Love and Happiness

Today, we’re going to begin an ongoing conversation about the importance and power of love.

Love is obviously a subject very present in our lives. When we are in love we’re happy. When we’re out of love we’re heartbroken and unhappy. We love our parents and our kids. Love is the subject of more than half the hit songs on the radio.

As present as love is in our lives, I don’t think we have a good understanding of love. Maybe we’re too familiar with it. Maybe we take it for granted.

All too often we think of love as little more than falling in romantic love with someone. No doubt, romantic love—eros—is awesome. It feels great. It’s exciting. Maybe even intoxicating.

But love is much bigger than that. It includes love for your parents and your children. Love for your friends. The self-giving love that leads some people to sacrifice their lives for others.

Love isn’t just something we feel. Love is also action.

In my blog, The Meaning of Life: Happiness, we talk about the importance of relationship for Happiness in life. A study that Harvard has been doing for more than 70 years shows that the most important thing for happiness in life is having high-quality relationships.

Happiness does not come from money. Or fame. Or social status.

Happiness is deeply tied to having great relationships. And the best relationships are love-based relationships. Loving relationships with your friends. With your spouse. With your children. With your co-workers.

Being loved by others changes us. When we practice loving others, it changes us too.

Not just changed emotionally, but physically changed. We’re biologically wired for love. It’s embedded deeply in our DNA.

That Harvard study didn’t just show that high-quality relationships make you happier in life. People with good relationships are healthier and actually live longer. Let’s flip it the other way. Loneliness, the lack of love, is as deadly as smoking or alcoholism.

There’s more. Babies. It turns out that if you give infants all the food and water they need—if you give them all the nutrition they need—but you don’t give them love and physical affection, almost 40% of them will die. A 40% death rate for babies who don’t receive love. More than half of the infant survivors will have significant psychological challenges.

The simple and yet profound answer for the meaning of life--for Happiness--is having good, loving relationships.

Love is the foundation for a healthy and happy life.

When you understand and practice love, you'll receive enormous benefits in life.

You’ll have better relationships with your spouse and children and family.

You’ll be a much more successful leader at work.

You’ll have the best chance for fulfillment and happiness in your own life.

Love is at the very core of life. The more you understand love, the better you’ll be at every aspect of your life.

One experience taught me a very important lesson about love and life. It’s make-or-break.

What you believe about love--what you know about love--dramatically impacts your understanding of life.

A Story About Death and Love

True story. I had a friend at the gym who was an accomplished doctor with an Ivy League education. Very smart. Very intellectual.

He claimed to be an atheist, and we had interesting and thoughtful conversations about life. He had a nice wife who I saw frequently at church. It seemed clear, by the way he talked about and treated her, that he was very much in love with her.

So we had our conversations—mostly fun intellectual sparring about life—while riding stationary bikes in the gym.

One day our talk was interrupted by a loud crash behind us. A person working out on one of the elliptical machines had collapsed. The doctor jumped off his stationary bike and helped save that person’s life.

I didn’t see the doctor again for some time. Our workout schedules didn’t coincide.