The Five Love Languages

I picked up the audio book at the library last Thursday and finished most of it in one day.  It was my baking day so I listened to it while I cooked in the kitchen.  I loved the concepts in this book.  It's by Gary Chapman.  I have seen others read and talk about this book but had never read it myself.  I'm glad I finally "read" it.
Chapman believes all individuals have a love language they prefer to receive from others.  Here are the 5 languages and a few examples:
1.  Words of Affirmation
Words of encouragement and praise, Complements, Hearing "I love you, I need you"  Hearing Thank you and I appreciate what you do.
2.  Giving Time, and Full Attention
Doing things together, quality conversation, going out to dinner, sitting on the couch together, going for a walk
3.  Receiving Gifts
It doesn't have to be expensive but just receiving something shows them they care.  Flowers, candy bar, a new outfit, card.
4.  Acts of Service
These can be as mundane as making the bed, doing laundry, dishes, dinner on the table when they get home from work, mowing the grass, doing errands for them etc.
5.  Physical Touch
Holding hands, massages, back scratches, and of course sexual intercourse.
Chapman talked about how each of us have a love tank within us.  If our love tank is full then we fill good about our relationship.  Our spouse fills our love tank by speaking to us in our love language.  When we are dating we do all of these things to try to find out what our date likes.  When we get a positive response then we repeat and give more.  Sometimes in marriage we forget to keep giving those things that make our spouse happy.  Or we could be doing tons of service to our spouse and not seeing any results but really all they want is to go on a walk with us every night.  I decided to talk to Devin about what he thought was his love language and see how his love tank was.  I was right when he said his love language is Physical Touch.  My own language is Acts of Service.
The last part of this book focused on our children.  We can apply these same principals with our children. This really made sense to me when he said if our children's love language is words of affirmation that for that child when a parent puts them down verbally it is even more devastating to them.  This gave me some things to think about.  I would highly recommend reading this book if you haven't.  I believe it could really help any relationship.