Shakespeare's Sonnets teach us life lessons

Sonnet 1

"Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel." This line is perfectly relatable to so many people for it defines a common practice. It asks people to be kind to themselves as being cruel and self-sabotaging is destructive.

Sonnet 94

"For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds; / Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds." Shakespeare's Sonnet 94 defines perfectly the effects and positives of good actions and bad ones. It tells how even the best qualities can become corrupted without good actions.

Sonnet 30

"But if the while I think on thee, dear friend, / All losses are restored, and sorrows end." Sonnet 30 has the perfect motivation in just 2 lines. It describes how with the right friends and company, with time, the losses and sorrows become distant.

Sonnet 18

"So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, / So long lives this, and this gives life to thee." These lines are about life and how art and words and emotions have the power to make life and love immortal.

Sonnet 80

"The worst was this: my love was my decay." This line from Sonnet 80 is the perfect lesson on how when love becomes unhealthy, it leads to ills and self-destruction.

Sonnet 116

"Love is not love / Which alters when it alteration finds." Another life lesson on love by Shakespeare, this sonnet describes how true love remains the same no matter what circumstances or change.

Sonnet 22

"So long as youth and thou are of one date, / But when in thee time's furrows I behold." These lines give a life lesson in the form that old age, aging, and losing your youth is obvious and cannot be changed, but this should not change your view about self.

Sonnet 12

"Nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence / Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence." Another lesson on life is that time won't see who you were and you won't be able to defend yourself when it comes, so what really matters is what you leave behind.