It can be a hostile world. More hostile to some of us than to others, sure, but almost everyone I care about knows what it is to run up against cruelty or indifference or dehumanization from individuals or from systems sometimes. 

And while I very much want a person in my life who, when the world has been cruel or dehumanizing to me, can look at me and see me for who I am and help me restore my sense of myself and my own worth, I’m increasingly aware that, much more than I want and need even that, I want and need a person for whom I can be a person who does that.