1. Actions speak louder than words.

Sometimes just being there for your significant other, rubbing their back, leaving a note to remind them that someone in this world cares about them makes all the difference. The effort itself speaks volumes.

2. Cuddling can cure almost everything.

Had a bad day? Snuggle up next to your boo. Get a bad grade on an exam? Ask to be the little spoon. Occasionally all you need is to be close to someone who loves you.

3. Appreciate rainy days.

Days where you can lay in bed with your person listening to the rain pitter patter outside of your window, falling in and out of sleep to the sound of their heart beating. When your days get stressful you’ll come to appreciate moments like those.

4. The little things matter.

Yes, grand gestures of romance are wonderful, but so are the small things. You have to learn to enjoy the everyday things that your significant other does for you because that’s what life is made up of…little things.

5. Dates do not require dressing up and going out.

It’s all about connecting with your person. Be creative! Have a make-shift candle-lit dinner, go for a walk, lay out and look for shooting stars. It doesn’t matter what you do, just who you do it with.

6. Be open-minded.

Relationships are all about compromise and acceptance of other people and their ideas. Even if you don’t agree with them.

7. If you are afraid to be yourself with someone, you're doing them and yourself an injustice.

If someone doesn’t accept you and your flaws, then that’s on them. Don’t settle for someone who would let you pretend to be anyone but you.

8. It isn't always pretty.

People have bad days. Sometimes they project their feelings onto you. But, you can’t give up on someone for having a bad day. Love takes patience and understanding. You have to put in the effort to reap the rewards.

9. You will learn something new about them every day.

You’ll fall in love with all of the little tidbits that make up their being. When you first start to date someone, they only show you what they want you to see, but when you fall in love they allow you to break down their walls and see behind the mask they paint.

10. Physically intimacy is cool, but conversations in which you soul, rather than your body, is exposed are vital.

Being physically intimate is only part of a relationship. In order to really connect and have a mutual affection for each other, you have to let them in. You have to expose yourself in a non-physical way to truly allow them into your heart.

But the most important thing that love has taught me is that it makes everything worthwhile.