Rewire Your Brain: Think Your Way to a Better Life

parts of your brain are also related to your capacity for love, because 
they activate when you fi nd a person attractive or see a picture of 
a person you love.
Love 
Why is falling in love so blissful? Why did Marc look so alive after 
he got to know Karen? Throughout history, many theories about 
love have contributed more to mythology than to clarity. Take, for 
example, the concept of the soul mate, which stems from Plato ’ s 
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proposal that there is another “ half ” out there in the universe that 
“ completes ” each of us. Although there is much debate on whether 
opposites attract or repel, there is a more fundamental way of 
understanding what happens in your brain when you are falling in 
love. Examining what happens in your brain does not devalue love; 
as I have stated several times in this book, the brain and the mind 
are two parts of the same picture. Whatever happens in the 
mind changes the brain, and vice versa. When there is chemistry 
between you and another person, there is actually chemistry
within
each of you when you ’ re together. This “ good chemistry ” occurs 
because of the way you behave toward each other. 
Falling in love is a blissful experience with a powerful rush of 
euphoria because your pleasure center is activated. For example, 
during the infatuation phase, your dopamine system is charged up. 
From the fi rst sight of your new partner, your PFC works with the 
dopamine system to help you attend to this attractive person. This 
enhanced attention triggers your brain to release more dopamine 
and tells your hippocampus to remember this attractive person. 
The more dopamine, the greater the chance that you will probably 
remember the fi rst time you saw the person. 
Your attachment history and the regulation of your emotions 
by the OFC play a part in how connected you feel to that person. 
These tendencies further infl uence how much effort you make to 
reach out to him or her and enjoy a balanced relationship. Don ’ t 
forget that too much right frontal lobe activity is associated with 
passive withdrawal. Making an effort to reach out activates the left 
frontal lobe and the positive feelings associated with it, enabling you 
to move the relationship ahead for mutual enjoyment. 
The following aspects of the “ chemistry of love ” give you those 
blissful feelings: 
• 
At fi rst sight, the PFC says, “ Pay attention! This person is 
attractive. ” This triggers your brain to discharge dopamine.
• 
The hippocampus records this memory of fi rst sight.
• 
The nucleus accumbens (the pleasure and addiction center) 
is activated with dopamine. When you are separated too long 
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from the one you love, you experience something akin to with-
drawal symptoms.
• 
The
septal region
(another pleasure center) is activated after 
dopamine triggers the excitement. This area is also activated 
during orgasm.
• 
You and your partner run the risk of developing a tolerance for 
dopamine. After the initial rush, there will be fewer dopamine 
receptors. You and your partner will have to create novelty to 
stimulate dopamine.
The fi rst few dates are infused with pleasure because your nucleus 
ac cumbens is activated. This is the same pleasure center that is acti-
vated by drugs, gambling, pornography, and anything else that can 
become addictive. Some people don ’ t activate the rest of their brain 
systems and can ’ t move on to a more mature form of love. They are 
addicted to falling in love, so they move on to another relationship 
because they are constantly looking for that initial rush of excitement. 
Since dopamine circuits thrive on novelty, you and your partner 
can become used to each other and not feel the same excitement; 
you can even become bored. To prevent the dulling of your relation-
ship, you can charge up your dopamine system by doing novel things 
together like traveling and going out on romantic dates. The feelings 
of pleasure from the new experiences will spill over into your rela-
tionship by kindling the dopaminergic system. 
When the septal region is activated, you generalize a positive 
feeling to other experiences. For example, when you spend time with 
your partner on a sunny day, that day seems gloriously full of color, 
fragrance, and wonderful people. Any fl aw in your partner is glossed 
over or seen as an endearing characteristic. Everything is fused with 
hopeful anticipation. The things that normally bother you don ’ t. Your 
brain essentially recruits memories and associations that make all 
experiences positive. 
To maintain positive and secure attachment feelings for a long 
time, you ’ ll have to stimulate the neurochemistry in your brain that 
fosters long - term bonding. Fortunately, your brain has the neuro-
chemistry potential to make long - term bonding a possibility. Oxytocin 
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and vasopressin are the two principal hormones that facilitate close 
relationships. Oxytocin helps to create a bond between people who 
are forming an intimate relationship. The oxytocin level rises when 
you have warm physical contact with someone you are close to and 
with whom you feel safe. Vasopressin rises when you recognize the 
person you feel close to, as if to say, “ Oh, it ’ s you! ”
Oxytocin functions as a neuromodulator, which means that it 
orchestrates the activities of the neurotransmitters and helps to 
enhance or dampen the effectiveness of synaptic connections. It is 
sometimes called the cuddling or the commitment neuromodulator 
because it facilitates bonding in all mammals. Animals with a rela-
tively high amount of oxytocin are monogamous. The classic example 
is the prairie vole, which mates for life. Oxytocin is released in women 
during labor and breastfeeding, and it is released in both sexes when 
nurturing children, cuddling, making love, and having an orgasm. 
In romantic relationships, once dopamine triggers excitement, 
oxytocin triggers feelings of warmth and attachment. In one study, 
when people were exposed to a sniff of oxytocin, they were more apt 
to participate in a fi nancial game and trust others with their money. 
You can actually make the neurochemical foundation of your rela-
tionship deepen your long - term commitment. For example, when 
oxytocin is combined with dopamine (which occurs when excite-
ment is rekindled through novel experiences), a long - term sense of 
love and commitment arises that feels exciting, safe, and fulfi lling. 
It is my hope that this is what happened to Marc and Karen. 
Use the social brain system to rewire your brain and enhance 
your relationships. If you make the effort to feed your brain in order 
to expand and deepen your social and intimate relationships, you 
will enjoy the vast benefi ts of social medicine.
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165
M
aria came to see me after a series of losses. First her father 
died. That loss was hard, and she emerged slowly from her 
grief six months later. Then her cat died. She had been very attached 
to him and had spent years holding him on her lap in the evenings. 
It took two months for her to move beyond the sadness. Then, when 
all seemed to be going well again, she was transferred to a new unit 
at work. She had grown very close to her coworkers, and the pros-
pect of having to get to know an entire new group of people was 
daunting. Eventually, she found that this new group was as easy to 
get along with as her old group had been. A few months later she 
twisted her ankle and had to walk with crutches. This occurred just 
as she had begun to take a walk every evening with a neighbor. 
Maria complained, “ I ’ m just not as durable as most people. Why 
is it that it takes me so long to bounce back after something bad 
happens? ”
No one in her past had ever served as a resilient role model. In 
fact, many members of her family were the opposite of resilient. 
Her father complained woefully about everything, even when things 
8
Resiliency and 
Wisdom
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were going well. He always found a fl aw in whatever was going on: 
his favorite restaurant was closed, or his favorite television show was 
being preempted by a special newscast. He sulked for hours after 
these minor disappointments. 
Maria ’ s mother spent much of her time trying to make sure that 
everything went easily for Maria ’ s father, but she silently loathed the 
role. Her older brother was quite passive - aggressive, always manipu-
lating his wife, who babied him. Thus, Maria ’ s role models were 
not resilient or vibrant people. This, coupled with the fact that she 
married an alcoholic right after high school, meant that she entered 
adulthood with few durable role models. Now, thirty years old and 
with an eleven - year - old daughter, she was ill prepared for the gen-
eral stresses of life. Even when her daughter caught a cold, it took 
her quite a while to adjust to taking care of her while also managing 
the household and going to work. 
Maria told me that she was both a pessimist and a perfectionist. 
I noted that those attitudes set her up to react to whatever occurs in 
her life by making the situation worse rather than better. Her pes-
simism meant that she could foresee no good options and no light 
at the end of the tunnel. This was a prescription for despair and 
anxiety to return. Her neural circuitry emphasized a “ worry loop ” in 
which her amygdala triggered fear and her PFC ruminated about 
the possible causes of that fear. She also overactivated her right 
PFC and underactivated her left. 
My plan to help her rewire her brain entailed inoculations of 
manageable periods of stress. Simultaneously, she needed to acti-
vate her left PFC, which involved taking action to kindle all the 
positive emotions associated with it. 
I was not surprised that Maria was resistant to the plan, yet after 
I explained how neuroplasticity works, she indicated that she was 
willing to give it a try. I explained that she had to get out of the 
victim role. She was making herself feel as though life were noth-
ing but a series of bad experiences over which she had no control. 
Instead, she needed to learn to put herself in the driver ’ s seat by 
making decisions about whatever occurs in her life. Through slowly 
regaining a reasonable sense of control, Maria was better able to 
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initiate the process of neuroplasticity. Rewiring her brain required 
that she decide to make changes rather than react to whatever 
occurred as if she were nothing more than a victim. To remember 
the steps that are required to rewire the brain, I gave her the FEED 
acronym as a mnemonic device. 
Since Maria needed a place to practice feeding her brain, 
I suggested that she take initiative at work. She could, for example, 
volunteer to be on a committee with the new team. Her reaction 
was, “ I just got comfortable with them. Why push it? ”
“ That ’ s the point, ” I said. “ You need to push it. Think of what 
you ’ ll be doing as a sort of inoculation. You ’ re building up your stress 
tolerance by expanding your comfort area. ” After considerable per-
suasion, she reluctantly agreed. I reminded her that she was still 
playing the passive victim by dragging herself into following through 
with our agreement. In fact, when she procrastinated about nomi-
nating herself, she was still playing victim in our agreement. She 
was not going to develop resiliency until she used the FEED plan 
and did what seemed to her to be against her nature. 
Maria volunteered herself the next day. When she returned to see 
me a week later, she said that the members of the committee were 
pleasantly surprised and thanked her for volunteering. 
After the committee assignment was completed, she asked if 
I thought it would be wise to “ resign now because I have done my bit. ”
“ On the contrary, ” I protested, “ you ’ re just getting started. Your 
job is to keep on expanding your comfort zone. Remember, the sec-
ond