For openers, consider the lopsided amount of attention we have paid to the definition, measurement, and cultivation of intelligence, in contrast to our failure to investigate the many modes of love. We have a national obsession with IQ, but we never seriously consider the possibility that we possess an LQ, a love quotient, a genetic aptitude for empathy or compassion that may be enhanced or diminished by circumstances.
Without doubt we desire love, dream about it, are disappointed by its absence, and become angry when it vanishes. In fact, love has become the secular equivalent of the Holy Grail — the magic treasure that should save us. But we think about love, if at all, as a kind of warm, squishy, pink feeling like the grace of God or a Chinook wind that is supposed to come mysteriously out of nowhere and bring eternal spring into our frigid hearts, Unless and until that happens, we wait, and wait for Godot, the godlet that might bring happiness to our strife-filled lives. It seldom occurs to us while we want, we might analyze the complexities of love and figure out how to do it.
— Sam Keen, To Love and Be Loved