How to know you are in love.

depends on the person really, for me its constantly thinking about that person, willing to do anything for them even if its letting the go plus it comes with a warm feeling in your heart and chest

 

When you are okay with the person you love, seeing you at not only your best, but also your worst.

 

I have found there is a difference between being in love (puppy kinda love) and being in love for real.

Puppy in-love makes you feel like you are floating on a cloud. It makes you feel silly and whimsical.

For real in-love makes you think of the person you are in love constantly, making you want to be with them and making you want to do anything for them and liking and loving them for all they are (the good and the bad).

In my experience it takes a few big hurts to make you snap out of the phase of puppy in-love and experiencing being in love for real. Being in love for real is also a mutual thing. You cannot be really in love with someone when it is coming form one side only.

 

when you put the crest worms in your body for some1, writhe in agony greater than the pain of flames as they shred your internal organs from within for every second of every minute of the few weeks of life youve left to suffer through before dying a miserable and pathetic death in their name even though they never noticed you the whole time, then you love them

 

I gotta a gree with duende84.
And in general I think you just feel it. You feel that there's sth more than just wanting to hang out and have fun. You want to be around them all the time and get almost a heartattack when you see, touch or hear them. Sth like that.
And this warm feeling in your chest is there and it makes you feel as you were complete if you get what I mean.

 

With my bf, I'm not obsessed with him and feel like I need to be talking to him or with him all the time. I wouldn't say I'm infatuated.

But when something good or funny happens, I want to share it with him. When I'm upset, I feel better when I tell him. When he just randomly enters my mind or I talk about him, I can't help but smile. And when I'm with him, everything feels right in the world and I want to hold him so tightly. That's how I know.

 

That sums it up with me and my dude! :icon_bigg

 

I didnt know what love was. but i constantly want to be with him. We see each other every weekend and its just amazing but then as soon as he goes home im sad and just feel like crap. I feel co-dependant with him to an extent. And i feel like i want to share everything with him all the time.

 

It depends what do you mean by 'in love' actually. To some point, I agree with duende84 - there's huge difference between 'being in love', and 'loving someone' for real. In my native language we have two separate words for that: 'zakochanie' and 'milosc', so I never really identified one with another. It always bothers me when someone asks this question in English, because I never know what do they mean by being 'in love'.
The way I see it: 'being in love' is a purely hormonal, unconditional reaction to someone we find attractive for some reason; it's nothing but a biological stimulus to encourage us to make effort to get close to them. It's a very instinctual response, probably known to all animals that mate, and resembles short-lived addiction to another person. When we see them, the brain produces phenethylamine which literally makes us high, like euphoric; when we lost touch with them the brain stops to produce this neurochemical and therefore we start to exhibit symptoms of narcotic hunger, like irritability, aggresiveness and obsession about getting high again. 'Being in love' makes us crazy about other person without any rational reflection, sometimes obsessive or jealous, sometimes prone to unusual sacrifices, but is usually short-lived (can last from few days to few years, but no longer, it would be too exhausting for our nervous system I get xD) and the person that triggers that feeling can be, sort of random. You fall in that kind of love based on impression that someone made on you, not neccesarily you have to know them well enough. Therefore I don't think it can be trusted. That kind of 'love' is hard to miss, really, it makes you feel euphoric and hazy with lots of moodswings and exaggarating on the way.
Loving someone romantically for real is far more complex feeling that's experienced by the animals that form more or less monogamous long-term relationships - it cannot be as easily understood or explained by hormones to me. Although there are hormonal basis for love too - the main hormones responsible for feelings of bond and trust are oxitocin and vassopressin. The two important differences between these two and the phenethylamine is that they rather calm you down than cause euphoria (therefore loving someone doesnt exclude thinking straight) and their production depends more on a quality of a contact, rather than quantity (true love needs effort to develop, needs the relationship to be gratifying, 'being in love' is blind). How to tell if you truly love someone? I think it's easier to miss than 'being in puppy love' because it's not that flamboyant, not the eye-catching. It doesn't change you like the hormonal shake you have while 'being in love', doesn;t give you high, euphoria, alternate state of mind for free; it just feelis like a very very intimate friendship. But it's not volatile. It's firm and deep and it makes you more stable. I think that true loving someone is worth an effort; 'being in love' is good for junkies.
How do I tell if I love someone? I guess you just know that. Being extra comfortable around someone is usually a good sign. The first thing I usually feel is trust. Like I have no nervousness around someone, I know I can be always myself and they wouldn't harm me and I'm grateful for that. I don't think you can really love someone without trust, it's the basic of love for me. Like without that you are too nervous and stress makes you focused on yourself; when you have no worries about yourself you can truly focus on another.
Another thing is acceptance. I'm usually strict when it comes to my standards, strict and overly analytical. I can't help but notice flaws in people and for the most of time when those flaws reaval it makes me feel like those people are not good enough for me, like I don't like them at all. When loving someone all this criticism suddenly disappears, like I still notice flaws but I don't mind. I wouldn't want the other person to change anything because I think they are already perfect enough as a whole. And even when I'm pissed at them, I always have feeling it's worth it.
There's also a feeling of loosing boundaries between 'you' and 'me' when you love. 'You' and 'me' disappear for me when I love someone, there's only 'we'. Like I stop to see them and myself as a separate beings, I start to perceive them as an integral part of myself, and myself as integral part of them. I don't wana privacy anymore, I want them to be part of everything I do, but also I start to perceive their goals as mine as well. You can be prone to huge sacrifices to other person at that stage but you don't see them as sacrifices anymore, these actions are as natural as taking care of your business because now the other person's business is now your business too.

Also, I know it's a bit of cliche but I guess that when you're in a romantic relationship that's proper for you, it brings out the best in you. Like you feel you realise your potential fully around the person you chose, like they see you as who you always felt you was, deep in your heart.

 

People usually refer to the romantic kind of love and tend to forget that there is more than one kind. I guess to find out if what you have is truly love, you need to think about your other close relationships; there is familial love and intense friendship too, not to mention the love a parent has for their children.
When I love someone truly (in the romantic sense), it's not just lust, but a relationship that gives me the joy of friendship, the sense of security and warmth of family — in addition to affection and physical intimacy. I have only felt it once, and unfortunately, my feelings weren't reciprocated. :/

 

I don't think I ever felt it .

 

There are many kinds of love, I agree. I guess that's just that the term 'being in love' is used for romantic love specifically rather than for all kinds of love.
I guess people tend to idealise romantic love and underestimate other types of it, like platonic love. Perhaps hormones are to be responsible for that.
I think I truly love only my mother and my partner. I once loved a woman; we're still somewhat close on an intellectual level but I don't think I retained my feelings to her, I was rejected too many times. Maybe I'm not selfless enough to maintain unrequited love for long.
I guess that every love to every person is different, but for me the most important aspects of all types of is acceptance, trust and the feeling that you truly share a life with somebody, not matter if it's platonic love, love among family members, romantic love... I don't find lust to be that important in romance. It can help you make the bond, but it can also mislead you. I felt lust for so many people that annoyed me and looking back I don't think I was ever capable of understanding them. On the other hand, my partner and I started our relationship from pure lust only and it developed later, so..you never know.

@stocking
You still have time to feel it. I guess for love you need a bit of luck to meet right people eh...

 

I've never been in love, but I heard an interesting discription of what you're asking. They said that there whole life they had wondered if they truly loved someone, but then when they finally fell in love with someone they eventually married, they knew it because it felt different than anyone else they loved.

 

When you constantly think about that person. When you love everything about them, looks and personality .

 

For me each feeling I had to each person I ever think I loved is completely different so far, so for a person like me that wouldn't be the right definition, nope. I also don't buy this whole 'you only love once' kind of thing. But I'm polyamorous, so.

I used to ponder my feelings to certain people until I gotten into what I thought was a life-threatening situation. And then I suddenly knew. Everything gets sharpened in such situation, when you think you might not come back, and then you know who do you truly want to come back to. And it's not always like you know from the beggining that you love someone because 'it feels different'; sometimes you need to test it in some crisis situation to realise what you have.

 

I miss them after only a minute
I can't get them out of my head
My heart flutters and my face gets stuck in a big smile when I see them
I constantly see things and think "they'd like that"
I start to love all the little things they do, and when a sappy love song comes on I actually sing along with it.
I start to fear losing them, and hate when they walk away. Basically I get REALLY sappy

 

I know I'm in love because the thought of being with her for as long as I exist makes me happier than anything else. =)

 

If the romantic behaviours you once considered excessive, obnoxious or ridiculous are things you do frequently, you're probably in love. I dunno. Shouldn't it be obvious? Never been in love myself.

 

While I am in love, I'm not exactly sentimental nor am I clingy or do I obsessively think of her, but there's a level of comfort between us. I feel safe sharing everything with her, being myself around her regardless of how I'm feeling or if I'm at my best or my worst, and I would do a lot of things for her, maybe sacrifice more than I would in limerence. Perhaps sacrifice equates to love? The more you are willing to sacrifice the more you love, I suppose.