Communication: What is Your Love Language?
One of the resources that I personally have found helpful in my communication with my fiance is Gary Chapman’s “The 5 Love Languages.” I want to share a personal reflection on why I find this useful in the hope it inspires you to consider checking it out.
A few months ago I found myself feeling a little frustrated with my partner when I was hoping that he would express his love for me by doing certain things for me- like helping with the dishes after I had cooked dinner. I didn’t want to have to ASK him to do this, I just wanted him to volunteer and was feeling disappointed when that didn’t just happen.
This was when my mom reminded me about this book and how useful it can be for couples to understand each other’s love languages.
In “The 5 Love Languages,” Chapman discusses how we like to give and receive love in 5 main ways. These are:
- words of affirmation
- acts of service
- receiving gifts
- quality time
- physical touch
What I realized is that I like to express and receive love through acts of service and quality time while my partner’s primary love languages are more about words of affirmation and physical touch.
While I enjoy receiving words of affirmation and physical touch, a part of me wants to receive more acts of service from my partner. However, by understand his primary love languages, I can realize that he is not neglecting to show his love, he just doesn’t necessarily think of acts of service first. We can then dialogue about how we express our love and what we are needing from each other.
If you are in a relationship, it can be helpful to read this book or at least take the online profile quiz because doing so can help you to understand each other’s primary love languages and can open a dialogue about how you might meet the other’s needs if you don’t have a direct match.
Knowledge, in this case, is definitely power and going through the process of understanding each other’s love languages can really facilitate better understanding and communication.
Have you taken the online quiz? Share your thoughts about your love languages and the usefulness of this approach in the comments!
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