interest without motive is really hard to fake

by Clyfford Still

Everyone wants to know how to make other people like them. Personally, I think the secret is to be interested in another person without trying to manipulate what they think of you. Interest without motive is really difficult to fake. I know a lot of people who are, in their own way, very warm and seductive, but there’s an essential anxiety to their ministrations—they want your approval or your attention or your time, and you can feel that in their gaze, in their hand on the small of your back, in the way they so thoughtfully anticipate all of your needs.

Not that there’s anything so wrong with that. We all have needs. But: wanting something from someone is never the best way to love them. Wanting something from someone reduces them to a commodity and you to a person trying to purchase it. You start to view them as a means to an end instead of as an end to themselves. You start digging for a feeling.