It's widely accepted, these days, that there's plenty of wisdom to be found in Buddhism, even if you're a hardcore atheist with a Richard Dawkins ankle tattoo who'd never be caught taking life advice from any other religion. (Can you imagine the damage to mindfulness meditation's reputation if word got out that it's been part of Christian, Muslim and Jewish traditions for centuries?) Yet one of the most insightful bits of Buddhist psychology has yet to reach a widespread modern audience: the notion of the "near enemy". According to this way of thinking, for every desirable habit or state of mind, there's a "far enemy", which is its obvious antithesis. Thus hatred, it won't surprise you to learn, is the far enemy of love. Near enemies, on the other hand, are much sneakier and harder to spot, because they so closely resemble the thing they're the enemy of. Needy, possessive co-dependency can look and feel a lot like love, when really it corrodes it.
This is best thought of as a metaphor, of course: Buddhist mythology is full of malicious demons disguising themselves as decent sorts, and clearly emotions can't really be devious or sneaky. But it's a metaphor that works surprisingly well in numerous contexts. It's great to cultivate an attitude of easy-going acceptance, for instance but not if it curdles into resignation or indifference, which looks similar but is in fact entirely opposed. (Ancient Greek Stoicism is one thing; stiff upper-lipped, repressed British stoicism another.) A further example: psychology studies remind us that being overly materialistic is a recipe for misery. Yet all too often the proposed solutions involve spending lots of money on memorable experiences, or becoming obsessively minimalist and purging your possessions both of which, though they appear anti-materialist, are just different versions of a fixation on money and stuff.
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