About Barbara Fredrickson
Barbara Fredrickson, Ph.D., is a leading researcher in the field of positive psychology. She is the Kenan Distinguished Professor of Psychology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the director of the Positive Emotions and Psychophysiology Lab. Best known for her “broaden-and-build” theory of positive emotions, Fredrickson’s work explores how experiences like love, joy, and gratitude shape our mental and physical health.
About the Book
“To absorb what the new science of love has to offer, you’ll need to step back from “love” as you may now know it. Forget about the love you typically hear on the radio, the one that’s centered on desire and yearns for touch from a new squeeze. Set aside the take on love your family might have offered you, one that requires that you love your relatives unconditionally, regardless of whether their actions disturb you, or their aloofness leaves you cold. I’m even asking you to set aside your view of love as a special bond or relationship, be it with your spouse, partner, or soul mate. And if you’ve come to view love as a commitment, promise, or pledge, through marriage or any other loyalty ritual, prepare for an about-face. I need you to step back from all of your preconceptions and consider an upgrade. Love 2.0 offers a different perspective—your body’s perspective. […]
Love is our supreme emotion: Its presence or absence in our lives influences everything we feel, think, do, and become. It’s that recurrent state that ties you in—your body and brain alike—to the social fabric, to the bodies and brains of those in your midst. When you experience love—true heart/mind/soul-expanding love—you not only become better able to see the larger tapestry of life and better able to breathe life into the connections that matter to you, but you also set yourself on a pathway that leads to more health, happiness, and wisdom.”
If you’ve been reading Parentotheca for a while, you know I’m a big fan of positive psychology. So it’s no surprise that Barbara Fredrickson’s name has come up more than once – she’s one of the world’s leading researchers on positive emotions. A few months ago, I finally picked up her book Love 2.0, and I found myself completely glued to it.
Without exaggeration, it changed the way I think about love.
This book isn’t about romance or soulmates. It offers a fresh, science-backed perspective on love – showing that love is not a constant state or reserved for “special people” in your life. Instead, it’s a micro-moment of connection that can happen with anyone, even a stranger. Fredrickson redefines love as an emotion grounded in biology, shared presence, and mutual care – something far more expansive and accessible than we’re usually taught.
As Sonja Lyubomirsky, another pioneer in positive psychology and author of The How of Happiness (check out our notes!), puts it:
“Read this book and you’ll never think about love in the same way again!”
And I couldn’t agree more. Love 2.0 is beautifully written, intellectually rich, and packed with insights and practical tools you can use to bring more connection into your daily life. I highly recommend it.
Want a quick intro to Barbara’s work? Watch her TED Talk, “Remaking Love”, where she shares the powerful science behind this new understanding of love.
Now, let’s dive into some of my favourite ideas from the book!
Key Insights
Love 2.0: Love = Positivity Resonance
“Perhaps counterintuitively, love is far more ubiquitous than you ever thought possible for the simple fact that love is connection. It’s that poignant stretching of your heart that you feel when you gaze into a newborn’s eyes for the first time or share a farewell hug with a dear friend. It’s even the fondness and sense of shared purpose you might unexpectedly feel with a group of strangers who’ve come together to marvel at a hatching of sea turtles or cheer at a football game. The new take on love that I want to share with you is this: Love blossoms virtually anytime two or more people—even strangers—connect over a shared positive emotion, be it mild or strong.
To put it in a nutshell, love is the momentary upwelling of three tightly interwoven events: first, a sharing of one or more positive emotions between you and another; second, a synchrony between your and the other person’s biochemistry and behaviors; and third, a reflected motive to invest in each other’s well-being that brings mutual care.My shorthand for this trio is positivity resonance. Within those moments of interpersonal connection that are characterized by this amplifying symphony—of shared positive emotions, biobehavioral synchrony, and mutual care-life-giving positivity resonates between and among people. This back-and-forth reverberation of positive energy sustains itself-and can even grow stronger-until the momentary connection wanes, which is of course inevitable, because that’s how emotions work.”
Alright, let’s kick off by talking about love – but not the kind that involves candlelit dinners, soulmates, or cheesy rom-com endings.
Barbara Fredrickson, one of the top positive psychology researchers out there, has a totally different take on love. And honestly? It made me reflect a lot.
She says love isn’t some grand, once-in-a-lifetime thing you save for “The One” and maybe your mum. Nope. Love is connection. Real, human, in-the-moment connection. It’s that little spark you feel when you have a warm exchange with a barista, a shared laugh with a coworker, or even a silent, collective awe with strangers watching sea turtles hatch.
She calls it positivity resonance – that sweet spot where shared emotion, synced-up energy, and mutual care collide. And yeah, it’s temporary (because emotions are), but that doesn’t make it any less real – or powerful.
This totally flips the script on the “love is rare and precious” narrative. Because if love is something we can experience in a hundred tiny moments every day, then we’ve been walking around starving for no reason.
And the best part? We can make the most important people in our lives feel deeply loved – simply by intentionally creating more of these moments of positive resonance with our kids, partners, and family.
So maybe it’s time we stop treating love like a unicorn and start seeing it for what it is: an everyday human superpower that gets stronger the more we use it.That leads us to the next insight.
Love’s Biology Explained (Brain + Oxytocin + Vagus Nerve)
“Taking cues from what leading neuroscientist Stephen Porges calls the social engagement system, I describe love’s biology as a system, a whole comprised of several interacting parts. You can think of love, or positivity resonance, as one of the more complex and recurrent scenes nested within the act of your day, which is in turn nested within the play of your life. As with any scene in a play, the drama of love has its own cast of characters. Here I turn the spotlight on three main biological characters: your brain; one particular hormone, oxytocin, which circulates throughout your brain and body; and your vagus nerve, the tenth cranial nerve that runs from deep within your brain stem down to your heart, lungs, and other internal organs. Other characters step onto the biological stage to deliver their own lines, to be sure, but these three are primary players in love’s biology.”
Barbara explains that love isn’t just a warm, fuzzy feeling – it’s a real biological event that happens in your body, especially during moments of genuine connection with another person. And I found it totally fascinating!
At the heart of her science are three key biological players that come alive during positivity resonance: your brain, oxytocin, and your vagus nerve. Let’s break them down:
- The Brain:
When we connect with someone – really tune in to them – our brains start syncing up in real-time. This is called neural synchrony or neural coupling. It’s like our minds are dancing together, mirroring emotions, attention, and even facial expressions. It helps us feel understood and emotionally aligned with others.
- Oxytocin:
Oxytocin is often nicknamed the “love hormone,” but technically it’s a neuropeptide, because it acts both in the body and the brain. When it flows, we feel more trust, empathy, and willingness to connect. It lowers fear and increases cooperation – making it easier to open up and bond with others, even in small everyday moments.
- The Vagus Nerve:
Then there’s the vagus nerve – a major nerve that runs from your brainstem through your chest and connects with your heart and other key organs. Fredrickson calls it a kind of biological “love circuit.” It helps regulate your heart rate, facial expressions, voice tone, and social engagement. The better your vagus nerve is functioning (what scientists call vagal tone), the easier it is to feel calm, present, and connected with others.
Here’s the cool part: Just like you can strengthen a muscle, you can train your vagus nerve. With simple daily practices – like deep breathing, mindfulness, or loving-kindness meditations – you can actually improve your ability to experience and share love.
But more on that later.
Unleash Upward Spirals
“Through love, you become a better version of yourself. And as your better self, you experience love more readily. It is in this dance between your enduring resources and your micro-moments of love that life-giving upward spirals are born. […]
This latent biological upward spiral is a powerful force: Love can affect you so deeply that it reshapes you from the inside out and by doing so alters your destiny for further loving moments. With each micro-moment of love, then, as I feature in chapter 4, you climb another rung on the spiralling ladder that lifts you up to your higher ground, to richer and more compassionate social relationships, to greater resilience and wisdom, and to better physical health.”
Isn’t it beautiful?
The more you love, the better you become, and the better you become, the more easily you find and enjoy love again.
I just love this concept. It perfectly explains why parenting is such a powerful catalyst for personal growth!
So, let’s start creating those upward spirals.
Create 3 Loving Connections a Day
“Recall how energizing and rewarding it can be to really connect with somebody, sharing a flow of thoughts and feelings with ease. As your day unfolds, seek out at least three opportunities to connect with others like this, with warmth, respect, and goodwill. Opportunities may spring up at home, at work, in your neighborhood, or out in your community. Wherever you are, open toward others, freely offering your attention, creating a sense of safety, through eye contact, conversation, or, when appropriate, touch. Share your own lighthearted thoughts and feelings, and stay present as the other person shares theirs. Afterward, lightly reflect on whether that interchange led you to feel the oneness of positivity resonance, even to a small degree. Creating the intention to seek out and create more micro-moments of loving connection can be another tool for elevating your health and well-being.”
In the book, Barbara shares some beautifully simple practices and meditations to help us intentionally create more love in our everyday lives. But hands down, one of my favourites – and probably the easiest – is this:
Deliberately create 3 opportunities to connect with others throughout your day.
It could be at home, at work, during school pickups, at the gym – literally anywhere.
Here’s how my morning went:
1. I went for an early run. Every time I passed another runner, I looked up, smiled, and said “Good morning.” That’s it. Nothing fancy. But after just 30 minutes, I felt this warm buzz in my chest – like I’d been topped up with human goodness. That tiny act had flipped a switch. The day suddenly felt lighter.
2. Right before school, we squeezed in a quick board game with the kids. Just 10 minutes of laughter, bickering, and goofy rules. But it shifted the mood completely. Instead of the usual rush, we left the house smiling, connected, and in sync.
3. On the way to school, I bumped into a friend we’d just gone camping with. Within seconds we were laughing, swapping highlights from the trip – and I could literally feel joy bubbling up inside.
And here’s the crazy part: it’s not even noon yet.
As I’m writing this, I feel lit up – creative, calm, and just plain happy.
Try it. Seriously. 3 moments. That’s all it takes to start your own upward spiral.
Loving-Kindness Meditation
“Bring your awareness to the sensations of your own heart. Breathe to and from your heart. Notice how each breath brings new energy to your heart and allows your heart to send life-giving oxygen coursing throughout your body. Rest in this awareness for several breaths. Now, in this quiet moment, visualize someone for whom you already feel warm, tender, and compassionate feelings. This could be your child, your spouse, even a pet—someone whom the mere thought of makes you smile. Let his or her smiling face surface in your mind’s eye. As you take in that image, with the lightest mental touch, briefly call to mind this loves one’s good qualities. Your goal is to rouse warm and tender feelings naturally, by visualizing how connecting with this loved one makes you feel.
Once these tender feelings have taken root, creating genuine warmth and kindness in you, gently repeat the traditional phrases of loving-kindness meditation, silently to yourself, in some form or another. The traditional phrases go something like this:
May this one (or I, we, he, she, or they) feel safe.
May this one feel happy.
May this one feel healthy.
May this one live with ease.”
Loving-Kindness Meditation. The science behind it is mind-blowing. Barbara walks us through how just a few minutes a day can literally rewire our nervous system – toning the vagus nerve, boosting our mood, and even improving our physical health.
Less than 10 minutes a day. Massive return. That’s my new go-to meditation.
Each chapter in Part II includes a different guided meditation designed to help us expand our capacity to love – ourselves, others, even strangers. They’re short, beautiful, and surprisingly moving.
And yep, Barbara kindly shared them for free at her website. Definitely check them out!
P.S.: One phrase hit me like a sack of potatoes: “Cocoon of self-absorption.”
You know that place we all live in? Constantly chasing to-do lists, wrapped up in our own thoughts, worries, and goals? Yeah, that cocoon. Want a simple way out? Loving-kindness meditation.
P.P.S.: I’ve also found loving-kindness meditation to be a powerful way to train my heart to stay open and respond with love in those messy, heated moments when I’m angry or frustrated with the people I care about most.
It All Starts With Self-Love
“The old saying tells us that we can’t love others unless we first love ourselves. It’s true. Even though love is defined throughout this book as moments of positivity shared between and among people, the positivity shared between knower and known-between I and me— provides a vital foundation for all other forms of love. We first need to accept ourselves fully, as worthy partners in positivity, before we can freely enjoy the many other fruits of positivity resonance that we can share with others.”
We can’t love others unless we first love ourselves.
It’s an old saying, but Chapter 6 of Love 2.0 shows just how true it is. Fredrickson explains that while love is all about shared positive moments with others, the first and most vital relationship is the one between “I and me.”
Self-love isn’t narcissistic. It’s based on treating yourself with the same kindness, acceptance, and compassion you want to offer to others. When you’re constantly self-critical or emotionally shut down, real connection becomes nearly impossible. Love requires emotional openness, and you can’t give what you don’t allow yourself to feel.
This hit me hard as a parent. If you’re struggling to feel loving toward your child (and yes, that happens more than we admit), start with self-love. Because when you’re running on empty, love gets blocked. You might still do all the “right” things, but without that inner warmth, it can feel hollow.
Practicing self-love helps you reconnect with yourself, so you can show up fully for the people who matter most.
Love starts within. And that’s where healing begins, too.
Action Steps For You
1. Create 3 Micro-Moments of Love Each Day: Set an intention each morning to connect meaningfully with at least three people. Greet your child with full attention. Smile at a stranger. Ask your partner how they really are. Make eye contact. Listen like you mean it.
2. Try Loving-Kindness Meditation (10 Minutes a Day): This practice boosts your mood, tones your nervous system, and expands your capacity for love and connection. Start today with one of Barbara Fredrickson’s beautiful guided meditations:
3. Start with Self-Love: Self-love is the ground from which all your relationships grow. Be gentle with your inner critic. Take a breath. Give yourself the same care you wish someone else would. Try this soothing guided practice to reconnect with your own heart:
Quotes From The Book
“Your body was designed for love, and to benefit from loving.“
“Love grows best when you are attuned to the present moment, your bodily sensations, as well as to the actions and reactions of others. Sadly, when you are more attuned to technology, to-do lists, and mass media than to the unique and wondrous individuals in your day, you miss out.“
“Loving is a skill. It takes practice.“
“Love is not simply something you stumble or fall into. While love can certainly catch you by surprise, like a sudden rain, unlike the weather, you can also seed and cultivate the conditions for love all on your own.”
“Love is not a magic bullet. You can no more expect to become healthier through a single, isolated micro-moment of positivity resonance than you can by eating just one piece of broccoli per year. Yet just as a steady diet of a wide range of fresh fruits and vegetables does indeed make you healthier, so does a steady diet of a wide range of loving moments.“
“Learn to seek love out more frequently and it can elevate you, your community, and our world far beyond what you and I can today envision.“
