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There is no meaning to life except the meaning man gives his life by the unfolding of his powers.

Erich Fromm

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Erich Fromm
Age: 79 †
Born: 1900
Born: March 23
Died: 1980
Died: March 18
Philosopher
Psychoanalyst
Psychologist
Sociologist
University Teacher
Writer
Frankfurt/Main
Life
Powers
Except
Meaning
Gives
Purpose
Power
Nonconformity
Giving
Unfolding
Men
Stubborn

More quotes by Erich Fromm

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Love is active penetration of the other person, in which my desire to know is stilled by union. In the act of fusion I know you, I know myself, I know everybody - and I know nothing.
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The mother-child relationship is paradoxical and, in a sense, tragic. It requires the most intense love on the mother's side, yet this very love must help the child grow away from the mother, and to become fully independent.
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For [Karl] Marx what counts is man. He is the root of everythingwhile for capitalism, the aim are things, profit, and man is only a means to gain them. As an authentically religious individual, Marx could not be other than against religion.
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I think our danger is that we talk one thing, and we feel and act another thing.
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Mobilizing the love of life is the only force that can defeat the love for the dead.
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I think we got off the track, as many societies do, who follow successfully one aim, and yet are not capable of seeing at what point the pursuit of this aim prevents them from following a more total aim. That is to say, they get into a blind alley.
Erich Fromm
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The root of the word education is e-ducere, literally, to lead forth, or to bring out something which is potentially present.
Erich Fromm
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Love is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise. If love were only a feeling, there would be no basis for the promise to love each other forever. A feeling comes and it may go. How can I judge that it will stay forever, when my act does not involve judgment and decision.
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Critical and radical thought will only bear fruit when it is blended with the most precious quality man is endowed with - the love of life
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Respect is not fear and awe it...[is]the ability to see a person as he is, to be aware of his unique individuality. Respect, thus, implies the absence of exploitation. I want the loved person to grow and unfold for his own sake, and in his own ways, and not for the purpose of serving me.
Erich Fromm
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What is for me socialism is exactly the opposite of a bureaucratically-managed culture.
Erich Fromm
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Giving is the highest expression of potency.
Erich Fromm
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We are all equal in the sense that no man must mean - must be - the means for the purposes of another man but each individual is an end in itself.
Erich Fromm
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The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that men may become robots. True enough, robots do not rebel. But given man's nature, robots cannot live and remain sane, they become ''Golems',' they will destroy their world and themselves because they cannot stand any longer the boredom of a meaningless life.
Erich Fromm
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It is a tragedy that most of us die before we have begun to live.
Erich Fromm
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If the Russians claim they are Socialist, this is just, I would say, a lie. They have no socialism at all. They have what I would call a state capitalism.
Erich Fromm
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Modern capitalism needs men who cooperate smoothly and in large numbers who want to consume more and more and whose tastes are standardized and can be easily influenced and anticipated ... what is the outcome? Modern man is alienated from himself, from his fellow man and from nature.
Erich Fromm
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When people can't handle God any more, they turn to religion.
Erich Fromm
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Once they are through the process of education, most people lose the capacity of wondering, of being surprised. They feel they ought to know everything, and hence that it is a sign of ignorance to be surprised or puzzled by anything.
Erich Fromm
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The Russians have succeeded in one thing: they have sold the world the idea that they represent socialism and the ideas of Marx,and we have done the greatest service to their propaganda by agreeing that that's what it is.
Erich Fromm