How Do You Know When You’re in Love?

Love is a powerful feeling that can make you feel giddy, like your heart might burst with excitement. It’s a sensation that’s hard to describe — and it can be elusive, too. Some people know it after a single moment; others develop feelings of love over months or even years.

Many of us think that the most important thing in life is to find a partner with whom we can be ourselves and who will understand and accept us. When we do find that person, it’s often a feeling of connection and safety. It’s a place where we can be our true selves, and it feels like home. The question is, how do we know when we’ve found “the one?” What are the signs?

When you fall in love, your brain becomes wired to pay attention to the person you love — to their appearance, words and actions. This is because the biological model of love sees it as a mammalian drive, similar to hunger or thirst. It involves a mix of hormones, including adrenaline and dopamine, which cause your cheeks to flush and your palms to sweat when you see someone you’re attracted to. As the relationship progresses, dopamine is replaced by oxytocin, or the cuddle hormone, which helps you become closely bonded and start making long-term plans together.

This is the kind of love that parents have for their children — the love that tells you that they’re your best friend, and that next to God, there’s no one else like them. It’s the kind of love that keeps husbands and wives together in marriage, and it’s the kind of love that makes families healthy and strong.

But there’s another kind of love – the love for a higher power, or for one’s own soul. This kind of love is less irrational, and it makes you think about the welfare of other people, rather than your own needs. It’s also a love that helps us to grow as humans.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, as concepts of reason and individuality gained traction, love started to be seen as more of a practical and sensible feeling. Politicians and royalty used it to form alliances and marriages, and philosophers from the Enlightenment period talked about how the love for a higher power could guide our choices of work, entertainment and relationships.

This understanding of love is still a popular idea today, and it’s the one that many religious faiths embrace. It’s the love that enables us to forgive people who hurt or wronged us, and it’s the kind of love a parent or friend shows for a person who has destructive patterns of behavior – by staying committed to them in order to help them move toward healthier behaviors. This is the love that is the source of compassion – the kind of love that can heal the world. And it’s the kind of love that I believe we all need to try to live by.