Forgetting the Self (Erich Fromm)

Once we can forget the self as the prime focus of our interest and once we experience ourselves as acting, feeling, non-alienated human beings, then the world becomes the prime focus of our interest, our concern, our creative energies.

...We can best practise self-analysis the first thing each morning, combining it with the kind of breathing and concentration exercises used in Buddhist meditation. The important thing is to step back from the bustle of life, to come to ourselves, to stop reacting constantly to stimuli, to make ourselves "empty" so that we can become active within ourselves.

Anyone who attempts this will, I think, experience a deepening of his capacity to feel; he will experience "healing", a recovery of health, not in the medical sense but in a profound human sense. But this process requires patience, and patience is certainly not a commodity we have in great abundance. To any and all who want to make the attempt, though, I wish the best of luck.

Erich Fromm