Have you ever had a fight with a friend, co-worker, family member or partner about something that just doesn’t make sense to you?
Everyone has different communication styles, and it is easy to get caught up in your perspective and be unable to see the other person’s, even in situations where no bad intention took place.
In 1995, Dr. Gary Chapman PhD. of psychology published years of research about love and communication that he coins, love languages. There are 5, that everyone has, but individuals give different preferences to each one. When there are issues of communication in close relationships, whether they be platonic, romantic, professional or familiar, it is often a misunderstanding of intent.
You can find out how you rank love languages through quizzes created by psychologists, There are four official quizzes on the love language website: friendship, family, romantic and workplace.
Understand your love language to better communicate with the ones around you, and spread the knowledge. If the people around you understand their love languages too, it gives you all a tool for communicating better and understanding conflict.
What Are Love Languages?
The love languages are words of affirmation, acts of service, physical touch, quality time and gifts. When you take the quizzes, it will give you a ranking of your preference depending on the context of the relationship. Your number one, being your biggest preference, is how you feel most loved, cared about and considered.
When people have different love language priorities, it causes issues of miscommunication. For example, if your love language is words of affirmation, and your friends is gifts, then you express care in different ways, but may not necessarily feel cared about by the other person.
Continuing with this example, even though both people do actually care about the friendship, but they express it differently, it may still cause misunderstandings. There is so much power in knowing other people’s love languages.
Even if you can’t ask everyone in your life to take the quiz and see where they rank, knowing this information can be a tool on its own for opening your perspective. Keep in mind that other people express care and consideration differently and be open to other kinds of signs of affection that are different from your own.
It is important to feel cared about, but use this tool to meet people halfway, especially in friendships and work relationships. Whereas with family or romantic relationships, you can use this tool as a form of building intimacy, for sharing living spaces and long-term communication.
