Best lessons from Jay Shetty’s '8 Rules of Love'

“Nobody sits down and teaches us how to love. So, we’re often thrown into relationships with nothing but romantic movies and pop culture to help us muddle through.” Well, not that there’s anything wrong with that—I, for one have been the Disney fairy tale and rom-come loyalist for as long as I can remember. I love the grand romantic gesture and fancy-shmancy expressions of love. But here’s the thing, love is a gamut of thoughts, actions, feelings and values. It’s a multifaceted phenomenon that cannot be confined to a bouquet of flowers or extraveggant announcements of love. In his latest book, 8 Rules of Love, podcaster, inspirational speaker and author, Jay Shetty sums up love in this manner: love has four components—connecting with the self, chemistry, compatibility, and character.” The book takes us through the nitty-gritties of finding love, learning how to love and more. We’ve collated, what we were thought were some of the most striking lessons from the book, on the days you want some quick inspiration. Read on below. 

Self-love: from loneliness to solitude 
We live in an age where we speak about self-love and going on solo dates. In one of the first chapters of the book, Shetty speaks about the need to being comfortable being alone. This is a multi-fold and often tedious process. In the book, you’ll find a multiple tips and tables to break-down the process and simplify it for you take action in your everyday life. Of course, You’re likely to face setbacks and feel uncomfortable—a lot. But as your grow, one step at a time, you go from feeling lonely to appreciating the solitude and your own company. When you get comfortable with yourself, is when you will understand yourself, your strengths,  your values and your goals. Further, once this happens, you are able to bring out your true self, (goals, values and all) in your relationship. “We don’t think about the importance of bringing self-knowledge to a relationship, being self-aware means you can temper your weaknesses and play to your strengths,” he writes. 

Chemistry is only a part of love 

 “I find that most of us are obsessed about the chemistry piece; we don't really connect with ourselves, we don't know whether we're compatible with other people, and we don't really know other people's character or even our own character,” Shetty had said in an interview. We’re so consumed by happily-ever-afters and rather superficial notions of love that we don’t realise that there’s so much more to being in a relationship. In the chapter, ‘Define love before you think it, feel it or say it,” Shetty exemplifies four phases of love beginning with attraction and ending in complete trust. The phases include date nights, with evolving conversations about values, each other’s personal goals in life. It goes beyond physical attraction and looking your best during a night out. Shetty quotes Antoine De Saint-Exupery, “Love does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction.” 

Our understanding of love has become overly-limiting

Love is omnipresent, we, only need to strive to find it. Over the years, our definition of love became limited to what was written about it in romantic fiction and movies. In the book, Shetty aims to make the reader realise that love is present beyond the boundaries of romance. Love’s presence is felt in being kind to a stranger or someone in need through compassion and empathy. Love is to be shared with friends, family and children. It reminds me of a post I read not too long ago as I was scrolling through my feed on Instagram: 

Love is not defined by gender roles 
As mentioned previously, to be able to be in a strong, long-term and healthy relationship, it’s almost imperative to know the strengths and skillsets that two people bring into a relationship. It’s not about whether a man should conform to certain roles and responsibilities in a relationship. Love is about bringing out the best in each other. “I really believe that we need to go beyond genders in relationships, and treat people as humans, and see what they want to do and who they want to be. People should be doing what they're passionate about,” he stated in an interview. 

Love is about growing 

“For me, when you love someone, they fall more in love with themselves, not more in love with you. Imagine you really love someone so much that they fell more in love with themselves because they see their potential and see in themselves what you saw in them. That's real love,” Shetty has stated in an interview. We tend to agree. In the chapter, ‘Purpose comes first’ Shetty writes about how knowing one’s own purpose and their partner’s helps in their journey towards fulfilling it. It brings about the support necessary for an individual to achieve their purpose. “It helps growing and sustaining the relationship. Purpose always comes first,” he writes.