I call February, a love month. I find it a wonderful month to focus on love. It is the only time of the year we know for sure everyone is thinking about love too. This year I had a great activity I did which was based on the traditional advent calendar which we have at Christmas time except it was a love calendar. All the activities were focused around bringing more love into my world and into the lives of those I touch every day.
It was at this time I once again picked up the wonderful book written by Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell called The 5 Love Languages of your Family. It is a good read.
In the book it asks the question, Can you speak and do you speak, your child’s love language?
Every child has their very own primary love language. This is the way they understand a parents love best. We all need to know we are loved to develop into responsible adults. Love is the foundation to provide security for a child to grow into a giving, loving adult.
In raising a child everything depends on the love relationship between a parent and their child. We may truly love our child, but unless she feels it through her language of love, she will not feel loved.
Children all have emotional love tanks. A child’s emotional love tank will over flow when we speak their love language. It is then easier to guide and teach a child. Real love is always unconditional. This is love that accepts and affirms a child for who he is not for what he does. No matter what he does or does not do the parent still loves him. Conditional love is based on performance and is often associated with training techniques that offer gifts, rewards and privileges to children who behave or perform in desired ways.
Every child has a special way of perceiving love. There are 5 ways children (indeed, all people) speak and understand emotional love.
They are:
Physical Touch
Words of Affirmation
Quality Time
Gifts
Acts of Service
Love languages are just like personalities all different for each child. If a child is under age 5, don’t expect to work out their primary love language. You can’t. Your child may give you clues. Just speak all 5 love languages to meet your child’s need for love. Children need all 5 languages to grow even though he will crave one more than the others.
Physical Touch:
Physical touch is one of love’s strongest voices. Physical touch can be expressed through hugs, kisses and any kind of physical contact. We have constant opportunity to transfer love to the heart of a child with touch. Studies indicate that many parents only touch their children when necessary: dressing, undressing, putting them in the car or carry them to bed. It seems that parents are unaware of how much their children need to be touched and how easily they can use touch to fill their children’s emotional tanks.
Words Affirmation:
In communicating love, words are powerful. Words of affection and endearment, words of praise and encouragement, words that give positive guidance all say,” I care about you.” Words such as these are like a gentle, warm rain falling on the soul, they nurture the child’s inner sense of worth and security. Even although such words are quickly said, they are not soon forgotten. A child reaps the benefits of affirming words for a lifetime. Conversely, cutting words, spoken out of short-lived frustration, can hurt a child’s self esteem and cast doubts about his abilities. Children think we deeply believe what we say.
Quality Time:
Quality time is focused attention. It means giving your child undivided attention. Most babies receive quality time, feeding and changing nappies gives the child hours of focused attention. Quality time as a child gets older is difficult as our lives are so full of everything we need to do. Quality time however is a parent’s gift of presence to a child. It conveys this message you are important. I like being with you. It makes a child feel that they are the most important person in the world to the parent.
Gifts:
For those children whose language of love is receiving gifts will respond differently when they get their gift. They will want you to wrapped or give their present in a creative and unique way. This is all part of the love expression. They will take note of the bow, card and the wrapping. They will talk about it. They will ooh and aah too as they open their gift. It will be seen as a big deal to them and it is. They are feeling very special as they open the gift. They want your undivided attention as they do it. To them this is loves loudest voice. They see the gift as an extension of your love and they want to share this moment with you. They will hug and thank you profusely. These children will make a special place in their room for the gift. They will show their friends and talk about it. The gift holds a special place in their hearts because in fact it is an expression of your love. It does not matter if the gift was made, found or purchased. What matters is you thought about them.
Acts of Service:
Acts of service that are genuine expressions of love will communicate on an emotional level to most children. However, if service is your child’s primary love language, your acts of service will communicate most deeply that you love them. When a child asks you to fix their doll or bike, it is not only the task to get the job done, but it is a cry for emotional love. If your child’s love language is acts of service this does not mean you are to jump to all their requests. Each request calls for a thoughtful, loving response.
If you have enjoyed reading about the 5 love languages and would like to learn more I highly recommend you read the book of Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell.
