being a shoulder.