now you're speaking my (love) language

Oh Valentines day,  a day full of red and pink hearts, chocolate, flowers, and LOVE. Have you ever noticed
that the most popular ways to show love to your significant other around Valentines day is by giving gifts? I think it's interesting because not everyone feels loved by receiving or giving gifts. We all have a way we feel most loved, it's called our love language. 

The Love languages website says "The premise of The 5 Love Language book is quite simple: different people with different personalities give and receive love in different ways. By learning to recognize these preferences in yourself and in your loved ones, you can learn to identify the root of your conflicts, connect more profoundly, and truly begin to grow closer." 

So what are the 5 love languages? They are Physical Touch, Words of Affirmation, Acts of Service, Gift Giving, and Quality time. As we grow and change as adults our love languages may change also. When I first married Glenn my love language was definitely physical touch. I wanted him to hold my hand in public, I wanted to sit RIGHT next to him on the couch as we watched tv. I still love these things, but now I also love quality time with Glenn, even if it is just going to the grocery store together, or going on a walk in our back yard. 

Just as our own love languages shift so may the love languages of our spouses.  It's so easy to know what ours and our spouses love language is. All we have to do is take a short quiz, and if you're like me one of your guilty pleasures as a teen was completing buzz feed quizzes. This quiz is almost just like buzz feed quizzes but better!

Once you learn our own and our spouses love language you may feel one of two ways... 1) excited and ready to love your spouse more fully in a way that they receive love the most or 2) more confused than ever before.  I love this chart found on an online counseling website. It goes over what each love language IS and IS NOT. 

Another aspect of this chart that I love is that is teaches us how to communicate with our loved ones how they can love us. For the first few months on mine and Glenn's marriage he would always surprise me with small gifts, which I appreciated but I never really knew why he would randomly buy me things. I eventually realized that his love language is giving/receiving gifts. We were able to talk about it and since then we both try to make a more conscience effort to love each other in a way that we best receive love. 

Love languages don't just apply to romantic partners, they can be used between friends and other family members. So share with me what your love language is! I'm always curious to see how my loved ones feel the most loved.