"Love is of all passions, the strongest, for it attacks simultaneously the head, the heart and the senses !"
- Lao Tzu
Love, a seemingly plain and simple four-letter-word... L-O-V-E.
Undoubtedly the strongest and deepest of all emotions and better-most of all bonds. Love.
What exactly is thing so mysterious, so fascinating, so simple but yet so unfathomable.
From time immemorial we've been hearing of stories or rather EPICS of love-borne souls. Stories of Romeo and Juliet, Antony and Cleopatra, Layla-Majnun, Salim-Anarkali, Shah Jahan and Mumtaz and more of "The League", not only talk of but also epitomize love in the best possible way. The innocence, purity, the greatness...all just make these Cupidians the perfect love-couples to talk of.
Even today we find many such souls possessed by love who claim to be the innocent victims of that winged-Cupid's arrow, or so atleast they claim. Infact every 5th friend of yours (just an estimate figure) would claim to be in a relationship, or in love, as said them. Even if they don't speak of it, certain symptoms are always there out in the open for the vigilant minds : untimely calls, loss of hunger and/or sleep, solitary being or jus' smiling away. I know it all sounds filmy but seriously, its all out there, ain't it ! Being in love is one thing, but why ditch the necessities of life dude ? Well, now its not even completely their fault. And how do we know this ? Thanks to Science...
Numerous studies and researches have been undertaken to study these symptomatic patterns of people deeply in love, and the results have been very interesting...
The moment when you see your loved ones (or infatuated ones, you decide) and you blush or start beating your chest, is nothing but the sudden gush of adrenaline in your "Bloody" circuits, a sort of Stress (of perhaps dealing with huge excitement of thy lover's sight) Response. As comes in the Hindi song - "saamne, yeh kaun aaya, dil mein hui halchal. Dekh ke bas ek hi nazar, ho gaye ham pagal..." :) :P
Best have been the Neurophysical reports.
Dr. Arthur Aaron, associated with the State University of New York, reports from his fMRI studies of the brain that :
early stage of love is associated with a hypertrophy (i.e. hyper-activation) of the sub-cortical region rich in DA (Dopamine).
romantic love engages the brain systems associated with motivation to acquire reward.
It would be interesting here to note that the brain area mentioned in the last point is also the part active (hyperactive ofcourse) in addicts. Be it alcohol, drugs, cocaine, gambling, etc. And DA or Dopamine is a neurotransmitter a chemical messenger of the brain (in layman). With this comes another interesting point worth noting that anything causing a gush of DA (or a neurotransmitter for that matter) is accompanied with a sense of pleasure and well-being.
In another brain-MRI study, of the deeply and madly in love, by Dr. Lucy Brown, a neuroscience Professor at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, it was revealed :
there is an increased activity of the VTA (Ventral Tegmental Area), which is the same part active in addiction or a cocaine "high".
in addition, other parts of the brain become comparitivley less active (this involves areas controlling behaviour and impulses as well as fear and negative emotions)
Point (1) here would probably explain the "madness" in love and Point (2) would perhaps help shed some light on the various behaviour changes including sleep, and hunger, and.... the fact "jab pyaar kiya toh darna kya" !
At this point, and the conjecture we've so far developed, it wouldn't be a bad idea to agree with Dr. Helen Fisher, scientist at Rutgers University, who says that "love can well be classified as an addiction as it is associated with a drive and involves the same areas of the brain, as in an addict".
Another enthralling study reveals low-levels of Serotonin (again, a neurotransmitter) in the head ! Now these low levels of Serotonin place Cupidians in direct comparison with people suffering from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). OCD is characterized by the person indulging in certain actions or thoughts and the indulgence being an uncontrolled compulsion. Similiar is the case with lovers lost in the thought of their loved-ones 24X7, isn't it ?!!
So, to sum it all up, Love is but a "Chemical Locha" in the brain (Locha is a soft hindi slang for mess/problem).
As said by Shakespeare, "Love looks not with the eyes but with the mind, and therefore is
winged-cupid painted blind" !
So the next time any girl speaks to ypu of Romeo and Juliet or Layla-Majnun, go ahead and tell her what "locha" actually happened with them, and you never know...it might just turn out to be your lucky day. Oh and yes, you too then would join "the League". ;)
Before I wind up, I'd like you to ponder on this...after knowing of all this chemical-locha and that we're actually helpless not at the hands of our hearts (as very much propagated in Bollywood) but at the hands of our minds, does true-love really exist ?
To add to this, La Rouchefoucauld quotes to us - "true love is like ghosts, of which many speak, but only few have seen" !
Though I firmly believe in the belief that every soul has been made with its respective "pair", but then this love-ly locha and all just confuses me.
Well whatever it be, at the end of the day, sooner or later, you have to fall in love once-n-for all,
right ? And ofcourse, no love is complete without no compromise !!
As it is said, "to love, is human. And to be indulgent, is also human"
- Latin Proverb.
