“In the end, what we pay the most attention to defines us. How you choose to spend the irreplaceable hours of your life literally transforms you… All relationships change the brain — but most important are the intimate bonds that foster or fail us, altering the delicate circuits that shape memories, emotions and that ultimate souvenir, the self.”
“Love is the best school, but the tuition is high and the homework can be painful… Whether they speak Armenian or Mandarin, people around the world use the same images of physical pain to describe a broken heart, which they perceive as crushing and crippling. It’s not just a metaphor for an emotional punch. Social pain can trigger the same sort of distress as a stomachache or a broken bone.”
“During idylls of safety, when your brain knows you’re with someone you can trust, it needn’t waste precious resources coping with stressors or menace… The flip side is that, given how vulnerable one then is, love lessons — sweet or villainous — can make a deep impression.”
