Fifteen minutes alone

"Love is not a feeling you fall into. It is an art you practice." That's my paraphrase of Erich Fromm, who in 1956 wrote a short book called The Art of Loving that said loving someone takes the same things music or carpentry take: discipline, concentration, patience, and caring more about getting it right than about being comfortable.

You might wonder why a book about love is in the month called You, instead of the month about your circle. One reason. Fromm said you cannot love anyone until you can stand being alone with yourself. Today you find out whether you can.

Fromm was a German psychoanalyst who left in 1934 and spent the rest of his life asking why people who are finally free so often hand the freedom back. His claim is that most of what we call love is a trade: I need, you need, we exchange. He calls that a market, and he says it fails because it depends on the other person staying useful. Real love is an activity, not a passivity. It has four elements, the same whether you are loving a child, a friend, a spouse or a stranger: care, responsibility, respect, and knowledge.

Knowledge is the hard one. It means seeing the person as they are, not as you need them to be. And that begins with seeing yourself that way.

So his exercise is almost rude in its simplicity. Sit alone. No book, no phone, no music, no task. For a set time. And notice how fast you want to leave.

Most people last about four minutes before they reach for something. The urge to leave your own company is one of the most honest readings you will ever take of yourself. It's also a muscle, and like every muscle in this month, it responds to reps. By the end of the year, fifteen minutes alone will be the best part of your morning.