Learn to Speak the Same Love Language

We all express and receive love messages differently. Figuring out how you and your partner experience love can help tremendously in strengthening your relationship. My favorite book on this topic comes from Gary Chapman, The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts.

After forty years as a marriage and family counselor, Dr. Chapman had heard a lot of couples’ complaints. From these complaints he began to see a pattern. What he was hearing were the same stories over and over again. When he reviewed more than a decade’s worth of notes, he realized that what couples really wanted from each other fell into five distinct categories:

Words of Affirmation: Compliments or words of encouragement.

Quality Time: A partner’s undivided attention.

Receiving Gifts: Symbols of love such as flowers or chocolates.

Acts of Service: Settling the table, walking the dog, or doing other small jobs.

Physical Touch: Having sex, holding hands, kissing.

According to the concept, the way you feel loved is also the way you show love. 

Figuring out your partner’s primary love language requires you listen carefully to both positive responses and complaints. 

Quite simply, you have a particular way you experience love. Because you can only truly receive love that way, you are likely to give love that way too. Yet you can learn to give love in other ways, ways that can be better received by your partner because of your partner’s own love language. 

Learning how you and your partner experience love is the bridge to both giving and receiving it fully. Through conscious decision making, you can choose to speak your partner’s language every day. It is one of the fastest methods to bring you closer together. 

To get more of Arielle’s great advice, preorder her new book Turn Your Mate into Your Soulmate. The book is on sale December 29 2015, but order your copy today!

Photo Credit: Carl Studna