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By B. Sapoznik  Love. What is it truly? I hate to break it to you, but love isn’t much of that fairy-tale mystical sentiment. I mean, for some people, it might be. But at the end of the day, love (alongside virtually any other feeling) is merely a reaction from your body to your external environment. Yes, anything in your external environment. A person, a pet, a place, a color, or any other thing may be ‘loved’ by someone. Love is extremely hard to explain biologically. In a nutshell, love is derived from your instinctive decision-making brain.
It has much to do with the different chemicals released inside your brain. Initially, the chemicals are released from the ventral tegmental area (VTA). Practically, if your brain is intrigued, many chemicals are instantly released because your decision-making instinct decides that something is better for you than worse. This is also the reaction to immediately get us safe, to trigger what is best for your survival. Therefore, when it views something as a positive, it is set to release ‘rewarding’ chemicals so that you primarily follow that positive instinct. For instance, if you’re in a very cold setting, and you enter a heated environment, you will naturally feel better because your body wants you to stay heated and minimize the chances of pain (any threat to your body). Due to this positive (interpreted by your brain), the VTA produces and releases chemicals such as dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and others. Zooming in on the brain structure, when these specific chemicals reach the destined neurotransmitters, they’re supposed to make you feel something. Dopamine (produced in the VTA, hypothalamus, and other sections of the brain) is the ultimate happiness/reward hormone to make you feel happy (formula: C8 H11 NO2). Oxytocin (produced in the VTA, pituitary gland, hypothalamus, and other sections of the brain) is the main ‘love’ hormone, triggered by trust, safety, and other aspects (formula: C43 H66 N12 O12 S2). Amongst other chemicals, these are the main factors for the love reaction. After production/action, the brain feeds in on itself as dopamine creates drive and happiness whilst oxytocin creates relaxation and trust. From there, your body takes physical external measures, such as pupil dilation, hormone production, etc. From that point on, your brain is in love. It might produce more or less hormones and chemicals in response to your decision-making. But all in all, that’s pretty much love. This is a nutshell of an explanation about love. However, scientists conduct ongoing research projects to find out more about the neuroscience behind our brain and all the chemicals involved in this process. The most adequate term I could find for love is an ‘illusion’. Because love is something created by your brain, which drives you to feed itself and to feed the feeling. Love isn’t really there physically, it’s the way your brain interprets the chemicals released by itself due to a quick survival reaction. So, to feed both views, love is science. But love is also something mystical, because it doesn’t exist, though people rely and experience it constantly. Sources: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15990719/#:~:text=Love%20is%20a%20complex%20neurobiological,%2C%20dopamine%2C%20and%20serotonergic%20signaling https://www.verywellmind.com/what-happens-in-your-brain-when-you-fall-in-love-7971808#:~:text=The%20ventral%20tegmental%20area%20floods,can't%20stop%20thinking%20about. https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/14/health/brain-on-love-wellness/index.html#:~:text=It%20starts%20with%20a%20crush,%E2%80%9Cfeel%2Dgood%E2%80%9D%20neurotransmitter. https://www.healthline.com/health/love-hormone#motherhood https://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/oxytocin-the-love-hormone#:~:text=Oxytocin%20is%20a%20hormone%20that's,%22%20or%20%22love%20hormone.%22 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxytocin
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