Five Love Languages: Words of Affirmation

One of the most revolutionary popular mass psychology concepts on love and relationship, Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman. I've discussed about Acts of Service here:

http://www.angeliciaang.com/2014/03/the-five-love-languages-acts-of-service.html

Now, let's elaborate more on the language of Words.

It is the beauty of kind and gentle words spoken to encourage and appreciate our loved ones. It is the uplifting sentences we utter to cheer them when they're down, to acknowledge the pains they're going through, or as simple as the basic "I love you" to affirm our affection. 

Words of affirmation, words of appreciation, or words of encouragement. These are positive words desperately needed in a healthy home environment where people truly let go of the masks and pretense of having-it-all in the external world. 

Home ought to be the safest haven where our loved ones feel most secure to identify personal strengths and weaknesses. Sadly, many dysfunctional parent relationship pass down the destructive culture of belittling and harsh criticism for perfection. 

That's where words play its crucial part. People who score high on the language Words feel the most pain when they receive negative critics. Hurtful words will be like verbal ammos to the heart, leaving scars deep inside. And sometimes, the lack of positive appreciation may hurt as much. 

People crave recognition. If we can't get it from the world, we'll try to get it at home. If we can't receive it at home, then where else do we seek the affirmation we desperately need?

Examples of important words of affirmation:

I love you

Thank you for your hardwork

I really appreciate your presence

Thanks for being thoughtful

I admire your honesty

Doesn't matter what people think, I believe the best in you

Noone can do the way you do it

I am grateful to have you

Thank you for being a great part of my life

I appreciate your sacrifices and effort to make this happen

You are important to me

I value our relationship

Words can either bring healing or curses. Words can either build up or destroy relationships. People with language of Words as their main love language fully realise that although action matters, the words that they sow matters much more than the result of the actions.

The primary channel to communicate affection is through words, to appreciate loved ones and let them know how important they are. 

"One way to verbally affirm your spouse is to give encouraging words. Allison always wanted to be a writer, but after receiving her first rejection slip from the publisher, she gave up. One evening her husband Keith came into the den and said, “I hate to interrupt your reading, but I have to tell you this. I just finished reading your article. Allison, you are an excellent writer. This stuff ought to be published! Your words paint pictures that I can visualize. You have got to submit this stuff to some magazines.” “Do you really think so?” Allison asked. “I know so,” Keith said. “I’m telling you, this is good.”

Ten years later, Allison has had several articles published and has her first book contract. She credits her success to Keith’s words of encouragement. Perhaps your spouse has untapped potential in one or more areas of life. That potential may be awaiting your encouraging words."

The general explanation of Gary Chapman's 5 Love Languages:

http://www.angeliciaang.com/2014/03/five-love-languages-by-gary-chapman.html

What I deduce from the love language concept:

http://www.angeliciaang.com/2014/03/gary-chapman-5-love-language-general.html

The Five Love Languages: Acts of Service

According to the Christian marriage counselor, Gary Chapman's popular pop psychology approach into marriage/relationship strengthener, our love languages are boxed into five general categories.

1. Words of affirmation (praises, compliments, encouraging and supportive words)
2. Quality time (activities together, deep meaningful heart to heart quality conversation or as simple as spending time together without saying anything)
3. Act of Service (household chores, picking or sending back someone, doing the groceries, cooking, etc)
4. Physical touch (hugs, kisses, the need of holding someone's hand to feel 'connected')
5. Gifts (small thoughtful gift as remembrance)

As we grow older and journey life longer we progressively come into a realisation that people are distinctly tuned and creatively do life differently than we do. One question may give rise to 10 varying opinions from 10 different individuals.

The general concept of the Five Love Languages theory is to stretch our mind into understanding others as we strive to fathom the mysteries of love in differing individuals. For this to come to fruition, first come an understanding of self, followed with continuous and consistent effort in comprehending others.

In the initial period of practice, it may be difficult to acknowledge that a relationship between two persons consists of two independent minds with its own set of values, perspectives, and life views. A relationship between two parties contains two separate identity no matter how similar they seem to be. That's an indisputable fact.

Five Love Languages encourages us to walk out of our comfort zone, our mindset, and our perception of being loved. As we accumulate knowledge of what our language is and how we speak love to others, we'll gain a better insight on how to serve others' interest well. The ideal pattern is two persons with an understanding of each other's love language who speak love in one another's language.

Example of Acts of Service language:

Basically it's about doing something for others that we know they would like for us to do

- Cooking meals, washing dishes, taking out the garbage, mowing the lawn, changing the baby’s diaper, painting the bedroom, filling in the gas tank, cleaning the kitchen or bedroom, buying lunch, opening car doors for your wife, etc.

If this is your spouse’s primary love language, nothing speaks as loudly as these acts of service. You may give him or her words of affirmation, but they are thinking, “Cut the talk. If you loved me, you would do something around here.” For them, actions truly speak louder than words.
http://www.5lovelanguages.com/2009/02/acts-of-service/

Maxine, who had been married for 15 years, came to my office one day because she was frustrated with her marriage. Listen to what she said: "I don't understand David. Every day he tells me that he loves me, but he never does anything to help me. He just sits on the couch watching TV while I wash the dishes, and the thought never crosses his mind to help me. I'm sick of hearing 'I love you.' If he loved me, he would do something to help me."
http://www.focusonthefamily.com/marriage/communication_and_conflict/learn-to-speak-your-spouses-love-language/understanding-the-five-love-languages.aspx

Understand yourself better by taking this short 5 min quiz: http://www.5lovelanguages.com/profile/singles/

Gary Chapman 5 Love Language: General Ideas

In Gary Chapman's famous 5 Love Languages relationship theory, the ways we love or express our affection to our loved ones are classified into 5 different languages : Words of affirmation, quality time, acts of service, physical touch, gifts.

Three general ideas that I got is: 

1. Everyone have one (or two or three) love language unique to themselves. Sometimes this is influenced by family upbringing, friends and social environment. Nature and nurture play together in developing someone's preferred language. Thus, our love language can evolve too as time goes by and our maturity level increases.

2. Success = To speak love using the language most relevant to the other party. If the other person's love language is words of affirmation or encouragement, the best way to truly express our love to that person is by showering he/she with positive words, compliments, genuine praises of their accomplishments, supportive notes, etc (instead of giving he/she box of chocolate).

3. The feeling of 'not being loved' is due to communication breakdown somewhere along the line between two parties. Perhaps Jen's love language is quality time, and thus Jen expects Matt to consistently show interest into what she's interested in, doing activities together, or have regular deep, meaningful, heart-to-heart conversation. But Matt's love language is acts of service, so he expresses himself by doing house chores for Jen.

Because of this language difference, no matter how much work Matt has done for Jen, she can possibly still 'feel unloved'. Not because Matt hasn't done enough, but because Matt speaks differently.

A good understanding of our love language and people's language is the key to successful relationship.

Understand yourself better by taking this short 5 min quiz: http://www.5lovelanguages.com/profile/singles/

http://www.angeliciaang.com/2014/03/five-love-languages-by-gary-chapman.html

Shannon sat reclined in her chair with a plush red blanket. I gently ran my fingers through her hair and walked across the room to sit down and hear about her day. This is good, I thought. This communication will refill her love tank which has obviously been sucked dry by our twin terrors. We talked for an hour. I heard about her day, and she listened to mine.

Satisfied and sufficiently replenished from our connection, I announced I was going to bed.

"I don’t feel loved.”

Like a thief caught in the act, I froze. The dots between confident, mystified, and thwarted began to connect in my head. Hadn’t I just deposited a good hour of emotional currency?

My love language is touch. Yours is words. You get energy from our discussions. I need touch.”
She was right. I had really thought I was loving her well. The only problem was I loved her the way I need to be loved, not the way she needed it.

I mustered up some pathetic defense, “But remember when I ran my hands through your hair before I sat down?”

In preparation for writing on this topic, I took the five minute love languages assessment at 5lovelanguages.com. Of the five choices (Touch, Words, Service, Quality Time, and Gifts), my top needs are acts of service and words of affirmation. You know where physical touch fell? Dead last. I don’t even know if you can score a 0 on the scoring system. I scored a 1. My wife is doomed.

Wouldn’t it be nice if our first inclination was to love our spouse in the way he or she needed to be loved?
I see husbands and wives make the mistake of loving their spouses by way of their own love language. It is an easy mistake. Naturally the thought process goes something like this: “I see my spouse. I want to love him well. I know what makes me feel loved. I will do that really well for him.”

But then despite well-meaning effort, connection breaks down.

(Read more at: http://www.startmarriageright.com/2014/01/speaking-a-new-language/#sthash.3wGGPERW.dpuf)

Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman

This is one of the revolutionary pop psychology quiz that brings lots of breakthrough in my relationship understanding. I'm totally sold. Gary Chapman is a Christian marriage counsellor.

It's funny how humans love to put people or things into 'boxes'. Categories. Classifications. Hierarchies. Subs. Basically to simplify our brain's interpretation of the world and what's happening around us. I'm aware of myself doing this often and lots of other people too.

For one, this Love Languages concept puts a nice box into five different languages, or ways, people express and receive love.

1. Words of affirmation (praises, compliments, encouraging and supportive words)
2. Quality time (activities together, deep meaningful heart to heart quality conversation or as simple as spending time together without saying anything)
3. Act of Service (household chores, picking or sending back someone, doing the groceries, cooking, etc)
4. Physical touch (hugs, kisses, the need of holding someone's hand to feel 'connected')
5. Gifts (small thoughtful gift as remembrance)

Sometimes conflicts rise up not because people don't love us, but because the way they show their love to us isn't the way we expect them to be. The key is understanding ourselves and understanding people. When we understand how we navigate, and how people navigate, it's so much easier to resolve conflicts and extend love in a way most easily accepted by those who matter :)

You can check your language here: http://www.5lovelanguages.com/profile/singles/

Loving From Strengths

A thought that comes up from a post I read in Relevant magazine.

Do you love from insecurities or do you love from strengths?

Although the question sounds very simple with obvious answer, I used to missed the obvious. And I'm sure many have also missed this obvious for the lack of better relationship education. Hopefully this can help give light to the obvious for you (in case you've missed it too) :)

Insecurities - What can you do for me?
Strengths - What can I do for you?

Loving out of insecurities demands from others. It's an uncomfortable feeling you experience when you see others succeed more than yourself. They just can't get it right. They don't understand you enough. They don't try to love you enough. You don't feel loved and cared and appreciated for because their efforts aren't visible to your eyes.

You don't want to be affectionate because you think they aren't deserving. They need to apologise first because you are the one being wronged. And even if you're the one with the mistakes, you expect them to understand that it is a tough and difficult day for you. You want people to readily forgive and extend their loving arms to you when you need those.

You want people to always be around. They need to learn to be more available, more responsible, more committed, more and more etc.

You see that relationship's all about expectation. I see loving out of insecurities as a way to force our expectation into people's lives. This is very illogical since everyone will eventually do what's best according to their personal principles and values.

The irony is, loving out of insecurities screams out fear. It is about our anxiety of being alone and lonely. It is about feigning 'love' as a tool to manipulate people into doing things according to 'our best interest' instead of their best interest.

Some people consciously choose to stay in an unwise/destructive relationship because that's the only option left. I'm very tempted to say that two insecure people staying together is a very bad recipe for healthy relationship/friendship, but I know many people who seem to be doing just fine. Commitment is a big contributing factor to this success.

Noone's perfect and no relationship will ever be perfect. It comes back again to our expectation.

So how do I think I'll recognize loving out of strengths?

It is when I'm willing to give. Sacrifice. Put effort and work on things toward the better future of the relationship. It starts with the mindset of 'What can I do for him/her?'

What can I do for my family? Plenty. I can start picking up the small, ignored necessary details of life by helping them with phone bill discount info, promo stuffs, credit card saving tips, or whatever administrative stuffs that is such a bore but I'll do it because it's one way to express my love. Or I can say "I miss you", let them know that their presence matters, appreciate their commitment by saying thanks often, etc. I can also go supermarket and shop some fatty snacks just because I know we all enjoy the guilty feelings of nighttime snacking together. Or I can simply go to my parent's bedroom and watch TV together with them.

There are countless ways, actually, to show love to people. Even a sincere how are you or are you okay question makes a difference when our heart is sincerely wanting to know how people are doing. Simply put, loving from strengths mean when I'm able to treat others with this 'What can I do for you' mindset. And in order to have 100% success rate of doing that, I'll need to be healthy. To be healthy, I need to stay close and connected to Jesus, by prayer and persistent daily devotion.

God is amazing. What can I do for you? :)