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Lovebirds: How to Live with the One You Love
'One of the biggest mistakes we make,' Trevor Silvester says, 'is to treat other people as if they are just like us. I'm a Harley Street therapist, and over nearly twenty years I've been helping couples improve their lives together, and one thing is clear to me: most couples don't flounder through lack of love, but through a lack of understanding.'
373 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
February 18, 2013
Trevor Silvester divides people by their preferred mode of communication/operation: seeing, speaking, feeling, and thinking. He fails to consider whether anyone might use a combination of these traits equally.
I did not identify with a single "songbird" -- I identified with all of them (despite the results of the quiz), including the supposed fundamental "opposites" of sky bird (intuitive, big picture orientated) and ground bird (detail orientated, prefers "facts").
This lead me to read the entire book of lovebird combinations (tedious and repetitive, do not recommend it). What I found was obvious to anyone within a relationship and not worth reading.
Rather than read this and have your personality compartmentalised, all you have to do is: communicate with your partner multiple times a day (ask questions -- if you don't learn anything this way you never will), and RESPECT THEM. This is what I have learned from a one-year relationship and not "Lovebirds" by Trevor Silvester.
I did not identify with a single "songbird" -- I identified with all of them (despite the results of the quiz), including the supposed fundamental "opposites" of sky bird (intuitive, big picture orientated) and ground bird (detail orientated, prefers "facts").
This lead me to read the entire book of lovebird combinations (tedious and repetitive, do not recommend it). What I found was obvious to anyone within a relationship and not worth reading.
Rather than read this and have your personality compartmentalised, all you have to do is: communicate with your partner multiple times a day (ask questions -- if you don't learn anything this way you never will), and RESPECT THEM. This is what I have learned from a one-year relationship and not "Lovebirds" by Trevor Silvester.
February 11, 2013
After hearing an interview with the author on Radio Two's Steve Wright's show I was intrigued and read it straight away. An interesting new look at personality types and how they get on together. Very similar to Myers Briggs, but the personalities are labelled after types of birds. Firstly whether you are a ground bird (concerned with detail and planning) or a sky bird (concerned with ideas and vision) and then whether you are a thinking, feeling, seeing or hearing type (once again all named after a bird) so eight types altogether. I must admit I got very confused as I found I had traits from all the types and when I thought I was getting closer to finding my strongest type, an aspect very NOT me would follow. Also my OH didn't fit any category as the descriptions are all about extremes and he isn't extreme anything so am now none the wiser but I did enjoy the read as am fascinated by all personality analysis books.
January 22, 2014
In a funny and creative way, bird watcher and couple's therapist Trevor Silvester writes a self-help book of sorts for couples looking to create a more respectful and peaceful relationship.
From start to finish this book was powerful and wise. To begin, Silvester has you and your partner (if you have one) take a series of short quizzes to determine the type of "bird" you are.
Don't feel like this book is just for couples, because that is absolutely not true. Silvester does a fabulous job at informing and describing a person's unique, emotional style of love. How do you or your partner perceive love? Through sight? Through feeling?
When I finished this book, I honestly felt I had grasped a more positive view on my relationship with my fiancé and understood on a higher level what he needs to see from me and vice versa to make our relationship amicable.
Very fun and positive read. I definitely recommend this to anyone who just wants a perspective on their emotions and love.
From start to finish this book was powerful and wise. To begin, Silvester has you and your partner (if you have one) take a series of short quizzes to determine the type of "bird" you are.
Don't feel like this book is just for couples, because that is absolutely not true. Silvester does a fabulous job at informing and describing a person's unique, emotional style of love. How do you or your partner perceive love? Through sight? Through feeling?
When I finished this book, I honestly felt I had grasped a more positive view on my relationship with my fiancé and understood on a higher level what he needs to see from me and vice versa to make our relationship amicable.
Very fun and positive read. I definitely recommend this to anyone who just wants a perspective on their emotions and love.
December 13, 2019
This was a book in which I was just more interested in taking the quiz to see how it may line with other similar relationship-type books and to see what I would think of it. So what is the verdict of this British birds relationship book?
First there are actually two quizzes in the book with the first one placing the reader in one of two broad categories that generalizes what type of person you are. These groups can be compared to the Myers-Briggs extroverts and introverts. The next quiz separates the reader into one of four groups that resembles Gary Chapman's Love Languages with the exception of his thinkers - the kingfishers and the owls.
First of all to touch on the first six groups quickly these are the sensors so each follows along a sensory love language with your audios (robins, nightingales), your visuals (peacocks, swifts) and your tactiles (swans, doves). But this is where the book takes an interesting turn with the fourth group of thinkers. The thinkers, the author states, are a group of people whose circumstances as children have driven them underground from the sensory fields and as a result use the mind to think feelings instead of having them as primaries. At the same time they still relate on their original sensory language in bits and pieces.
This is one part that of the book that I am actually quite happy to see although it is a bit twisted to be so since not many self-help type books look at the nature and nurture of a child. Instead many focus that we are all born a certain way, grow that way and are untouched by the tragic, lonely or horrific events of our childhood lives while all it takes is certain willpower along with magic formulas of mantras to become a better person who can bypass anything in our lives. Possibly some may work in fixing the cause but it is still life to have those dark moments and acknowledge that they have happened.
As for the book there is definitely a lot of reading, especially if you are a thinking bird. Furthermore it gets to be really repetitive if you choose to read it from cover-to-cover, which is highly not recommended. Unfortunately, though, you do get more details about the bird types by reading all the entries as the author explores them in detail with the matched couples.
Another problem I found was in the couple analysis as there didn't seem to be any order of the twenty-three couple matches being listed so for those who had to read multiple entries. So even with a Table of Contents you still had a lot of flipping pages through to get to the right entry.
All in all Trevor brings an interesting new way of viewing relationship languages while contributing insights and solutions for those who would like to work on that part of their bond with their partner. But otherwise if you want to avoid the hassle a shorter way of getting your information is through knowing your extrovert/introvert persuasion and Gary Chapman's works.
First there are actually two quizzes in the book with the first one placing the reader in one of two broad categories that generalizes what type of person you are. These groups can be compared to the Myers-Briggs extroverts and introverts. The next quiz separates the reader into one of four groups that resembles Gary Chapman's Love Languages with the exception of his thinkers - the kingfishers and the owls.
First of all to touch on the first six groups quickly these are the sensors so each follows along a sensory love language with your audios (robins, nightingales), your visuals (peacocks, swifts) and your tactiles (swans, doves). But this is where the book takes an interesting turn with the fourth group of thinkers. The thinkers, the author states, are a group of people whose circumstances as children have driven them underground from the sensory fields and as a result use the mind to think feelings instead of having them as primaries. At the same time they still relate on their original sensory language in bits and pieces.
This is one part that of the book that I am actually quite happy to see although it is a bit twisted to be so since not many self-help type books look at the nature and nurture of a child. Instead many focus that we are all born a certain way, grow that way and are untouched by the tragic, lonely or horrific events of our childhood lives while all it takes is certain willpower along with magic formulas of mantras to become a better person who can bypass anything in our lives. Possibly some may work in fixing the cause but it is still life to have those dark moments and acknowledge that they have happened.
As for the book there is definitely a lot of reading, especially if you are a thinking bird. Furthermore it gets to be really repetitive if you choose to read it from cover-to-cover, which is highly not recommended. Unfortunately, though, you do get more details about the bird types by reading all the entries as the author explores them in detail with the matched couples.
Another problem I found was in the couple analysis as there didn't seem to be any order of the twenty-three couple matches being listed so for those who had to read multiple entries. So even with a Table of Contents you still had a lot of flipping pages through to get to the right entry.
All in all Trevor brings an interesting new way of viewing relationship languages while contributing insights and solutions for those who would like to work on that part of their bond with their partner. But otherwise if you want to avoid the hassle a shorter way of getting your information is through knowing your extrovert/introvert persuasion and Gary Chapman's works.
July 2, 2020
I chose this book as I was interested in what I could learn about myself and my partner. The book divides people firstly into 2 categories, ground birds and sky birds. And then into 4 categories, thinking, feeling, seeing and sound birds. And there are 2 quizzes in order to determine which one you are. I found that I fitted quite well into the peacock category as indicated by the quiz. However I read the book from cover to cover (VERY repetitive) and found that there were parts about each bird that I related to. So I found it might not be as accurate as proposed to be, however there is some interesting guidance to help different personality types to understand each other and get along.
August 7, 2019
Though two person is differ from each other, things can work well as long as we learn to understand and tolerate with the differences. Fun "exercise" to determined your bird type is included in this book.
"I believe relationships don't usually fail from lack of love, but from a lack of understanding and a failure to nourish".
Actually it is more like a 2.5⭐ for me.
"I believe relationships don't usually fail from lack of love, but from a lack of understanding and a failure to nourish".
Actually it is more like a 2.5⭐ for me.
February 3, 2014
2.5 stars
I'm a sucker for these things and what did my eyes find at my local Target that cool, wet February 1st night?
This book.
Suddenly, I was reminded that Valentine's Day was around the corner again and also of that warm feeling I get at the idea of possibly finding love at any given moment. I picked up the book, read the blurb, open the cover and dug right in.
The quizzes reminded me of the Myers-Briggs personality assessment immediately. (I'm a proud ENFP~)and after taking my quiz I was excited to find out which bird I would be, though I knew for a fact I would be a sky-bird. Personally, I didn't really identify with my bird(swift) completely. I felt like I was a mix of several but then again everyone has multiple dimensions to them. My bird type did, however, have the basics down for the most part.
I love personality quizzes and I love romance, so what could go wrong with placing those two things together in a book? Nothing at all. It was straight forward and leaves you wanting to go out there and find your own special bird.
I just wished it had been a bit more organized near the end. Overall, it was interesting but not anything I didn't already know.
I'm a sucker for these things and what did my eyes find at my local Target that cool, wet February 1st night?
This book.
Suddenly, I was reminded that Valentine's Day was around the corner again and also of that warm feeling I get at the idea of possibly finding love at any given moment. I picked up the book, read the blurb, open the cover and dug right in.
The quizzes reminded me of the Myers-Briggs personality assessment immediately. (I'm a proud ENFP~)and after taking my quiz I was excited to find out which bird I would be, though I knew for a fact I would be a sky-bird. Personally, I didn't really identify with my bird(swift) completely. I felt like I was a mix of several but then again everyone has multiple dimensions to them. My bird type did, however, have the basics down for the most part.
I love personality quizzes and I love romance, so what could go wrong with placing those two things together in a book? Nothing at all. It was straight forward and leaves you wanting to go out there and find your own special bird.
I just wished it had been a bit more organized near the end. Overall, it was interesting but not anything I didn't already know.
June 24, 2014
هذا الكتاب مرجع في العلاقات، لا أنصح به للمتزوجين فحسب، بل لكل فرد يعيش في أسرة ممتدة ويرتبط فيهم.
أحببت طريقة العرض، المؤلف مرتبط بالطيور لأبعد الحدود ، فالقارئ في البرمجة العصبية اللغوية يدريك أن هناك أربع أنماط رئيسة للشخصيات: سمعية، حسية، بصرية، فكرية، المؤلف أضاف تقسيما وهو الطيور السماوية والطيور الأرضية، كل على حسب رؤية الأمور إما بشكل عام أو بشكل تفصيلي دقيق، وبالتالي أصبح لدينا ٨ أنماط للشخصية.
يبدأ الكتاب باختبارين بسيطين الأول لتحديد إن كنت سماويا أو أرضيا، والثاني لتحديد النمط الحسي.
هذه نسخة إلكترونية من الاختبار -باللغة الإنجليزية-
http://www.lovebirdsbook.com/lovebird...
*تنويه: الكتاب لا يقرأ من الغلاف إلى الغلاف!
وبعدها يقفز القارئ بين الوحدات للتعرف على شخصيته المتمثلة في نوع من أنواع الطيور، وبعدها يبدأ في قراءة علاقة هذا الطائر بالطائر الآخر، وهنا عليك أن تطلب من الزوج/ة القيام بالاختبارين، اللطيف، أن في نهاية الكتاب، تجد تمارينا مشتركة لكما، لتحسين علاقتك ما والاستمتاع بها، والأهم متابعتها.
أترك الكتاب في مكان قريب منكما لتستطيعان الاطلاع عليه متى رغبتما في ذلك.
الكتاب أكثر من رائع!
أحببت طريقة العرض، المؤلف مرتبط بالطيور لأبعد الحدود ، فالقارئ في البرمجة العصبية اللغوية يدريك أن هناك أربع أنماط رئيسة للشخصيات: سمعية، حسية، بصرية، فكرية، المؤلف أضاف تقسيما وهو الطيور السماوية والطيور الأرضية، كل على حسب رؤية الأمور إما بشكل عام أو بشكل تفصيلي دقيق، وبالتالي أصبح لدينا ٨ أنماط للشخصية.
يبدأ الكتاب باختبارين بسيطين الأول لتحديد إن كنت سماويا أو أرضيا، والثاني لتحديد النمط الحسي.
هذه نسخة إلكترونية من الاختبار -باللغة الإنجليزية-
http://www.lovebirdsbook.com/lovebird...
*تنويه: الكتاب لا يقرأ من الغلاف إلى الغلاف!
وبعدها يقفز القارئ بين الوحدات للتعرف على شخصيته المتمثلة في نوع من أنواع الطيور، وبعدها يبدأ في قراءة علاقة هذا الطائر بالطائر الآخر، وهنا عليك أن تطلب من الزوج/ة القيام بالاختبارين، اللطيف، أن في نهاية الكتاب، تجد تمارينا مشتركة لكما، لتحسين علاقتك ما والاستمتاع بها، والأهم متابعتها.
أترك الكتاب في مكان قريب منكما لتستطيعان الاطلاع عليه متى رغبتما في ذلك.
الكتاب أكثر من رائع!
May 10, 2015
About as useful as MBTI, but more specific to your style of loving. It was intriguing that the author thinks the Thinking type (one of the four main types) is not a real base type and that those who score highest on Thinking should look at their second highest type to find out what they really are. The author claims (without proof except his own anecdotal evidence as a therapist) that no one is born a Thinking type. They develop into Thinking types only because of traumatic childhood experiences, which is too much of a generalisation to be true.
In any case, my partner and I scored very similarly so this was not particularly helpful to us, especially because we both scored highest for Thinking and our next two types were almost the same so we had six different combinations to look at which was ridiculous.
I think the recent article I encountered on the four different types of introversion was a lot more illuminating.
Link here: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/b...
In any case, my partner and I scored very similarly so this was not particularly helpful to us, especially because we both scored highest for Thinking and our next two types were almost the same so we had six different combinations to look at which was ridiculous.
I think the recent article I encountered on the four different types of introversion was a lot more illuminating.
Link here: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/b...
February 8, 2016
The book tells of the different birds in which the author uses to describe the different love languages and the way these birds interact with one another in a relationship. To me it was a marketing ploy where the birds were concerned. However, I cannot argue that the information provided regarding the different love languages were unreliable. In fact, the way the love languages in the book were highly elaborated and I found it to be a pretty good resource. The bulk of the book talks about the relationships between the different birds. This aspect of the book to me was sloppy and could have been further improved. Majority of the information describing the birds were repeated and the content soon became stale. In conclusion, I found the first part of the book to be a worthy read but the second part a chore at times.
December 22, 2015
There was some things to learn from this, but I found myself quite insulted by the author's insinuations about some of the types. He says that no type is better than another, but some birds are thought to be clearly superior than others - see Owl and Kingfisher, both thinking types, but the Owl is a lot more flexible and less up it's own bum (despite the Owl's habit of disappearing into its inner life whilst in the middle of a conversation).
Some people may get a lot from this, but mostly I just got to shake my head and have a chuckle with the boyfriend.
Some people may get a lot from this, but mostly I just got to shake my head and have a chuckle with the boyfriend.
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September 6, 2013Amazing. The 2 part quiz was quite the feat in the beginning, but, was well worth my time once I got to reading about me: Dove and my love: Owl! Well-written, detailed and helpful! Definitely a resource for me in having a healthy relationship with this man I feel I've waited my entire life to meet! And pleasantly surprised to learn a few things about myself in a relationship that I didn't already know! lol
January 25, 2022
Buku ni aku masih simpan. Dan dah habis baca. bagi 5 bintang bukan sebab buku ni Best. Tapi sebab orang yang bagi buku ni orang yang aku suka hahahaha.(takpela kalau dia baca review ni pun). Kat sini je la aku mampu confess. Sobs. Aku percaya dia bagi pun sebab random je. Bukan sebab dia suka aku pun. Ke aku yang mintak, aku pun tak ingat dah. 5 tahun lepas dah kot dia bagi. Hahaha
May 4, 2014
Pretty accurate, I thought, with good advice.
April 23, 2017
How fun! This was hilarious. My husband and I are both feeling birds, him a dove and I a swan. We giggled at spot on it describes our lives. It was a great look into how our personalities dominate our home and I will never be able to tell him how to do something with a straight face again. It will result in torrents of giggling and him teases me on my need for perfection. Ultimately, this has confirmed that we are two halves to a whole and for us it works perfectly.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews