Love is one of the deepest human needs and essential quality of our being. And even though it is the most common topics in the world we often don’t seem to speak the same language when it comes to giving and receiving love.

This is because we all have different ways we are trying to meet the need for love, different strategies to connect with the quality of love inside – different love languages. 

HOW DO WE IN REALITY SHOW SOMEONE LOVE?

All of us are familiar with the quality of Love and all of us have the universal human need to both receive and give love. We spend a lot of time talking, complaining, searching for, trying out different strategies to experience love – both in receiving and giving, especially in intimate relationships (a very popular strategy to live the quality of love). What we seem to forget is the simple and very profound question: 

How? 

How do we offer, show, give love to someone? 

And how, when, in what ways do I feel loved? 

WHAT LANGUAGE OF LOVE DO YOU SPEAK?  

We all know when it works, we are feeling fulfilled and in celebration, and when it does not work, we are feeling like something is lacking and we are full of frustration. 

I know that I am longing to live more the quality of love in my relationship but I don’t know how to shift it. I might even get trapped in the ideas that my partner should already be knowing how to otherwise the relationship is a fail, I should be valued more and that I need to search for a better relationship. 

This might be true, it might not be. My point is that asking for what we want is something most of us have a hard time doing. Some because they simply don’t know, others because they have the idea it is shameful to speak up about what they long for and some simply because they fear they won’t receive it and then rather stay safe, not rejected, and avoid ever thinking about it. 

THE DIFFERENT LANGUAGE OF LOVE ARE:

Which I see as different strategies to meet the need for love. With that I mean either to connect with it inside of us or celebrate it and offer it to someone else. If you want to read more about the love languages Gary Chapman wrote a beautiful little book called “The five love languages” Find it here!

1. Acts of Service (helping out in the house, cleaning, picking you up at the airport, building something, organizing something for the other, supported by concrete actions)
2. Gifts (physical presents in different forms, buying things or making things that you offer)
3. Physical Touch (through physical touch, not including sex, showing affection and care)
4. Words of Affirmation (through words speaking and offering love, affection and kindness, telling you lover how much you enjoy him/her or celebrating them by sharing it with words) 
5. Quality Time (offering your presence to your partner, spending undisturbed time enjoying something together like a common activity or learning something new together)

SEPARATING THE NEED FROM THE STRATEGY – OFFER OURSELVES CHOICE! 

We all share the same human needs, they are universal, but what is different is the way we chose to meet them. It is like everybody needs food but we all like to eat different things. 

By sorting out the difference between:

• The Strategies (the way we are trying to meet our needs) 
• The actual need (the quality we want to live or reconnect to) 

We can both gain a deeper understanding for each other in an intimate relating and we can also avoid misunderstandings and conflict. 

See these different strategies can be in conflict. If I want to receive gifts from my lover to feel seen, appreciated and loved and my lover keeps offering me acts of service I can experience it as a tension and conflict. I might even start wonder after some years if my partner even love me at all. I am not open to see the need behind the actions. I am stuck in my strategy and believe that i need the gifts, not seeing it is the love behind I truly need. 

So by separating these we gain more options and clarity. I can then choose to stick to my favorite strategy and truly honor that it is the gift that I absolutely want and share that with my partner or I can choose to find new strategies. The point is that I offer myself choice from a clear inner connection. 

Sometimes it happens to me that my partner, who ́s language of love is acts of service, is cleaning the house and since I know that it is his favorite strategy to meet his need for love I can see through that and receive it even though my preferred one is touch. I might even ask “Are you cleaning the floors right now because you really want me to know how much you care about me?” And then we both can feel seen. 

INVITATION FOR SELF INQUIRY INTO SPEAKING LOVE FLUENTLY:

• Explore what your language of love is. When you feel loved by your partner or someone close to you. What is it that makes you feel that way? 

• If you have a partner, be curious about what language your partner speaks and try to speak his/her language and practice translating his/her language so that you can see the love behind the actions.

• Practice to ask for what you long for by sharing openly how you enjoy to receive love with your partner. 

• Inquire into what ideas you have that holds you back from asking for what you need, what ideas you have around expressing and receiving love in an intimate relationship.