Now that you're feeling so warmly toward the entire human race, how
can you deepen your love for someone? The way God created us, actions
affect our feelings most. For example, if you want to become more
compassionate, thinking compassionate thoughts may be a start, but
giving tzedaka (charity) will get you there. Likewise, the best way to
feel loving is to be loving ― and that means giving.
While most people believe love leads to giving, the truth (as Rabbi
Eliyahu Dessler writes in his famous discourse on loving kindness) is
exactly the opposite: Giving leads to love.
What is giving? When an enthusiastic handyman happily announces to
his non- mechanically inclined wife, "Honey, wait till you see what I
got you for your birthday ― a triple-decker toolbox!" that's not
giving. Neither is a father's forcing violin lessons on his son because
he himself always dreamed of being a virtuoso.
True giving, as Erich Fromm points out, is other-oriented, and
requires four elements. The first is care, demonstrating active concern
for the recipient's life and growth. The second is responsibility,
responding to his or her expressed and unexpressed needs (particularly,
in an adult relationship, emotional needs). The third is respect, "the
ability to see a person as he [or she] is, to be aware of his [or her]
unique individuality," and, consequently, wanting that person to "grow
and unfold as he [or she] is."
These three components all depend upon the fourth, knowledge. You can
care for, respond to, and respect another only as deeply as you know
him or her.
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