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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.

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
Born
Important
Factor
Factors
Structure
Development
Society
Values
Individual

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The person who gives up his individual self and becomes an automaton, identical with millions of other automatons around him, need not feel alone and anxious any more. But the price he pays, however, is high it is the loss of his self.
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Modern man lives under the illusion that he knows what he wants, while he actually wants what he is supposed to want.
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Loving becomes, and the ability to love, becomes one of the most important things in life.
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We are terribly imaginative, as far as technique in science is concerned. As far as changes in social arrangements are concerned, we lack utterly in imagination.
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Our society is run by a managerial bureaucracy, by professional politicians people are motivated by mass suggestion, their aim is producing more and consuming more, as purposes in themselves.
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Paradoxically, the ability to be alone is the condition for the ability to love.
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To be loved because of one's merit, because one deserves it, always leaves doubt maybe I did not please the person whom I want to love me, maybe this, or that - there is always a fear that love could disappear.
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The sick individual finds himself at home with all other similarly sick individuals. The whole culture is geared to this kind of pathology.
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We substitute, or we rather hide, this fear of real intimacy by a superficial kind of friendliness, which is quite nice, but nevertheless, very shallow.
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Human history begins with man's act of disobedience which is at the same time the beginning of his freedom and the development of his reason.
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Sleep is often the only occasion in which man cannot silence his conscience we forget what we knew in our dream.
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I would say, compared with the 19th century, compared with most previous history, this is as good or better a society than any which man has ever made. But that doesn't mean it is such a good one.
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In fact, there are very important writings of Marx which are not even translated into English.
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It is a tragedy that most of us die before we have begun to live.
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Free man is by necessity insecure, thinking man by necessity uncertain.
Erich Fromm
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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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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.
Erich Fromm
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If you do not smile, you are judged lacking in a 'pleasing personality' - and you need to have a pleasing personality if you want to sell your services, whether as a waitress, a salesman, or a physician.
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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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People do not see that the main question is not : Am I loved? which is to a large extent the question : Am I approved of? Am I protected? Am I admired? The main question is: Can I love?
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