Learning To Love

[Music]

[Applause]

the day

i got an offer for my first job after

college in management consulting

a good friend told me girl

you’re done the hardest part is getting

the job

that got me really excited but i also

heard

this anxious voice speaking inside my

head

that voice is my inner critic who i call

nancy nancy kept telling me

renata i don’t think you should be that

excited

you have zero consulting skills

nancy was right but she calmed down once

i got to work on that skill set

a couple years ago though when i started

a new relationship

i had a strangely similar experience

my friends were saying things like

you’re done

the hardest part is finding the right

person

nancy did not like that at all

renata what do you know about

relationships

clearly not much because so far 100

of them have failed ouch

nancy that hurt but

she was right what did i know

and this time i wasn’t even sure what

and how to learn so i started thinking

am i the only one struggling with this

what do other people think about this

so i want to ask you

wherever you are right now raise your

hand if you think the love

is a really important part of life don’t

be shy

no one can actually see you great

now raise your hand if you feel

really well educated on how

to love

if you don’t have your hand up right now

i can guarantee

that you’re not alone i also asked

my amazing classmates in business school

at stamford

and every single person thought the love

was a really important part of life

but not a single person felt educated on

how to succeed

which is interesting because in business

school

we pride ourselves on being so educated

and so strategic in everything we do

except for relationships let’s think

about that for a second

if i was looking for a new job in the

same way that we often look for a new

relationship

i would probably just pull out my phone

swipe through a few photos and if i saw

something promising

like a attractive office

only two miles away then maybe i would

think that that could be

the one but that would be

really weird because we invest

so much time in our professional lives

we spend years building our knowledge

our skills our network that’s a

pretty solid foundation but when it

comes to relationships

which overwhelming research point as a

top predictor

of life satisfaction health and wealth

our foundation is more like a

flimsy house of cards

we basically learn by watching others

we look at the couples around us we

watch what they do

right and wrong and we assume we know

how to do it right but that’s like

hoping to become

a doctor by watching grey’s anatomy

so instead of like building a solid

foundation

we kind of just wait or swipe

until we find the right person

no wonder we feel so unprepared

that’s exactly how i felt a couple years

ago

i thought i already met the right person

but i still didn’t know

how to be the right person

and that felt really scary

so i started reading every single book

and every piece of research that i could

find about the science of relationships

and even though that became my favorite

activity

i try to hide it for a long time

i thought it was too personal

controversial and frankly too

embarrassing to discuss

with anyone but then one day

my amazing big brother rodrigo called me

and he asked hey

is everything okay and i said

yeah what’s going on

well as it turns out i forgot

that rodrigo and i share the same

account on amazon

which sometimes gets awkward

and he was calling because he noticed a

trend

in my recent book orders

seven principles for making marriage

work

your brain unlove mating

in captivity and many

many other relationship books

now at the time rodrigo was also

in business school so i told him

listen we’re both getting an mba

because it’s valuable it’s not always

been valuable

when they created the nba a hundred

years ago most people thought it was

crazy

that business was being elevated to the

same level of expertise as law

and engineering now it’s the most

popular graduate degree in the us

we finally see value in business

education

and we have to do the same for

relationships

now am i suggesting that we create a

formal

master’s degree in love no

but i am suggesting that we all start

seeing

ourselves as ceos of our love lives

and that means worrying less about

finding the right person

and more about becoming the right person

we know from research that couples who

thrive and couples who fail

behave very differently the patterns is

so clear

that dr john gatman can predict whether

a couple will stay together

with up to 90 accuracy just

by observing a few minutes of how they

interact

yes people are different and there’s no

one formula

but there are patterns that we can all

learn from

so i want to leave you with three

takeaways that i think of as

love101 these are just a few

of many things that i wish we all

learned

in school and talked about more

much more they’re also

great things to consider before you go

on tinder number one

choose to see love as a skill

by far the most important thing i’ve

learned from this journey

is that love is something far more

demanding

and far more rewarding than what we see

in hollywood love is not just an

emotion it’s a skill that we can choose

to learn practice and master over time

like learning a foreign language and

as a non-native speaker myself

i can tell you that i still struggle

with english sometimes

a lot and i also still struggle with my

relationships

sometimes a lot but that’s okay

like any other skill love is not easy

and will never be perfect but choosing

to see it as a skill

is the first step to getting better

number two choose generosity

over judgment if you’ve been the parent

of a child or a puppy you know what it

feels like to see

really unpleasant behavior with

generosity

not judgment you understand that they

are still growing up

but if our partner does something that

we don’t like

we get offended we judge

they should be fully grown up by now

but as long as we are

alive we’re all still

growing up on top of that

we know from research that on average

two-thirds of all relationship problems

i actually not solvable even in healthy

couples

so the key is not hoping for less

conflict

but focusing on practicing more

generosity

even during conflict it’s so easy to see

the wonderful things about a partner

but the true love skill is seeing what’s

not so wonderful about them

with generosity not judgment

number three choose to become

an expert on your partner

i used to find it romantic to say things

like

you know i know everything about my

boyfriend

but i realize that it’s even more

romantic

to think about how much more there is to

discover

and that’s because to have a great

relationship we need

so much detail knowledge about the other

person

from what they want in their coffee to

what they want in their legacy

that’s really hard to do but it’s

possible

if we take on the mindset of a curious

expert who never stops learning

we know from neuroscience that the

brains of couples who report to be

mad late in love after over 20 years

can still light up in similar ways as

couples who just recently met

couples who stay and love are couples

who stay curious

every day they commit to learning about

each other like an expert

they never assume they know everything

plus if you’re always discovering

a new side of your partner then maybe

the honeymoon can be more than just a

phase

now the important part is not just

understanding love 101 it’s committing

to a lifelong practice

sometimes that’s really hard

but it’s often through the difficult

times that we get to test

our beliefs and our resolve to them and

i experienced that recently

when i ended a special long-term

relationship

which was very difficult but it gave me

even more conviction

about what i think is so important about

learning to love

but nancy did not agree

renato aren’t you ashamed

you basically failed love 101

and frankly i did spend a few days

listening to nancy

and to ariana grande’s breakup anthem

but during my breakup breakdown

i had a breakthrough

love 101 is about taking radical

responsibility

for learning the skills that make us

better in any relationship

so breaking up was not like failing love

101

it was actually another chance to

practice it

and that’s because we can always choose

to see love as a skill

whether it’s in the beginning the middle

or the end

of any relationship we can always

choose generosity over judgment and not

only when things are going well

but especially during the difficult

times

and we can always choose to become an

expert

on the other person and use that

expertise to better understand

ourselves because that’s the one

relationship that we all get to

cultivate

and to enjoy every single day of our

lives

like any other important skill that we

learn in school

learning to love is our right

it’s our responsibility and it’s an

opportunity

that we cannot afford to waste

thank you