The Love Quest: the science of love and the received wisdom

So we are all looking for love. Even the cynics, the resigned, the disappointed, whatever we may be, we are all looking for love. 1 to 1, exclusive, personal, intimate love.

All of us in the same big boat, on a quest to find and keep love.

For the past few years I have been following the work of Dr Helen Fisher, the cultural anthropologist of romantic love. I am definitely a Fisher fan and she really makes 'romantic love' sound great and I am seduced by this new-old quest: to understand love. Fisher's research is fascinating, she collected thousands upon thousands of data surveys, she even scans lovers' brains. She says that 'love' is the most powerful brain system on earth and romantic love keeps the world turning. Sure she's not the first to make such a claim. Lots of nods from the gallery. Look at Freud's libido, Jung's animus and anima, Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.

So let's get some received wisdom (RW) out, on love - everything in between science and folk tale.

First I trust some of my good and beautiful friends who assure me that love NEVER happens when you're waiting for it.
Oh, ok! Thanks. That explains it.
Nope. Not here. It's like watching a kettle.

When you stop wanting love you get a brief relief from the longing and the hoping. This you must enjoy because it's restful and there aren't that many stops coming up. Then out of nowhere, love arrives in one's heart. Never goes for any fingers or toes, 'bulls' eye'!

Alas, the loving, the hoping, wishing and praying are back! No restful, serene, shady places now... Loving somebody takes energy.

No wonder so many of us on the journey get such tired hearts.

Second RW fact about love is that you must 'decide to love'. Yep, it's a decision which sort of goes well with an economic view of the personality and the cost-benefit calculations self-interested individuals are suppose to be making - consciously or not - when making decisions. But I like this step - 'decide to love' - because it shows that you have to be willing and you have to be open. It sounds like Khalil Gibran, but it's actually my 7 year old who told me this and he'd heard it on Cbeebies. Oh, so you decide to love but you can't decide who will love you back. Is that why love is blind?

Fisher says it takes seconds to make that decision though. She says we know, we are walking billboards advertising everything there is to know about ourselves, we always know what we want and who has it.

So what do we have so far?

You have to wait but stop waiting, with your open heart, with your defences down, in the way of the arrows. Imagine it, you're naked, at peace, restful, defenceless, sleeping in a forest like some nymph or satyr. One eye open though, so that you can decide.

I definitely think we're making some progress here...