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We all have differing personalities and ways of navigating life. We all have varying emotional needs. Many of us are sensitive to how others treat and appreciate us and our efforts, and this is especially true in our intimate relationships. None of us are completely free of unconscious influences from our past that affect how we perceive life, and these can make extra sensitive. This shows up as our vulnerabilities, and affects how we perceive what our partner is saying or doing and how we respond to him or her. We may even seem overly needy to our partner if he or she doesn’t understand our vulnerabilities, or if they choose to minimize or brush them off a silly. This is why trust, communication, and creating a “safe haven” for each in the partnership to show the other their fears, emotional barometer, and vulnerabilities is vital. So is being sensitive to our partner’s needs – even if we don’t understand them. We all are somewhat needy for love, as most of us are not fully connected to the love within our True Self, so we all need to feel loved from those close to us.

We all have different ways we express our love to our partner, but we also have different ways we interpret love from our partner. What makes one feel loved, may seem like an empty gesture to another. This is because we all have our own internal way of feeling loved. Part of really showing our love to our partner is understanding and acting in accordance with what Gary Chapman calls our “love language.”(1)

If we were completely aligned to the love within us 100% of the time, we would not need any specific expression of our partner’s (or anyone else’s) love for us. However, as we are not all fully aligned with our True Self and are just doing our best to deal with our inner worlds and their unconscious influences, we need those close to us, and especially our spouse, to express their love to us in ways we can feel it.

In Gary Chapman’s The Five Love Languages, he tells us that learning our partner’s love language is paramount to understanding how to show them our love. Listed below are Chapman’s Five Love Languages. (1)

Love Language 1: Words of Affirmation: We are not often taught to use encouraging, kind, and humble words, so as adults we do not tend to use positive affirmations of love. Complimenting and showing appreciation to a partner who needs to hear love and appreciation voiced is fundamental in communicating our love to them. Receiving positive reinforcements makes them much more willing and motivated to fulfill their partner’s desires.

Love Language 2: Quality Time: For many, togetherness and quality time is vital to feeling loved. Having quality conversations and heartfelt sharing encourages intimacy for them, and listening attentively when he or she speaks from their heart is paramount.

Love Language 3: Receiving Gifts: Gifts are important in relationships because they are tactile and visual symbols of love, particularly if our partner requires physical manifestations as a sign of our love. So bringing them gifts, especially for no reason at all, as well as ensuring we know what they would like as a gift makes them feel loved.

Love Language 4: Acts of Service: The act of being served is how some partners feel loved. Both small and large gestures will please a partner who feels loved by being served. Small gestures like making him or her supper for no reason, keeping their car fueled up and washed, or offering to babysit so our partner can get away with the guys or gals keeps him or her feeling loved and appreciated. He or she will then be able to respond more lovingly.

Love Language 5: Physical Touch: Any act of physical touch will express love to someone who requires touch as an indicator of love. A simple brush as you walk by, a hug or kiss as you leave or come home, or a massage for no particular reason will keep the necessary physical communication open that the other needs. A healthy sex life is paramount to the partner whose love language is touch. (1)

We must also understand that any attempt or gesture to show our love to our partner should be appreciated as such, even when it is in ways that do not fulfill our particular love needs. When living at our highest potentials we would not need any outward signs of our partner’s love for us as we would be getting that from our connection to our True Self. However, since most of us are not there yet and have been programmed to get our love cues from the external, until we find our way back to wholeness it is important to recognize how our partner feels our love. At the same time, we must show appreciation to our partner for any effort he or she makes to show their love and appreciation, no matter how feeble their attempt seems to us.

Endnote

(1) Gary Chapman, The Five Love Languages: How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate (Chicago: Northfield Publishing, 1992), 37–121.

© Rosemary McCarthy, October, 2016

This article is based on and an expansion of the sub-section “Expressing Our Love” within the main section “Making It Work” from chapter 5, Relationships.

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Below is a little peak at other concepts discussed the book:

Improving our attitudes helps change the world, as every shift it attitude affects the vibration of the Planet as a whole. (Introduction)

The need to fill a void within ourselves manifests itself in the demands we put on others or in our incessant striving for material possessions and status.  (Chapter 1, Why We Are the Way We Are)

Our capacity to love others is in direct relationship to how much we love ourselves. (Chapter 3, What We Can Do About It)

Our Relationships Are Pre-set Soul Contracts.  We manifest together so that we can help each other in life, but also to work our unconscious influences. (Chapter 5, Relationships)

We are not exercising true free will if we live under the tutelage of unconscious influences. (Chapter 6, Words, Symbols, Rituals, Concepts, Prayers).

We can reconcile our apparent relationship with extra-terrestrials with our belief systems. (Chapter 7, Science).

Our planet is a living, breathing organism … and just like us she has to cleanse herself of toxins – the physical and emotional toxins we have put upon her. (Chapter 9, The Planet and Abundance)

At levels beyond our awareness we chose to be here at this time of ‘The Shift’ to help bring about our and Gais’s Ascensions.  (Chapter 10, Ascension).

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Copyright © 2016 by Rosemary McCarthy. All rights Reserved. You may only copy, share and distribute this article provided that the content is copied in its entirety, is unaltered, and is distributed freely and for no monetary or personal gain, and that this copyright notice and the link for the article and the website www.yourjourneytopeace.com are included. You can contact me at: rosemary@yourjourneytopeace.com. Blessings.