Understanding the 5 Love Languages

Hello, my friends and welcome to another episode of unlimited. Today we are talking about understanding the five love languages. And I figured it was about time we actually talk about it because it has come up several times, including like the beginning of season one, where I said I would talk about it, and I still haven’t. So here we are, we’re talking about relationships, I figured it is time. Part of the reason that I have resisted talking about The Five Love Languages is that well, it is super popular and kind of all over the place when it comes to relationship stuff. I have mixed feelings about it, I think that it can be really helpful, I have personally found ways that it has been helpful in my own marriage. However, it’s got a lot of limitations. So in case you are one of the people who really hasn’t encountered The Five Love Languages, or maybe you have but like haven’t really looked into it or don’t remember, we are going to talk about what they are. So what each of the five love languages is, examples, etc. Then we’re going to talk about the limitations of this model. Because there are definitely some major limitations. So we’re gonna look at that. We’re also going to talk about learning what you need and communicating it because ultimately, I think that is at the root of how this model can be helpful, but also where it can fail. So we’re going to talk about what that looks like. Also reflections to support self love, because that is really important. And this is a model that can help with that, though, again, limitations. And finally tips to use The Five Love Languages model. So how can you take all of this information and apply it to you and use it in a way that will be supportive? for you in your relationships, whether it be with yourself or with others? I would love to hear from you about what your experience with this model has been? Have you found it helpful? In what ways? Have you found it not helpful and in what ways? So if you are willing to share, I’d love for you to reach out to me, you can send me an email at Valerie at Valerie friedlander.com You can DM me and then there’s also a forum where you can ask me anything if there is a topic that you would like me to explore on this podcast, something you’d like me to dig into. You are welcome to share that with me. So I will have the form link in the show notes. And now without further ado, let’s get started.

Hey there, I’m Valerie Friedlander, Certified Life business alignment coach, and this is unlimited. This podcast bridges the individual and the societal, scientific and spiritual, positive and negative, nerdy and no, there’s just a lot of nerdy. come on board and let’s unlock a light. This is badass as you are.

Before we talk about what the five love languages are, let’s talk about where they came from. The concept of love languages was coined by Baptist pastor Gary Chapman some 30 years ago, he wrote a book called The Five Love Languages in 1992, through the Moody Bible Institute, and over 2 million copies have been sold since then. And that’s just of the original that’s not including the several other spin off books such as love languages in the workplace, and love languages with children, etc. So, lots of books, lots of talk, if you look up the five love languages, you will find videos upon videos and podcasts upon podcast talking about them. So I’m in good company, I guess. Chapman developed this concept of love languages, as he was counseling couples in his role as a Baptist pastor. And it was through his observations of couples that this idea of Love Languages came out. He believed that love languages were an intuitive and simple way to teach couples about how to tune into each other’s way of expressing love. So he started using them to run seminars for husbands and wives. And its popularity took off from there. In this episode, I’m not going to dig into what makes us popular and all of that we’re not going to look at that sociological phenomenon that is occurring with this idea other than to state that we all really love the idea of a good, easy, quick fix. This is not that it is a tool that can be helped All, in some cases, as you may have noted, this is Christian based Western cultural context. And the idea of it is rooted in anecdotal evidence and observations. Not in science. Actually, despite millions of individuals having taken the quiz, according to The Five Love languages.com website, there’s actually no published findings as to the reliability and validity of it using it as a measure. Scientists have done some studies around it, and it hasn’t really shown anything conclusive. So just bearing that in mind, it is one of the places where we have some limitations. And it really is important to recognize that there are some amazing tools out there. Not all tools are appropriate. And all places just like you wouldn’t use a hammer for all of your needs. When you need a saw, you’re not going to use a hammer, for example. So being mindful that this is a tool and where it is helpful, and where it is not helpful to allow it to have a place. And maybe not, because not all tools are helpful for all people. So just keeping that in mind. Now, before we dig further into those limitations, let’s talk about what the Five Love Languages actually are. One of them is acts of service. So acts of service is doing something that helps a partner, such as running an errand, cleaning up something that is a service. Another is physical touch, which is demonstrating physical affection, such as giving your partner a hug, or a kiss, or a rub on the shoulders, or a back rub even, or something a little bit more intimate. All of those are physical touch, quality, time, spending time together, giving each other undivided attention. So quality time is like doing something where you are really present together, paying attention to each other to what you’re doing, rather than where you’re distracted and kind of here and there and not really with each other. Basically what it sounds like quality time. Another is gifts, giving your partner a present that communicates thoughtfulness effort or expense. It is saying I was thinking of you here’s here’s something. So it’s a physical tangible expression of affection. And then finally, words of affirmation, such as expressing your admiration, or complimenting a partner saying thank you expressing gratitude. Sometimes these can be combined together, like you might have a gift combined with words of affirmation in the form of a card, right? Like you could do that. You could also have quality time and physical touch go hand in hand. So none of these are like mutually exclusive of the other ones. It’s this idea that we have one, usually two that kind of stand out this concept of like, this is my primary love language. This is how I communicate love, this is how I receive love. So here’s the benefit that I see to something like this. And that is it is a tool for communication. When we can have a shared language with another person that allows us a certain amount of simplicity in communicating, we can articulate something that may be difficult to articulate with the facility of having a tool to do so. So if you have a shared language, such as The Five Love Languages, you can then express Hey, I could really use some quality time. And then that person knows what you’re talking about. Because they are sharing that language, they have that awareness. One of the other big benefits to having something like this is that it can help you step outside of your own standard way of thinking. And I actually think that that’s probably the biggest piece that I have personally found, and I’ve seen for others, with a tool like this, whether it’s this one or another one, it’s being able to recognize that not everybody thinks the same way as you do. Not everyone has the same needs as you do, or has different needs at different times. We have been so conditioned around this idea of the Golden Rule Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. So this idea that the way you think about things and what you need and Situation is therefore the way other people think and what they need in a situation. And that’s not always true. I’ve talked about this one before this difference between the golden rule and the platinum rule. I didn’t actually know it was called the platinum rule until I saw somebody post about it. I’m like, okay, so they gave it a name. But the idea of this platinum role is that you do unto others, the way they would have you do unto them, right. So it’s really about what they need. And so instead of assuming that somebody needs certain things based off of what you think you would need, you ask, you engage curiosity, and remove assumption, so that you are asking them, hey, what do you need, instead of imposing what you think upon them. So this is one of the main things that I think the five love languages and tools like it come into play is it helps people recognize that they don’t always know what is needed, and that someone else may need something different than them. So this is where you can go, Okay, well, what is my primary love language? This is how I’m expressing my love, but they’re not receiving my love that way? How do they want to receive love? What is useful for them? What is what they are looking for, in this dynamic in this relationship in this situation? And then how do I ask for what I need. So it’s a tool for communication, and it can help simplify communication. We’re gonna talk a little bit more about utilizing that in just a moment. But I do want to make sure that we talk about these limitations in a little bit more depth before we go much further, because it is really important that anytime you’re using a tool like this, that there’s clarity around where it really isn’t applicable. So some of the limitations of the Five Love Languages model is that it is an over simplification. It overly simplifies this idea that we have one love language that we communicate with. We don’t

I’ve seen this with plenty of clients, my empirical evidence says otherwise. But it can be helpful because sometimes we have a period of time where we need that it’s also not fixed. The way that this is presented is that this is your love language. This is their love language. And I have found in working with clients that it changes depending on what your needs are, depending on what’s going on, it may be one way for a period of time, and then that particular way of receiving love is solid, and another area feels like it’s lacking. And so that one starts to feel more dominant in terms of what is needed. So we have to have communication going alongside of this, it can’t be another tool to make assumptions off of because then it defeats the whole purpose. Alongside of this, and the dynamics of it shifting is that it doesn’t address attachment and trauma roots of what we are looking for in terms of receiving and how we tend to give, it may be that because of unhealed trauma, that particular love language that standing out can never be fully filled by another person. Because it has to do with wounds that need to be healed. Another aspect of that can also be the way that you give love, the language that you tend to use to express affection may be rooted in trauma or just conditioning from childhood and what you learned got you attention got you love from parental figures or other adults that you needed that attachment with. So as that work gets done, and as those things get healed and addressed, or those patterns get navigated and shifted, you may find that the love language that you thought was your love language actually isn’t applicable to the extent that it was because it isn’t needed the way it was needed before because you’ve done healing work because you’ve done pattern shifting work to address that underlying drive for say acts of service or gift giving right so those sorts of things. And then ultimately, this isn’t a fix all for relationship issues. Learning The Five Love Languages reading the book together even is not going to solve all of your relationship challenges. It is so important to have communication skills. And again, this can be a tool in your communication tool belt. But you also need the skills of communication of emotional intelligence, of conflict resolution. Having work around aligned values and making sure that there’s a connection there, having trust building trust. And also, of course, as I mentioned, healing trauma are all part of developing a healthy relationship. So just knowing your love language is not going to address all of those things. It can be a tool to facilitate in some instances. So that said, let’s talk about learning what you need and communicating it. I’ll give you an example of what my husband and I did with this tool. And first of all, we read the book together. It was really interesting, because I think anytime you read something together, especially if they’re exploratory questions like this book has, you explore together, you go on a journey together to reflect on yourself and on each other. And I think anytime you do that it can be beneficial in deepening a relationship, deepening an understanding, because you’re developing yourself understanding and you’re doing that in tandem, or in collaboration, even with a partner. Now, the only way I got my husband to do this is I’d read it to him in the shower. So I was like, Well, this is where we’re gonna grab this time. Call it quality time if you want. But I read it. And then we talked about it. I found from that my love language at the time this is several years ago, mind you, my love language stood out for me as words of affirmation. His stood out as physical touch. Now I’ve explored actually, in the last episode, we talked a little bit about the dynamics around physical touch. So check that out, if you haven’t yet. One of the things that came up around this where it was a useful tool, was my husband was really stressed out about something at work, and I was trying to offer validation. I was asking questions I put on my coaching hat, right. This is where it’s easier for me, you know, acknowledge and validate his feelings help explore, like, what can you do about this, and he was just getting so frustrated. This is where I am the instance of, I’m asking him, like, what would be supportive for you? And he was like, Well, stop asking me questions. I’m like, I How am I supposed to support you? If I don’t ask you questions? You know, people who aren’t coaches ask questions to is, this is a normal thing. Anyway, it took me a while of frustration on my own part where I couldn’t support him to think about, oh, maybe he just needs a hug. I actually was until the next morning, this is a whole conversation was in an evening after work. And then we were there’s this tension until the next morning, and I was just like, you know, just to give him a hug. And I felt his whole body shift, like just relax, almost like he was melting into the hug. And I was like, Oh, hmm, well, I knew that his love language was physical touch. And so obviously, this hug was exactly what he needed. Now. I will caveat this with acknowledging as I have before that this is not a fix all this doesn’t apply everywhere. So it could be a case of just validating beliefs that I already had. Right? So saying, Oh, he needed a hug because his love languages physical touch. Well, yeah, okay, maybe maybe you know, a hugs are good. Maybe hugs are nice to have when you’re stressed out. Not everybody wants a hug when they’re stressed out. But this is where it takes some time. Sometimes it takes processing, sometimes, sometimes an awareness of ourselves to be able to ask for what we need. And sometimes just an observation, or that communication of saying, Hey, would you like a hug? He didn’t know when I asked him that night before what would be helpful, even though we talked all about this, like, what our love language was, he didn’t know he didn’t know what he needed. It was only until I gave him the hug that he was like, oh, yeah, that was that’s what I needed. Sometimes we just don’t know. So yes, this can be a helpful tool in noticing in processing. Oh, I’ve hit an impasse. I want to show up. I don’t know how to show up. Oh, what do I know about this person? Here’s a way that I could show up. Right, or I don’t know what I need, I’m feeling overwhelmed that here’s what I know about myself, because I did this exploration work. And so let me ask for this. Or maybe it’s about self love. And oh, let me give myself this. So taking a moment to reflect on like, what do you tend to do when you want to show someone you care? That might be a hint at what your love languages, when do you feel most seen, loved cared for? That might be a hint at a love language at something that is a pattern for you. So I want to take it out of the love language context real quick and just say, notice the patterns, taking a pause to notice the patterns, whether you can fit it in a love language box or not, you know, love languages, again, they can be helpful if they apply to you. But as we can recall from just earlier when I mentioned that this is rooted in a Christian western context, so it might not be your thing, these may not apply to you, you may find something else to be more helpful, I personally have found that looking at some of the areas of influence in my life to be more to the point more helpful in some respects, like physical, mental, spiritual, emotional, social, environmental, to break it down into those six areas of energetic influence, that can often help point me toward where I feel a lack. And where I need to do some nurturing whether it is for myself, or in communication with another person. So again, if this is a helpful tool for you, by all means, use it. If it is a way to get an in to having a deeper conversation with a partner or a colleague or a friend, by all means use it. If it is not, and it feels complicated, it feels forced, put it down, it’s not necessary, just because so many people are talking about it and utilizing it doesn’t mean that it is the right tool for you.

And again, it’s not static, it can change over time. So as you heal, as your life circumstances change, you may find that should you be using this as a tool that it has changed. And that can be true for a partner as well. For example, I had a client who loved being acknowledged and getting thanks. And their spouse had to just work to learn how to say thank you and express gratitude for all the things that they were doing. Now that they have kids, acts of service is way more of a priority than just thank you thank you starts to feel like it’s not actually meaningful anymore. And helping out and showing up. And doing those acts of service without being asked feels a lot more meaningful. And as a lot more important. So you may find that as you do work in one area, you have less need in that area, that area has less emphasis, and another area has more emphasis. So continuing conversation. This is true, as you look at self love. So some reflections that you might give yourself around this idea of self love is whether you apply this tool or another tool, like the areas of energetic influence. Where do you receive love from yourself? Where does that feel good? What do you withhold from yourself when you feel like you haven’t done enough? So like, where’s that punishment? And again, this can be rooted in childhood stuff. And it can point to areas that need a little extra nurturing. What do you try to fill that void with that can also point to habits of filling a need, that isn’t actually working ways that we create kind of addictive behavior because we’re trying to feel something and it sort of does it but not really. So that can point to an area where some healing some care may be needed. So like I give myself gifts, you know, so the shopping to fill a void of needing care and a different way that you are maybe withholding from yourself or maybe you aren’t allowing in so not just withholding from yourself but being in spaces where you receive that. And again, so looking at how how do these things where you withhold caring for yourself, when you don’t feel like you’ve done enough? What you try and fill that void of need of love of care with and how does that relate? to what you were and weren’t given as a child. And then really looking at where do you feel that satisfaction? Or where might you explore creating some satisfaction, some love, some care, some pleasure in your life, where might you start to allow that in. So reflecting back on the last episode, talking about intimacy and pleasure that has a lot of great nuggets around that idea of receiving love. So taking a look at that, whether it is using this as a tool to help you explore because again, it is simple, and that is part of I think, why it is so popular and why people gravitate towards it is because when you feel overwhelmed with things like care and love and the idea of of doing that kind of nurturing, and engaging that conversation, when you have a disconnect with yourself and possibly with a partner, having something simple to tie to, to explore with can really make a huge difference. So tips on using the Five Love Languages model is if you need something to simplify, this is a way that you can simplify. It’s a tool for communication, use it to support you thinking outside of the golden rule, and asking other people what they need, instead of assuming that they need the same thing that you do, or assuming what they would need because you think you would need something in that situation. And then also asking for what you need. Use it as a way to help you simplify to communicate if trying to communicate more detailed, feels a little too overwhelming yet, though, I would encourage you don’t stop there. Allow yourself to go deeper as you find it easier to tap into what your needs are. And exploring with a loved one. These concepts can deepen your communication, and as I mentioned, give you shortcut codes. There are other tools out there that you might find helpful, I actually created one, again, empirical evidence using a wheel concept of this mental, physical, emotional spiritual to address stress release strategies, because again, we don’t all process stress the same way I have a whole episode talking about stress release strategies. I call it stress languages. Because again, it has to do with how we communicate. Having a shared language, having a way to articulate to process something that we unfortunately aren’t given a lot of tools for, as young people can help us start to tap into those needs that we have. Another great tool is an emotions wheel. And just having those emotions listed out for you to be able to say this is how I’m feeling. And get in touch with those feelings can be really helpful too. And I’ll have one of those linked in the show notes as well. I have a training on the stress relief strategies, if stress seems to be the thing that’s dominating for you, because sometimes it can be hard to get to the love part, when we’re overwhelmed by the stress and survival mode part. So all of these ways of conceptualizing are tools in our communication toolbox. And it is important to use them if they’re helpful, and let them go if they’re not. So, one thing I hope that you will take away from this is if this tool doesn’t work for you, even though so many people are talking about it, it’s okay. It’s not that something’s wrong with you. It’s not that you’re missing something, it just may not be a tool for you. There are other tools out there. And you are worth finding the thing that works for you, rather than trying to fit yourself into something that works for somebody else. That is what I specialize in is helping people access what works for them, and utilize those things to improve life, to enjoy life more to access, more pleasure, more joy, more purpose, more fulfillment. That is what I help people do is cut through all the crap and really hear what their needs are, and be able to start building toward bringing more of that in. So if that’s something you’re looking for, I encourage you to get on an exploration call with me. There’s a link in the show notes to my calendar. You can just schedule a call it is free and we can talk about what’s going on for you and see if we’re good fit to work together. There is never any pressure. I am here for your support. So if we’re not a good fit, I will give you some referrals if you are looking for them, maybe some tools that you can access. Again, if you are looking just for some free tools, I have a bunch of them on my website. So definitely go check those out, including one for couples that helps with building alignment. So all of that is available to you right now. I hope you found this helpful. I’ve been talking about doing it for a while. So here it is. Finally, Five Love Languages my take. If you have questions, I encourage you to reach out if you have comments, I encourage you to reach out I do love to hear from you. And I will talk to you all next time.

Thanks for listening. I so appreciate you being here. If you got something out of today’s episode, please share it. Leave me a review, take a screenshot and posted on social with a shout out to me. Send it to a friend or you know all of the above. Want to hang out more join me on Instagram, or better yet, get on my mailing list to make sure you don’t miss out on anything. And remember, your possibilities are as unlimited as you are. Allow yourself to shine my friend. The world needs your light. See you next time.

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