I have not read Dave Chapman’s book, “The Five Love Languages” but I heard Dave Chapman interviewed on NPR. I found the concept, that different people recognize and express love in different ways fascinating and not something that I had really thought about before. I will be talking about Daniel’s ability to express love, but first, I want to give a summary of the ideas contained in the book for people who are unaware, as I was. of Dave Chapman’s work.
I have taken parts of a summary written by Lucio Buffalmano . I think they make pretty clear the concept of “The Five Love Languages.”
“The 5 Love Languages states that people express and feel loved in 5 different ways. If two people from two different love languages are together they can ruin their relationship by not making their partner feel loved.
Words of Affirmation #1
To fix the issue you should learn how your partner communicates and receives love and adjust accordingly.
Love Language #1: WORDS OF AFFIRMATION
Words of affirmation communicate with words how much you love your partner.
If words of affirmations is your partner’s primary love language, it will mean the world to them when you say how much you love them.Tell them “I love you”
- Make compliments
Love Language #2: QUALITY TIME
People who have quality time as their main love language will value spending time with their partners and getting their full attention.Here’s how to express love in the quality time language:
- Going for a walk just the two of you
- Eating together while having personal conversations
- Doing new experiences together
Love Language #3: RECEIVING GIFTS
If your love language is gifts, you appreciate gifts and concrete symbols of love.
Indeed, that’s what gifts stand for: a symbol of appreciation, a sign you are thinking of them and, of course, a symbol love. No gifts, means no love.
If you never buy gifts and your partner’s love language is gifts, you are hurting them. Especially hurtful is missing gifts for celebrations, birthday and anniversaries.
Love Language #4: ACTS OF SERVICE
People whose love language are acts of service appreciate concrete help as a sign of love.
“Let me do that for you” is the keyword here. You use your own time and resources to take a load off their shoulders.
Love Language #5: PHYSICAL TOUCH
My next blog will talk about how lucky I was that Daniel expressed his love in so many ways. This was not something I realized when he was alive but would have loved to talk to him about.