爱对你的情绪和身体来说，跟氧气一样重要。这点无需置疑。你和别人关系越紧密，就会越健康，不仅在身体上情绪方面也是如此。而如果与别人越疏离，对健康的威胁就会越大。

　　同样，你拥有的爱越少，在你的一生中更可能经历抑郁。爱，可能是最好的抗抑郁药，因为陷入抑郁最重要的原因之一就是感觉没人爱。大多数抑郁的人不爱自己，也感觉不到有人爱他们。他们还总是把注意力集中在自己身上，这大大降低了他们的吸引力，也使得那些让他们学会去爱的机会白白溜走。

　　Love is as critical for your mind and body as oxygen. It's not negotiable. The more connected you are, the healthier you will be both physically and emotionally. The less connected you are, the more you are at risk.

　　It is also true that the less love you have, the more depression you are likely to experience in your life. Love is probably the best antidepressant there is because one of the most common sources of depression is feeling unloved. Most depressed people don't love themselves and they do not feel loved by others. They also are very self-focused, making them less attractive to others and depriving them of opportunities to learn the skills of love.

　　There is a mythology in our culture that love just happens. As a result, the depressed often sit around passively waiting for someone to love them. But love doesn't work that way. To get love and keep love you have to go out and be active and learn a variety of specific skills.

　　Most of us get our ideas of love from popular culture. We come to believe that love is something that sweeps us off our feet. But the pop-culture ideal of love consists of unrealistic images created for entertainment, which is one reason so many of us are set up to be depressed. It's part of our national vulnerability, like eating junk food, constantly stimulated by images of instant gratification. We think it is love when it's simply distraction and infatuation.