How I Met Your Mother introduced us to all types of romantic relationships, and each character has a unique story regarding love. This show has a great mix of humor and life lessons we can all learn from. However, before you start reading the rest of this post, I must admit there are spoilers, SO BEWARE.

Let’s start with Ted Mosby’s love life. As the main character and narrator of the show, he faces the most heartbreak of all his friends. In the first season, we learn that he is eager to settle down and start a family, but what we didn’t know is that it will take him nine seasons (nearly a decade) to finally find his special someone. Ted goes on countless of dates (some ending well and others ending up in flames -literally), all leading up to the day he meets the mother. What I learned from his character is good things will come to those who wait, and it’s best not to go looking for love, because eventually love will find you.

Then there is Barney Stinson, who is the complete opposite of Ted. He is the most perverted sex-crazed womanizer I have ever seen on television, but he sure is hilarious. He is the author of The Playbook, which is a list of over-the-top scams he uses to trick women into sleeping with him. Throughout the show, he has always been against relationships, until he fell for Robin, but correspondingly went back to his old ways. The lesson I learned from Barney regarding love is that relationships are not for everyone, and that is completely fine, and sometimes the best relationships are the ones you have with your friends.

Robin Scherbatsky has always been the most critical when it comes to love. She has always listened to her brain, rather than her heart, and put her career first. Being a strong, sarcastically funny, independent woman she is, Robin convinces herself she doesn’t need a man to be happy. However, as we see in the very end, true love got the best of her. Robin fell for both Barney and Ted, and what she learned –and I learned- while she dating them is sometimes you have to roll with the punches, and it’s OK to listen to your heart once in a while.

And finally, there is Marshmallow and Lily Pad! They have to be the cutest couple I have ever seen on television. Forget about Romeo and Juliet, or Jack and Rose, everything Marshall and Lily did together is on my relationship goals list. To me, they are perfectly imperfect. They both go through some rough patches throughout the show, but they manage to face them together. Each season we see their relationship grow stronger and stronger, giving us more lessons regarding love in each episode. Nevertheless, the lessons I took from the whole series is that relationships are going to be messy and chaotic at times, but you should never give up on the ones you love.