"To Fall in Love With Anyone, Do This"

"I know the eyes are the windows to the soul or whatever, but the real crux of the moment was not just that I was really seeing someone, but that I was seeing someone really seeing me. Once I embraced the terror of this realization and gave it time to subside, I arrived somewhere unexpected.

I felt brave, and in a state of wonder. Part of that wonder was at my own vulnerability and part was the weird kind of wonder you get from saying a word over and over until it loses its meaning and becomes what it actually is: an assemblage of sounds... I see now that the story isn’t about us; it’s about what it means to bother to know someone, which is really a story about what it means to be known."
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/fashion/modern-love-to-fall-in-love-with-anyone-do-this.html?referrer=

It's possible that I loved this partially because it's such a scientist thing to do - to know about the study and then casually replicate it - but there was something so sweet and aspirational about this essay.