Love guides us, and need drives us! 🌓

Karen Horney, in «Our Inner Conflicts», describes how a need frustrated in childhood can become so excessive that it directs a person’s actions toward satisfying it.

In this process, a person develops certain qualities and attitudes that shape their character. All of this leaves its mark on their particular system of values: the stronger and more significant the frustration of a need, the stronger and more significant the system of values formed in the process of satisfying that need.

This very frustrating need creates an impetus for action. If a goal or object (activity) directly or indirectly satisfies the need, then that goal or object itself becomes a powerful need.

However, if the need is satisfied before a character is formed, a certain system of values is established, or certain personality traits develop, will this lead to lasting results? Will the drive to move forward, to pursue a goal, be lost?

“It won’t be in vain if, by that time, love has developed, along with an interest in the object of that love and a desire to work.” (E. Fromm)

For Erich Fromm, love belongs to phenomena of abundance: in loving, a person gives rather than making up for a deficit. The author of this text is the one who connects this idea with supercompensation.

Satisfying a need alleviates the painful feeling of tension and provides temporary relief. Isn’t love a need?

Needs are a phenomenon of deficiency. Love is a phenomenon of abundance. The need for love is different from the ability to love. The former shapes the latter.

Love is a phenomenon of abundance, says “I can.” Need is a phenomenon of deficiency, says “I need.” Therefore, the impulse to move, to strive towards a goal, will not disappear when the need is satisfied, if the ability to love the goal and the movement itself has been developed.

You are moving towards your goal, you are engaged in meaningful activities, and you communicate not because you have to, but because you can. Although this is also a need, it is of a different kind, a higher one.

Necessity drives us forward, and love guides us.

The need to be strong makes a person weak. The need for a person to be independent makes them dependent on that need. By satisfying a need, a person wants to gain something – they need to gain it. By satisfying a need, a person feels fulfilled – they need to feel fulfilled. When loving, a person contemplates the result of their love and enjoys it. When loving, a person gives, because they themselves are full of love, and by giving, they do not demand anything in return.

Love is an act of freedom, a personal choice, a verb – that is, an action based on the possibility and ability to act. Needs, on the other hand, make a person unfree: a need drives a person, forces them to acquire something because it is essential for survival. All of this deprives them of flexibility.

These two types of relationships are not mutually exclusive; rather, they complement each other. One draws us in, while the other pushes us towards the object of our desire. By learning to love what we once felt a need for, we are no longer limited to just one approach. We can move towards our goal in either way.

During periods when our needs are satisfied, it is our ability, our “can-do” attitude, that drives us towards our goal. During periods when we lack the strength to love, it is our need, our “hunger,” that pushes us forward.

It is clear that the need to detach from love makes a person dependent. Love that is detached from needs is a utopia (there is always some need). The combination of need and love for an object makes a person strong, because now there is a choice.

“This strength lies in the ability to be vulnerable”… because now you have a choice… “You can allow others to influence you and be flexible” (S. Covey, The 8th Habit, p. 208).

“Plutarch is more consistent and steady, Seneca is more changeable… Seneca excites and stirs you more, while Plutarch satisfies you more and rewards you better. Plutarch leads us, Seneca pushes us” (M. Montaigne, on books, p. 364).

“Thus began the decline of Zarathustra. Incipit tragoedia.” (Friedrich Nietzsche, «The Gay Science», § 342).

“As Rollo May put it in his book ‘Love and Will,’ sensual love pulls us forward, while sex pushes us from behind.”