What's your love language?

"We're not talking comfort. We're talking love. Love is something we do for someone else. So often couples love one another but they aren't connecting. They are sincere, but sincerity isn't enough." - Dr Gary Chapman, the author of The 5 Love Languages.

I stumbled upon this article. It's an article based on Gary Chapman's book called The 5 Love Languages. Basically, Chapman gives the idea of how people express their love. Thing is, there are 5 different languages of love, and people can speak the same or totally different language with one and another. Those 5 languages are words of affirmation, quality time, receiving gifts, acts of service, and physical touch. Each person can have one (or two) primary languages, and those languages are ones they use to express their love and ones that can make them feel loved.

Actually, I've known this "5 languages" thing for a very long time. I remember I first read about this on my reading subject book (yes, reading subject) back when I was in college. But the article I put above (I suggest you to click it. Yes, click it away, baby) is very interesting. It sums up the whole thing very well, very clearly. Kudos to the writer.

Anyway, the article also leads me to the (I guess) official page of the 5 love languages itself. And what's more interesting? We can discover our own language by taking a quiz of 30 questions there. Yes, we can discover our love language, as well as our loved ones'.

And it got me thinking how important the language is.

There will be no problem if you and your loved ones (family, friends, spouse) speak the same language as you. But what if you both speak totally different languages? It's like you keep speaking in English, but they speak no English. No matter how hard you try to express your love, they won't get it. And you end up being sad, upset, or even angry. You may think they don't understand you or that you haven't been good enough to them. But in fact, it's not about that. It's just you should transfer what you speak into their language. If they speak Spanish, try to speak in Spanish.

I just fall in love with what Chapman says (as put on top of this post): "We're not talking comfort. We're talking love. Love is something we do for someone else. So often couples love one another but they aren't connecting. They are sincere, but sincerity isn't enough." Your language is English, so it's okay if when you try to speak in Spanish, you stammer, you find it discomforts you. But then, "love is something we do for someone else". Familiar to this saying: "Love is real when it's shared"? There's nothing wrong with trying to speak in Spanish so that your loved ones will get what you're trying to say.

But I'm gonna make a little bit of twist here.

Just because they speak Spanish, doesn't mean you should totally stop speaking English. After all, that's your own language, right? After all, there are English words that cannot fully replaced by Spanish words, right? You speak in Spanish to make them feel loved, yet you still keep speaking in English to express your love to the fullest. Sometimes you can teach them to speak in English too, so that they know what you are trying to say. Just combine them all. Be bilingual.

What a really interesting article with a nice topic there, anyway. Make me realize that love is indeed a sacrifice. Sometimes, we have to do things we don't enjoy just to make one we love feel loved. But the smile, the gratitude, and the happiness shared by the loved ones is too damn precious.

Yes it is.

I'd be more than honored to do that.

What about you? Do you love your loved ones enough to speak in their language?