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“There’s a secret skill—being made for each other.” ~ Unknown
We live in a culture obsessed with individualism—economic self-interest as a religion, an almost triumphant sense of self-sufficiency, and an entire arsenal of therapeutic and motivational mantras emphasizing self-love, self-help, self-made, selfies. But in chasing this ideal, we’ve created an epidemic of emotional detachment, a cooling of empathy, and a cynicism that sneers at love itself.
The mythology of love as a force of transcendence—think chivalry, grand romantic gestures, love letters penned in candlelight, or Shakespearean agony where death, exile, or a convent seemed like justified endings for heartbreak—has been replaced by its institutionalization.
Love has undergone a complete structural transformation.
Perhaps Madame Bovary would have made better choices if she had undergone self-reflection and “inner engineering” first. But have we rationalized love so much that we no longer hear the whisper of the morning stars? Have we truly abandoned the idea of romantic love as a force greater than our will, beyond our very existence?
Have we lost the ability to truly see into another person’s soul? Have pain, sacrifice, and devotion become relics of a bygone era, nailed to a pillar of shame, while self-interest is celebrated as a noble achievement?
Or is the problem even deeper? Have we deliberately built a society devoid of emotional expressiveness and basic social skills—one driven instead by consumerism and disposability?
Can we still feel a lump in our throats when Robert Redford’s plane disappears into the sky, knowing that something truly irreplaceable has been lost?
Do we even remember how to love?
Paradoxically, despite this slow dehumanization and social atrophy, one truth remains unscathed: humans have an undeniable need to connect.
We long to escape loneliness, to bridge the chasm of separation. We need each other.
This is something we intuitively understand, but it has also been spelled out in intellectual terms by countless philosophers and social theorists who have tried to decode love—to define it, dissect its chemistry, track its birth, and inevitable demise.
Erich Fromm challenged Freud’s theory that all our choices and desires stem from childhood trauma. Instead, he framed love as a deliberate practice—not a spontaneous burst of passion, but a skill, an art, a conscious commitment. Love, he argued, is not something that merely happens to us. It is something we actively choose, day after day.
Radical feminism sees love as a battleground for power, a terrain that deepens the already vast differences between men and women, turning them into irreconcilable chasms.
Esther Perel taught us how to keep passion alive in long-term relationships.
Eva Illouz warned of the rise of romantic consumerism, where partners are treated like commodities, carefully selected from a catalog of desires.
Feelings have been demystified, reduced, decoded.
Love has been stripped down—first through radical individual freedom and equality, then through the marketization of intimacy. It is now governed by the language of advertising and the logic of consumerism, absorbed into an economy of endless choice.
And yet, ironically, all these thinkers begin their books with the same kind of dedication—a tribute to someone close to them.
“I’m not a religious person, Marianne, but I think God made you just for me.” ~ Sally Rooney, “Normal People”
Sally Rooney nearly seduced us with these words. But beneath their poetic glow lies a story of insecurity, conflicting priorities, unspoken fears, and the unavoidable collision of two different selves. It’s a love story we now instinctively break down, scientifically analyze, and even predict its ending.
The Age of “Me, Myself, and I”
Western culture today is obsessed with psychology and hyper-individualism. Self-care has become an imperative—emphasizing personal boundaries, self-awareness, and a clear sense of identity. We dissect happiness, strategize how to love ourselves more, enhance our magnetism, and strengthen our self-confidence—all while the noise in our heads grows louder.
At the helm of it all is the hedonistic self, ruled by dopamine’s insatiable hunger for more—more pleasure, more validation, more “likes,” more…everything.
By nature, human beings are self-centered. We love to believe the universe revolves around us. Altruism is not an innate virtue. And yet, paradoxically, we have a deep, desperate need to be seen through the eyes of another.
We crave closeness, but we also guard our independence.
We seek security, but also excitement.
We long for stability, yet we chase the unpredictable.
We are both dependent and autonomous creatures.
And perhaps, the true skill we must master is the ability to hold both truths at once.
The Lost Art of Connection
Schools prepare us for careers, but they teach us nothing about how to treat the people we love—even though research proves that the quality of our relationships is the single most important factor in our health, happiness, and longevity.
The path to self-awareness does not unfold in isolation—it happens through others, with others.
To truly understand ourselves, we must learn to see and understand another person—to look into someone’s face with love, acceptance, and respect.
That is the greatest gift we can give.
George Bernard Shaw once said that indifference is the greatest sin.
To be ignored is to be told: “I don’t see you. You don’t matter.”
In the Age of the Self, do we even have the capacity to see another person anymore?
Do we know how to step aside so that someone else can pass?
And what about our right to come first—our own self-importance?
The eternal dilemma: Can I truly love someone if I haven’t first “fixed” myself? Or can I allow someone to love me before I even love myself? What does self-love look like when it also leaves space for another person?
Maybe self-love is not about mastering solitude or independence, but about recognizing and accepting our own imperfection.
It’s about knowing that even when we fail—even when we are alone or lost—we will be okay.
It’s the ability to forgive ourselves, to take risks without fearing failure, and to let others love us, even in moments when we don’t feel lovable at all.
Because often, their version of us is kinder than the merciless critic in our heads.
Love as a Creative Act
To bear witness to another person’s life—their struggles and triumphs—is there anything greater than that?
To truly see someone is an act of imagination and creativity.
The hedonistic paradox tells us that those who seek happiness for themselves rarely find it—but those who bring happiness to others, do.
Perhaps the ultimate test of life—the one for which all others are merely preparation—is simply: how to love.
How to be a good friend, partner, parent, and citizen.
Our joys and sorrows, triumphs and failures, shape a deeper awareness of others—their fragility, uniqueness, confusion, and courage.
We are all complex souls, falling and rising, again and again.
To witness another person’s existence is to say: “You matter. I see you. Your life will not go unnoticed. I will be your witness.”
And in that fleeting space—between you and me, between self and world, between desires and expectations—there is only one place where we cease to be alone.
Love.
~
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