Key ideas from David Whyte

• "What we love in other people is the hoped for satisfaction of our desires" - Simone Weil's insight reveals the initial self-centered nature of romantic attraction
• Brain functionality literally changes when falling in love, creating necessary subversion of present identity to enable life transformation
• "We love us" - David explains that mature love transcends individual "I love you" statements to become mutual union and shared future
• Vulnerability comes from Latin "vulnu" meaning wound - being open to the world in ways where you have no choice
• "Half a step into self-forgetting and the rest restored by what you'll meet" - the precise formula for finding what lies just beyond yourself
• Unrequited love serves as rehearsal for the appearances and disappearances that occur throughout committed relationships
• "You will walk across any territory, however fluid and however dangerous, to take the one hand you know belongs" - the ultimate commitment of true love