Love Languages

When my hubby and I were in our premarital counseling sessions over two years ago, one of the many things we went through with our pastor was The Five Love Languages. The love languages are the ways in which you show love to others, as well as the way you most feel loved by others when shown. There are five love languages to choose from: Words of Affirmation, Quality Time, Acts of Service, Receiving Gifts, and Physical Touch. Often, we fall into the trap of expressing our own love language to those we love, rather than remembering what THEIR love language is, and speaking that directly to them.

For example, before we got married, I discovered that my top love language is ACTS OF SERVICE. I often find myself doing Acts of Service with the mindset of "oh, Kelly will really see how much I love him by how clean the house is" or "if I pick up Kelly's plate after him, he'll be reminded of my love for him". Problem is: Acts of Service is nowhere on my hubby's radar of feeling loved. He could care less if I clean house or not, as far as him feeling love is concerned. Acts of Service is MY love language, not Kelly's. Therefore, if I want to show Kelly that I love him, Acts of Service is not the way to go. Rather, I should give him Words of Affirmation, or Physical Touch, or Quality Time. But, if Kelly speaks to me through Acts of Service, I totally feel loved and appreciated.

It's quite neat, if you have never read through the Five Love Languages. It's totally worth reading. It's work though, when a certain love language is not your natural thing, and it's what your mate most likes, you have to work outside of your zone to speak their language to them.

My hubby did just that for me today. Among taking care of me all day while I was home sick from work, he totally spoke my love language in an intentional way. After I finally got off the couch and took a shower this evening, I found my hubby doing the below for me. Speaking my love language! He's vacuuming! Cleaning house for me is like writing the most eloquent love letter to me! Crazy isn't it?!

I snuck a shot while he worked and luckily he did not notice until the shot was already taken... once he heard the snap of the camera, his only words after I told him it was for my blog, was "oh great, Uncle Frank is not going to be happy about this one". To understand why Kelly might say that, see UFrank's comments on the following post.

I'm so thankful that the Lord blessed me with a man that loves me! My hope for everyone is that they are also blessed with someone that is willing to speak their love language. Even friends of mine who have 6 love languages. You know who you are. ha ha.


My hubby's quote when he saw me typing out the beginning of this post was: "That was my New Year's resolution, remember?" Yep. I remember.