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The most important misunderstanding seems to me to lie in a confusion between the human necessities which I consider part of human nature, and the human necessities as they appear as drives, needs, passions, etc., in any given historical period.

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
Given
Confusion
Nature
Appear
Part
Period
Seems
Historical
Necessities
Human
Consider
Misunderstanding
Humans
Periods
Drives
Important
Passion
Etc
Needs
Lying
Passions

More quotes by Erich Fromm

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In the sleeping state, instead, one is much more oneself, even if society never ceases to intervene.
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Loving becomes, and the ability to love, becomes one of the most important things in life.
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It is true that one has to think first and then to act - but it's also true that if one has no possibility of acting, one's thinking kind of becomes empty and stupid.
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The experience of separateness arouses anxiety it is, indeed, the source of all anxiety.
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There is nothing inhuman, evil, or irrational which does not give some comfort, provided it is shared by a group.
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There is hardly any activity, any enterprise, which is started out with such tremendous hopes and expectations, and yet which fails so regularly, as love.
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The most important factor for the development of the individual is the structure and the values of the society into which he was born.
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For [Sigmund ] Freud, the manifest dream, that is that which we remember after waking,is like a code message, that can be interpreted, provided the right key is avail-able, for example the method of free association.
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A new question has arisen in modern man's mind, the question, namely, whether life is worth living...No sensible answer can be given to the question...because the question does not make any sense.
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We are not on the way to greater individualism, but are becoming an increasingly manipulated mass civilization.
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[Carl Gustav] Jung was not right when he said that the unconscious message is always written clearly and so there is no need to seek to discover the distortions, because one must recognize that many dreams are more or less distortions.
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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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Selfish persons are incapable of loving others, but they are not capable of loving themselves either.
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[Sigmund ] Freud did not under-stand that the dream is a highly creative act, written in the universal language of symbolism, and only secondarily does censorship distort those parts that the subject refuses to accept even in sleep.
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What is for me socialism is exactly the opposite of a bureaucratically-managed culture.
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Free man is by necessity insecure, thinking man by necessity uncertain.
Erich Fromm
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Why should society feel responsible only for the education of children, and not for the education of all adults of every age?
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It takes a moment to tell someone you love them, but it takes a lifetime to prove it.
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When people can't handle God any more, they turn to religion.
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Love isn't something natural. Rather it requires discipline, concentration, patience, faith, and the overcoming of narcissism. It isn't a feeling, it is a practice.
Erich Fromm