.. an incredible passage on identity from Edward T. Hall's "Beyond Culture":

"The paradoxical part of the identification syndrome is that until it has been resolved there can be no friendship and no love-only hate. Until we can allow others to be themselves, and ourselves to be free, it is impossible to truly love another human being; neurotic and dependent love is perhaps possible, but not genuine love, which can be generated only in the self."

we perceive undesirable traits in others as "uncontrollable and unpredictable" parts of ourselves that we attempt to suppress. "The trouble I have with him is ..me"

"Man must now embark on the difficult jounrye beyond culture, because the greatest separation feat of all is when one manages to gradually free oneself fromm the grip of unconscious culture."

2.3.2010 | @ AU Katzen.