Valentine’s Week can be tricky. If you’re single, it can throw you onto the “Will I Ever Find Love?” train. Newer couples, you have to beat your loved one’s last Valentine’s Day. Married couples, the restaurants are crowded and cards are five dollars, so you end up with an index card that your son scribbled on. Isn’t it cute?
No matter your relationship status, we can all love better, and knowing how we receive love ourselves can help us clarify that for the people who are trying to love us. This Valentine’s Week, grab a ballad, a bag of chocolates and Gary Chapman’s Five Love Languages Test.
Let me tell you how badly I needed reflection: when I read this book during our first few years of marriage, I immediately knew my love language and actually told my husband he didn’t have one! Who does that? He wasn’t at all interested in the book at all until I made my presumptuous announcement, and after reading for about five minutes, he had his love language pinned. I do have to say I think mine is the easiest and his is the most difficult.
Ugh…forever, the vacuuming my car and straightening up my office…all of the things. His effort looked exhausting. I thought he was critiquing me, showing me ways I could do things “better,” until he took the test. Oh no! His love language is “Acts of Service.” It’s for sure the worst one. You ladies that are complaining that your husband’s love language is “Physical Touch,” you can cry me a river while I am in the freezing cold shoveling snow.
My love language is “Words of Affirmation.” I don’t need to you to clean my car. For the love, just tell me you think I’m pretty and you can take that one to the bank.
Isn’t it ironic that finding a compliment for my husband’s mind is like climbing Mt. Everest? So much so that after taking the test, he bought himself a box of preprinted cards that say nice things on them to sign and give to me. You know what? I love those dang cards and eat up every single one he sets out. To me, that is marriage: doing the things that may not come naturally to us and accepting the effort like a priceless jewel.
So my husband gets to buy preprinted cards, and I get to do chores with him every.day.forever. I digress…
Knowing his love language helps me love him better. It allows me to realize that when he is vacuuming my car, it’s not because he is shaming me for my mess of a life, so I’ll watch him clean the car and take that as, “Huh. He thinks I’m pretty.” Then I’ll bring out some towels and help him dry. When he is trying to love me in the way that he receives love rather than the way I receive love, I will choose to receive that love.
Make it a date. Tell him you don’t need a fancy dinner or a bunch of overpriced flowers. Tell him you want to take the test together. Here is the link.
https://www.5lovelanguages.com/
It is free to take online or print out. If you have already done it…retake it. Reading through the questions gave me all kinds of ideas on how I can love my husband better.
Seize the day ladies! Valentine’s Day may be the only way that you can get this man of yours to participate in a love test. Tell him it will get him out of the “Flower Line of Shame” at 5 pm on Valentine’s Day. I bet this gift will last longer than a dozen roses.
HLLF,
