The 5 Love Languages

Hey everybody…and by “everybody” I mean friends and family of mine who check my blog, those who I will be tagging in this post and those of you who will randomly click on the Facebook Note in about 4 hours. Regardless, welcome…

So my small group has taken me into some interesting places in the past year and a half and one of places got me to purchase a book recently. Actually, this was a book my roommate Christiana had talked to me about awhile ago and, as I sometimes need, I didn’t pick it up until I found out my small group was going to have a study on it. Oh but right…you would need a title and author. It’s The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love That Lasts by Gary Chapman and, once I got past the cheesy cover (I mean come on...there's a heart drawn in the sand. Even *I'm* not that sappy), found a compellingly simple (I mean that in the best way possible) guide to understanding how different people love differently. I mean it seems like we should just know these things (as I found myself saying, “Well yeah. Absolutely.” Often, not because I had previously known them but it makes so much sense), but upon self-reflection and looking at my past loves and those of my friends I can totally see how figuring out your love language (and sometimes love dialect) can have such an affect (both positive and negative) on our relationships, and these could be those both romantic or otherwise.

Now I went in knowing the 5 Languages from a brief description and was pretty sure where I fell. Oh and before I continue, here they are: Words of Affirmation, Quality Time, Receiving Gifts, Acts of Service, and Physical Touch. Before I go on about the two I found myself closest to, how about we tackle the ones I wasn’t first? Deal.

Words of Affirmation: Now I like a good encouraging word like anyone else, and I *do* know that “Work Josh” really appreciates this aspect but that’s a little different, right? As far as my relationships, I’m certainly not dying for words of praise. I suppose I figure that all the affirmation I need stems from the fact that the other person (regardless of “status”) is spending time with me (Spoiler alert!!!!) so I’m not craving these kinds of words.

Receiving Gifts: You know…I *like* when someone gives me something but I always see gifts in any relationship as more being “icing on the cake” than anything else. I *do* appreciate them, and the sentimental sod I am have had instances where I’ve spent faaaaaar too long holding on to gifts and other physical objects of a love, long after the love is gone but that’s for another blog post. So gifts are appreciated but not a requirement for me to know I’m loved.

Acts of Service: In the book these are things like doing the laundry and the lot. I don’t know…I mean that kind of stuff just needs to happen, you know? I do spend quite a bit of time doing this kind of stuff so I see them more as things “you just have to do” so I don’t have love associates with aspect. On a side not, I kept on getting temporarily confused the other night when I thought people were saying “Access service” and welcome to my brain.

Okay so I went in thinking that I would fall somewhere between Quality Time and Physical Touch and after taking the assessment, this proved to be exactly right. There’s a 30 question assessment at the end of the book and here is how I scored (the highest for any category was 12):

Receiving Gifts: 0
Acts of Service: 4
Receiving Gifts: 5
Quality Time: 10
Physical Touch: 11

So there you go. Now let’s dig a little into my two primary loves languages, shall we?

Quality Time: This one is true for me across the board in all my relationships. I feel that one of the best gifts you can give another person is your time; essentially giving a small slice of your life just to them. I think it can be very intimate and when I think all the joys I’ve had in my romantic relationships, as well as my non-romantic ones, it’s the moments of time, small slices of heaven, and stretches of time with someone else that you never want to see end that affect me the most. When looking back at the good times of my life with other people it’s always those times doing things like spending days in parks, talking until restaurants close, walking around the block in a never ending loop talking, taking long road trips in which it didn’t matter how long we’d be in the car because I was in heaven just to be able to spend time with that other person, hiking in various spots with different friends, and a host of other things and these are just a few examples from friends and girlfriends past. I’m really hard wired to be connected to people in this way, and I’ve found it especially so in my romantic relationships.

Physical Touch: It’s funny with this one as Dr. Chapman writes that very often men automatically incorrectly assume that this is their #1 when in fact they haven’t separated Physical Touch as a love language from that of sexual experience and that they’re *not* one and the same. He correctly point out that we’re all designed to enjoy sex, but that doesn’t mean that we all have Physical Touch as our primary love language. Does that make sense?

Anyway, when I told a friend of mine that this was my top love language, he practically fell out of his seat and I think it might be a surprise to many as well. Something else that Dr. Chapman notes is that we could, but not always, have a love language that might be different than the love language used by the family we grew up in. Now we’re not a totally hands off family, but we’ve never been the biggest touchy feely family either. So growing up I didn’t receive a ton of this kind of love which I think I’m fine with because I more so associate this love language in a romantic setting anyway. So maybe that’s why some people would be surprised because I’ve only felt comfortable enough to really express this love language in certain settings and since it’s been 3 ½ years since I’ve been in a relationship, I suppose not many of my friends would observe this aspect. Also, I’ve always been self conscious as to how my touch would be interpreted so I usually hold back other than goodbye hugs and the lot because life’s complicated enough without my friends (especially the single ladies) “wondering”, if that makes sense. This last point *did* bring out a big bum-out for me with the realization that my primary love language is one I don’t feel horribly comfortable with expressing to most of the people in my life and since I’ve been striking out with the ladies more often than Reggie Jackson in the last few years, I’ve found myself in a bit of a pickle. Anyway, but I’ve *always* been very touch sensitive (highlighted as a child by being very ticklish) and all the aspects pointed out in the book are ones I’ve always connected to in a hard wired way. If it’s hugs, hand holding, brushes, a hand on the shoulder/wait, or a host of other things, I’ve always expressed myself in these manners as well as enjoyed being the recipient in my relationships.

Now beyond my specific love language, there are a few aspects of all of this that really made me think. The first one was me hitting my head with my palm because it would have greatly helped to have gone through and discovered the love languages of those girls I’ve dated because it’s so often that issues arise precisely because we’re not speaking the same language, as such. Chapman brings up many examples of two people who are seemingly in hopeless situations where the discovery of learning, and applying appropriately, the other’s love language has seen a complete turnaround on things. He also notes it *is* easier with someone who speaks the same language as you, but we shouldn’t get hung up on the idea that we should only be looking for people who speak our language. Ultimately, everyone can learn to love in other languages (as well as dialects of each language), but it *will* take practice, just like learning a regular language. Anyway at least I feel like I’m more equipped for my next (and hopefully last) love. The book also pointed out to me a common fallacy that I have fallen prey to, which is just because two people share a number of commonalities, interests, and are attracted to each other, it’s doesn’t mean that they speak the same love language. So when I’ve been with someone who has filled the aspects above, I’ve normally just assumed that they also (of course, right? We’re silly people.) must love the way I do and looking back, that’s a preposterous notion but I didn’t know any better. I’m an earnest man but sometimes I don’t know what I don’t know but it’s a good thing we all grow. I’ve had a lot of growing up to do, in fact in the last few years, and this has been another stop along the way. Lastly, and something I had to be reminded of was the other night when the group went over all of this, is that this isn’t a magic bullet; it’s merely tool (and a good one at that) to help as we grow closer to the person we’re with that can enable us to love more openly, genuinely, and fully. I can learn to live with the stumbles along the way and I know that this is one of the ways in which God cultivates our heart and character so that we can live the kind of life He would have of us. I don’t expect anything less and am excited for the journey.