Love is...OR... High on Love

Tweet

Remember those little memes in the newspaper back in the '70s or '80s? Like the one that goes: "Love is never having to say you're sorry." Love is a deep, even intense feeling of affection. A feeling of pleasure or great interest in can also be described as love. One of the purest feelings in the world. It gives us great joy and, at times great heartbreak. Many may wonder how the feeling of love is actually felt by the body. What brings it on? A brain has evolved to bring on reproduction. There are four chemicals(Dopamine, Serotonin, Oxytocin, and Cortisol) in the brain that bring on this feeling and help in this regard. Non-scientists may call this brain reaction 'love'. Is it really that easy? The Beach Boys in their song 'Kokomo' lyrics described love as "perfecting our chemistry". These chemicals make our hearts rush and our cheeks flush. We begin to feel an overwhelming fixation and even idealize the other person. Books have been written about this aspect of love. (Like 'The Neural Basis of Romantic Love by Semir Zeki)They talk about these four 'love chemicals' that bring on the feeling of love. Researchers have actually done brain scans analyzing those in love. When they are shown a picture of the person they are in love with their reward center in the brain fires like crazy. It is amazing what these four chemicals do in making us feel love and even feelings of heartbreak. They are complex and I won't go into them here. You can read about them at the link below if interested. The image is from my private collection.