Clarifying Your Love Language

Love Tank - Is it Filled or Empty?

Well, now that you've established (or are establishing) what your love language is, what is next? Your spouse doing it seems pretty logical. But, what if you don't exactly know what the specifics are of your spouses love language?

I believe it is in the book, "The 5 Love Languages" - a suggestion to write 5 things down so that your spouse has a small "map" for your love language.

My primary love language is Gifts, secondary is Acts of Service. Seems pretty cut and dry right? Perspectives come into play regarding this, but if we don't clarify what it is that draws us towards our love languages, our love tanks might not be able to fill up. It goes along the lines of - if you and I had the same love language, it doesn't mean that the specifics of the love language are the same, we really need to clarify these things to our spouse.

So for instance, with Gifts - I do look forward to gifts on the regular occasions; birthday, Valentine's day, Mother's day - but on this day, homemade gifts are fantastic - or even gifts that show appreciation for being a mom and all that entails, anniversary, Christmas. I don't expect a gift every day, though a just for the heck of it gifts are great - a card; in fact one card that my charm gave to me once is a treasured item for me, a just for the heck of it-letting you know I love you card and why. One of my other treasured items was a card given to me on Mother's day after I had our first child, my charm made it on the computer with a picture of our son, some words that made it seem that he was giving it to me rather than himself. It was the perfect card, perfect gift. Loved it! Another just for the heck of it, I was thinking of you today would simply be a favorite treat. There has been several occasions as of late that my charm has left me a surprise in the office - for me to find, as simple as a Snickers bar.

But that isn't all that can lift me up for gifts - I find that doing just for the heck of it treats on occasion (edible or not) for the kids; Shutterfly photo books - an ongoing project of mine to get the kids' baby books, family vacation books, milestone books; fulfilling traditions throughout the year, like Valentines Day (I love giving something to the kids), Easter, Halloween, their birthday's - not only their gifts, but doing their special 1-year combined family party, friend birthday parties, heck, even the party I did for my charm last year when he turned 40 was filling my love tank up. You can actually read about all that I did/all that it entails for that in my article "How to Plan a Fabulous 40th Birthday Party." One of these days I'd like to do a neighbor/family/friend Halloween Party..... that would require us to be in a house though and we are in a condo at the moment. I think the entertainer in me comes directly from my own mom, who is fabulous when it comes to such things! Creating family traditions, fulfilling family traditions - vacations. Oh and making a house a home... I love decorating. You get the idea.

Then there is Acts of Service, which I am still learning about what ties to that with me. But some of those things are that my needs are not dismissed, that all of our needs are met... next to wants... (I don't want to always deprive our kids of their wants - of course balanced out of needs and wants are important - because if you take it all away all of the time, their perception as they grow up with wants will become a negative outlook or managed negatively with their money - I do not want that for them. I want them to have a healthy balance with needs and wants; wants are natural to each and everyone, taking it away would be taking part of the joy out of life and what would they have to look forward to?) So besides providing for our family - it is doing/choosing things that better oneself overall; other Acts of Service would be things I have asked to be done around our home.

We are working towards both of our love languages, and we are learning more and more about each other each day. When our love languages aren't being met, our love feels dry, out of service, we feel insecure, not cared for or loved, we simply are in a day to day routine without much thought of the other person - when they should be our first thought each day and give our 100% to them each day. It can actually be quite the adventure if you are on a constant journey to do things and find things that will benefit your spouse's love language.

One of my favorite scriptures is: "When ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God", Mosiah 2:17 - This scripture obviously refers to everyone, but lets put it into the context of your spouse. How about this scripture: "Those who embark in the service of God should serve with their whole hearts", D&C 4:2 - Again, refer this to your spouse - serve your spouse 100%, it isn't a 50/50 arrangement, it is a 100%!