Erich Fromm: biography of the founder of humanistic psychoanalysis

It is likely that, if you are not specialized in psychology, when talking about “psychoanalysis” you only think of the figure of Sigmund Freud. For this reason, today we present to you the biography of Erich Fromm (Frankfurt, 1900 – Muralto, 1980), the founder of humanist psychoanalysis.

When psychoanalysis was definitively established in Europe, other proposals progressively appeared based on this current, but with different perspectives. If you want to know how the founder of humanistic psychoanalysis arrived at this thought, keep reading.

Biography of Erich Fromm

Erich Fromm belonged to a family related to Orthodox Judaism. For this reason, during his youth, he began to train in Talmudic studies, but they did not convince him at all and he embarked on another path. He was inspired by the theories of psychoanalysis of Sigmund Freud and the thought of Karl Marx.: two figures who brought him closer to socialism and who marked him to the point of obtaining a doctorate in sociology.

In addition, he also studied law and trained at the universities of Heidelberg and from Munich, at the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute. During the 1930s, when the Nazis took control of Germany, Fromm moved to New York, where he opened a clinical practice based on psychoanalysis and began teaching at Columbia University.

From that moment on, was developing a psychoanalysis with strong influences of humanist philosophywhich was based on the ability of human beings to become, little by little, more free and autonomous through their own personal development.

Personal interests and inspirations

Erich Fromm’s interests focused especially on create a new “science of man” that would be capable of guiding a balanced individual in the midst of cultural chaos, violence and loneliness. This thought was nourished by:

The work of Marx. Freud’s theory. Buddhism Zen and his notion about “enlightenment”, understood as the development of man’s intuitive qualities.

First steps towards humanistic psychoanalysis

As Milagros and Dolores Sáiz describe well, when psychology emerged in the second half of the 19th century, the first generation of researchers strove to understand the functioning of mental processes. However, it was not until the consolidation of psychoanalysis in Europe that psychologists left aside the problems related to the life path, the past and the future.

Thus, Psychoanalysis opened a more philosophical approach to psychotherapeutic practice.and Fromm departed from this approach to develop a more humanistic vision.

Humanistic psychoanalysis

For Fromm, the Psyche Human nature could not be explained only with cultural images or images created by the environment that revealed unconscious desires. According to his thinking, and coinciding in some parameters with existentialists, to understand it we must also know how human beings strive to find the meaning of life. Thus, he discovered that:

Life is not necessarily a field strewn with suffering: The optimism of his humanistic vision was not expressed through the denial of pain, but through the idea of ​​enduring it by giving it meaning.The ability to love is basic: each person is unique in their mistakes, just as they are unique in what they can contribute.

These thoughts may seem difficult to achieve in practice. However, as described in his book The Art of Loving: An Investigation into the Nature of Love (1982), The objective of these two missions is to develop love for life itself. And with it, towards oneself too.

The importance of needs

Fromm bases his analysis of society on the concept of the social unconscious. (that is, in the repressed part according to Freud). Therefore, inevitably according to this thought, the realization of love, justice and freedom will be achieved when man’s needs are satisfied.

For this reason, each individual must strive to satisfy his desires, but be careful not to become robots that they end up destroying themselves for not supporting a meaningless life lacking goals. And you? What do you think?

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