Why is it that so many of us are loved… and yet don’t actually feel loved?
Dr. Sonja Lyubomirsky, Professor of Psychology at UC Riverside and one of the world’s leading researchers on happiness, joins Dr. Michael Gervais for a conversation about her latest book, How to Feel Loved, co-authored with relationship scientist Harry Reis. After 36 years studying what makes a life happy, she has landed on a quietly radical idea. Plenty of us are loved. Far fewer of us actually feel it. And the gap between those two is where so much of our quiet loneliness lives. The good news, Sonja argues, is that feeling loved is more under our control than most of us realize.
Most of us, when we sense the gap between the two, default to one of two strategies. We try to make ourselves more lovable. Or we try to change the person on the other side. Sonja’s research suggests that neither one tends to work. What does work is changing how we show up in the conversation. That, she argues, is the part we actually control.
The conversation gets personal. Mike opens up about wanting to bring more curiosity to his marriage of three decades. Sonja tells the story of a Dalai Lama line she has carried with her for years. They talk about the three words people actually want to hear (it isn’t I love you), what most of us misunderstand about love when we are chasing achievement, and why a relational mindset, rather than a transactional one, is becoming a quiet superpower in an AI-shaped world.
In this conversation, we explore:
- Why feeling loved is the real predictor of happiness, more than achievement, status, or even being loved
- The five mindsets that change how we connect: sharing, listening to learn, radical curiosity, open heart, and multiplicity
- The foggy glass metaphor for being known, and why being known is the door to being loved
- How to bring real curiosity to a partner, friend, or coworker you’ve known for years
- The science on why we underestimate compliments, deep questions, and reaching out to old friends
- How acts of kindness can quietly shape gene expression linked to inflammation and immunity
- Why a relational mindset matters more, not less, in an era of AI companions and digital connection
Sonja’s research is a reminder that some of the most important shifts in our lives are not big or dramatic. They show up in the next conversation we have, with the person right in front of us.
“The key to happiness is feeling loved… It’s not being loved. A lot of us are loved, but we don’t feel loved.” – Dr. Sonja Lyubomirsky
Resources + Links
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