Friday, December 19, 2008

5 Love Languages

Spend enough time with me and I'll eventually reference the Myers-Briggs inventory or the 5 love languages. The later comes from a book of the same title which outlines the 5 ways people like to receive love, care and affection. Typically a person's bias is to give love the way he or she prefers to receive love. The specific love languages are: quality time, acts of service, gifts, physical touch and encouraging words. Of course we humans want doses of all of these from time to time!

Chris leans towards encouraging words. I don't know if early on in our relationship I knew this, but our first Christmas together I happened to give him a gift of encouraging words. Throughout a downtown date, I gave him typed cards each in its own envelope outlining a different aspect of Chris that I appreciated. Instead of the "12 Days of Christmas" they were titled "The 12 Ways of Chris". I thought as special recognition for Chris this year, I'd share the short version with others. Guess what. They all hold true 7 years later. So Merry Christmas to us - life's better because we're together.

(Feel free to steal this idea for the person who speaks the encouraging words love language in your life!)

The 12 Ways of Chris
Planning - I feel valued when our time together is organized.
Consistency - Chris' yes means yes.
Laughing - He has the best laugh!
Openness - We can talk about anything.
Character - Has the attitude to do what's right.
Motivation - Chris wants to be his best and is a person of action.
Reflection - He listens, takes time to process and consider my thoughts.
Strength - Confident, he is not diminished even when acknowledging weakness.
Acceptance - He looks to the best in others.
Values - Easy to respect, our beliefs and background align.
Kissing - (No explanation - remember this was 3 months into dating!)
Optimism - Chris is the ultimate Mr. Brightside!

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