Things You Might Not Know About Love

 

Making eye contact is a key gateway for love. This board discusses ten other interesting and thought-provoking ideas about love and relationships from the book "Love 2.0: How our Supreme Emotion Affects What We Feel, Think, Do & Become."

It Can Be Hard to Talk About Love in Scientific Terms

The vision of love that emerges from the latest science requires a radical shift. Dr. Frederickson learned to ask people to leave love as they knew it to consider it from a different perspective: their body's perspective. Love is not romance, sexual desire, or that special bond you feel with family or significant others.
And perhaps most challenging of all, love is neither lasting nor unconditional. The radical shift we need to make is this: love, as your body experiences it, is a micro-moment of connection shared with another.

Love is Not Exclusive

We tend to think of love and loved ones at the same time, and perhaps as even the same thing. When you take these to be only your circle of family and friends, you inadvertently limit opportunities for health, growth and well-being.
You can experience micro-moments of connection and positivity with anyone -- whether with your soul mate or a stranger. You can love far more, and far more often, than you thought.

Love Doesn't Belong to One Person

We tend to think of emotions as private events, confined to one person's mind and skin. Upgrading our view of love to Love 2.0 leaves that perspective behind. Evidence suggests that when you really "click" with someone else, a discernible yet momentary synchrony emerges between the two of you, as your gestures and biochemistries, even your respective neural firings, come to mirror one another in a pattern Dr. Frederickson calls "positivity resonance." Love is "a biological wave of good feeling and mutual care that rolls through two or more brains and bodies at once."

Making Eye Contact is a Key Gateway for Love

Your body has the built-in ability to "catch" the emotions of those around you, making your prospects for love -- defined as micro-moments of positivity resonance -- nearly limitless. As hopeful as this sounds -- wouldn't limitless love be great? -- Dr. Frederickson also noted that people often short-circuit this natural ability by not making eye contact with the other person. Meeting eyes is a key gatekeeper to neural synchrony.

Love Fortifies the Connection Between Your Brain and Your Heart Health

Decades of research show that people who are more socially connected live longer and healthier lives. Yet precisely how social ties affect health has remained one of the great mysteries of science.
Dr. Frederickson's research team learned that when they made a random group of people learn ways to create more of these micro-moments of love in their daily lives, they lastingly improved the function of the vagus nerve, a key conduit that connects the brain to the heart. This discovery provides a new window into how micro-moments of love serve as nutrients for your health.

Your Immune Cells Reflect Your Past Experiences of Love

Too often, you get the message that your future prospects hinge on your DNA. Yet the ways that your genes get expressed at the cellular level depends mightily on many factors, including whether you consider yourself to be socially connected or chronically lonely.
Dr. Frederick's team is now investigating the cellular effects of love, testing whether people who build more micro-moments of love in daily life also build healthier immune cells. It is possible that changing your daily habits can affect these fundamental aspects of your physiology.