 Hey, hey Chapter one or you can call it section one, but if this is chapter one from the book make it work You don't know love Now think about that and I know it's hard to hear from someone you don't know love But I really want you to sit down and think about How you learn love when I was growing up. I saw abuse all around me I had cousins who had black eyes. I had aunts who had permanently swollen lips permanently swollen eyes I Saw so many divorces so much break up to make up. I saw so much cheating What did you see? Maybe you didn't see any of that. Maybe you just saw a single parent strong and doing their thing maybe you saw a healthy relationship in a household and You could not tell if it was real or not. You didn't see any arguments. You didn't see any fighting You didn't know if your father cheated or not. Everything looked perfect No matter what you saw, guess what? You don't know love You don't know love until you know love for yourself until you learn what it is to be in a relationship One thing you have to realize is that a relationship and love is not always synonymous you can have a relationship and have love but you can also have a relationship where there is no love and A lot of times what we call love is actually self-hate Because sometimes the fruit looks the same but the root is totally different now think about self-hate If I hate myself if I'm angry, you know, and I'm insecure. I'm going to control you I'm gonna lie to you. I'm gonna manipulate you. I may say hey Don't wear that you can't wear those shorts out. I don't like you wearing those shorts. You know, they're too short I don't want these other guys looking at you and lusting after you I may say you can't hang with her. You I don't like her attitude I don't like the way she is, you know, she's this she's that you shouldn't be friends with her She's all she's gonna try to do is bring her bitter Single life and ruin our relationship. I may say you talk to your dad too much And why are you on the phone with your dad and you're laughing at all of his jokes? You never laugh at me. So what do you want to marry your dad? You talk to your mom too much. Why do y'all have to talk four times a day five times a day? Is she still raising you is that your best friend? I thought I'm supposed to be your best friend I thought we were in a relationship. Is that your best friend? so I may say all of these things to you and You may at first in the beginning say wow like this guy really like loves me like he really wants all of me like He wants all of my time like we have to put down our phones You know, we can't answer the phone can't talk to anybody We got to put our phones in in the dresser drawer like this is happening in a lot of relationships and people are looking at it as Normal I remember when I was a toxic lover and I spoke to my girlfriend in college And I said, you know, you can't go out the night You can't go hang out with your friends go to the club and she was like, oh, that's so cute You care about me. You know, oh my goodie. That's so cute. So first it seems cute But then Two years three years four years five years in when you are still like a prisoner or maybe you're not a prisoner Maybe it feels like you're on probation. Now you're like, whoa, is this love? Is this love? No, it's not see love should not feel like prison Love should not feel like you are being held captive Love should feel like freedom. Love should make you come alive. Love should bring you life It should bring you peace joy happiness So really sit down and be honest with yourself. Be honest with yourself. Do you know love? Do you really know love and what it is the relationship that you're in or the relationship that you've been in? Is it painful? Are you hurting? Are you crying? There are going to be some annoying moments My wife may get annoyed with me when I say hey, babe open up the American Express app and Scroll through there for the last week and Count up how much money has been spent. She may get annoyed when I mentioned the word budget She does not speak budget in any language And so sometimes she may look at me and kind of want to roll her eyes And so I say okay I'm not yelling screaming cursing Being demanding. I'm just holding her accountable as her husband as her partner as her spouse for life I'm holding her accountable and sometimes she does the same thing to me. I said, oh man. Look at that building Man, I could turn that into this, you know bougie bites, you know and have celebrity chefs come and do a residence there You know we can make that happen and she said no, it is not the time It is not the season you do not know how to run a restaurant You've tried that before it failed in a year. Please let's do something else That may annoy me and I may want to say you don't believe in my dreams You don't believe in me. She may get on the means like what do you mean? I'm not overspending I'm not even doing nothing and so there will be annoying times in love So don't confuse what I'm saying when I say you don't know love Don't confuse the normal, you know bumps in the road with self-hate But if you're crying if you're screaming yelling arguing if you got to break up the makeup all the time That is not love. Hey, thank you so much. We'll talk soon