Latest / MESSmerized - Funny and faith based encouragement in marriage , family , Christian parenting , and finding purpose / Episode 162: The Love Language That Matters Most with Dr. Gary Chapman

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Episode 162: The Love Language That Matters Most with Dr. Gary Chapman · MESSmerized - Funny and faith based encouragement in marriage , family , Christian parenting , and finding purpose

0:06
[SPEAKER_00]: This is Cynthia Gannoff and you are listening to the mesmerized podcast.
0:14
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, friends, welcome to the podcast.
0:16
[SPEAKER_00]: I am so glad you're here.
0:18
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm so thankful for all of the notes, the DMs, the people who've emailed through my website, just letting me know that you're enjoying, all that we're doing this fall, the guests that are on the show, and it just means so much.
0:30
[SPEAKER_00]: So thanks, everyone.
0:32
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanted to let you know that I am now booking speaking engagements for the spring.
0:36
[SPEAKER_00]: So go to Cynthiaganoff.com.
0:39
[SPEAKER_00]: If you have a women's event coming up, if you have something at your church, whatever it is, I have a whole lot of things.
0:46
[SPEAKER_00]: I could talk about what would love to meet you and your people.
0:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Have suitcase will travel.
0:51
[SPEAKER_00]: So go to Cynthiaganoff.com.
0:53
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a place to fill out a form for speaking engagements to see if we can make that work.
0:57
[SPEAKER_00]: I would love it.
0:58
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, now I just went to Park City, Utah with some friends, and as you know in October, I'm trying to do something every single day that helps me appreciate that it's October, it's my favorite month, and so I'm trying to be outside to do fall things, and so it was amazing to be in Park City, apparently, other parts of the country get fall foliage, something that we don't know about in Dallas, and so it was incredible, just so beautiful, and to eat.
1:22
[SPEAKER_00]: He bike through that part of the country and to hike and all the things it was incredible.
1:27
[SPEAKER_00]: So let me encourage you to get out there and do all the fall things.
1:31
[SPEAKER_00]: Now when I was in Park City, something kind of funny happened, I was in an Uber and it was about 620 in the morning and I was barely awake trying to get back to the airport as by myself and my husband Mike always tells me, don't worry about when you're Ubering alone.
1:47
[SPEAKER_00]: They don't want to talk to you.
1:48
[SPEAKER_00]: So just sit back there and do your own thing and I was like, okay,
1:51
[SPEAKER_00]: So I sit back there.
1:51
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, Mike was wrong.
1:53
[SPEAKER_00]: This man did want to talk to me.
1:54
[SPEAKER_00]: And in fact, the entire way to the airport for 40 minutes, he proceeded to talk to me a lot.
2:00
[SPEAKER_00]: But he was telling me about a book he had written, and he was explaining it, and he was talking at how, you know, everybody has a different love language.
2:07
[SPEAKER_00]: And what might feel someone to scup up?
2:09
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't feel someone else up.
2:11
[SPEAKER_00]: He's going through all these things and finally, I'm like,
2:13
[SPEAKER_00]: It sounds a lot like Dr. Gary Chapman's book, The Love Language, and he goes, yeah, kind of a knockoff of that, and I was like, oh, well, great.
2:21
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, it's just funny because literally I had just interviewed Dr. Chapman, and I'm telling you, I've loved his stuff.
2:28
[SPEAKER_00]: I know most people have like secular Christian, whoever.
2:32
[SPEAKER_00]: If you ask one their love language,
2:34
[SPEAKER_00]: almost everybody knows what it is and maybe what their spouse is is and that's just how pervasive his work has been and so to have him on the show I was so excited and so he has a new book out the love language that matters most.
2:48
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought for sure he was gonna say it's acts of service and that's my love language turns out that's not at all the message he's going with, but you know, a girl can dream.
2:57
[SPEAKER_00]: But he's gonna talk about just the love languages, how it impacts our marriages, what he's found out since he wrote that original book that he wanted to now write in a new book, even how it impacts our kids.
3:07
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I'm just thrilled to have him.
3:09
[SPEAKER_00]: He is the sweetest man ever, especially since when we originally scheduled the interview, I wrote it down wrong on my calendar
3:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeti came back, so I'm so thrilled he's here.
3:20
[SPEAKER_00]: Check out his new book.
3:22
[SPEAKER_00]: It's called the Love Language that Matters Most.
3:25
[SPEAKER_00]: And here we go with Dr. Gary Chapman.
3:32
[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Chapman, welcome to mesmerized.
3:36
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, thank you, Sethi.
3:37
[SPEAKER_01]: It's great to be with you.
3:39
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I was saying this before, and I'm gonna wrap myself out, everybody.
3:43
[SPEAKER_00]: But I was saying this before we started recording.
3:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Chapman is obviously a legend in Christian circles, but in all circles.
3:52
[SPEAKER_00]: And of all the times for me to have a total snafu on my side and have the wrong time down for our interview, it was with Dr. Chapman, he was so kind and even called him was like, are you gonna be on the show?
4:05
[SPEAKER_00]: So we were able to reschedule and I can't tell you how much I appreciate it and how gracious you were with my mess up.
4:12
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, thank you.
4:13
[SPEAKER_01]: As I said, we are all human.
4:15
[SPEAKER_01]: None of us are perfect.
4:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, and I responded to his sweet text and said, I feel more human than usual today.
4:22
[SPEAKER_00]: So.
4:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I am so thrilled you're here, and I have a question.
4:29
[SPEAKER_00]: We all know the love languages.
4:30
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't, and I need to figure out what rock you people have been under, because if you don't know the love languages, last time I read, I think it was, I read the stats.
4:38
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like 20 million readers.
4:40
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's been translated in probably every language, right?
4:44
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, that's over 60 languages.
4:46
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
4:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow, did you know like when you started all of this like when you wrote it as a person who's written a couple books I'm I'm pretty sure I know the answer to this but did you know you are onto something like did you have any anticipation it was going to take off like it did.
5:01
[SPEAKER_01]: It's your answer is no, I knew it would help people because I had discovered it in my counseling.
5:08
[SPEAKER_01]: I've been using it at least for five years before I looked above.
5:12
[SPEAKER_01]: So I knew it would help people, but no, I had no idea what would happen.
5:17
[SPEAKER_01]: And people have asked me how to explain that, you know, I said, well, for my perspective, the short answer is God, and the long answer is God.
5:29
[SPEAKER_01]: I couldn't make that happen if I wanted to, you know, but I do think what's happened on the human level is couples have read it, the lights have come on, and they began to apply, speaking to each other's love language, and then they wanted their brother and his wife to read their mother and their daddy, and it just got a word of mouth, really all over the world.
5:49
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
5:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
5:50
[SPEAKER_00]: And not even exclusively in Christian circles.
5:53
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I feel like I could make a reference to a love language in non-Christian context and people know what I'm talking about.
6:00
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
6:00
[SPEAKER_01]: And I really did that on purpose.
6:03
[SPEAKER_01]: I decided I'd like to reach non Christians.
6:06
[SPEAKER_01]: And so as you know, I didn't put scriptures in there.
6:09
[SPEAKER_01]: I might once in a while, I said something like an ancient Hebrew prophet once said that I've had people read the book and say to me, I don't even know you were a Christian till almost at the end of the book.
6:20
[SPEAKER_01]: And I said, well, that's
6:24
[SPEAKER_01]: I was running to Christians and non-Christians, but at the end, I did say, what I'm giving you is information, I can't give you motivation, but I can tell you we're all got my motivation.
6:35
[SPEAKER_01]: And I thought briefly about my relationship with God.
6:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, it's incredible.
6:40
[SPEAKER_00]: It's, uh, I remember reading this, and I don't remember the exact time.
6:44
[SPEAKER_00]: I've been married 25 years.
6:45
[SPEAKER_00]: How long go to that book come out?
6:46
[SPEAKER_01]: 1992.
6:48
[SPEAKER_00]: 92.
6:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
6:50
[SPEAKER_00]: So I got married in 01.
6:52
[SPEAKER_00]: And I remember I had not read it.
6:55
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think before I got married.
6:57
[SPEAKER_00]: And I remember my husband when we were dating we're both in law school.
7:00
[SPEAKER_00]: That's where we met.
7:01
[SPEAKER_00]: And he would always make me these nice dinners.
7:03
[SPEAKER_00]: Like that was really like he wanted to make nice dinners for me.
7:07
[SPEAKER_00]: And I always was like, oh, that's nice.
7:08
[SPEAKER_00]: But it just, you know, didn't really hit.
7:10
[SPEAKER_00]: It wasn't that an appreciate nice dinner, but I think he thought it was this big thing.
7:17
[SPEAKER_00]: I just wish that, like, you know, he could, you know, vacuum once in a while or dust or these other things and once we got married, you know, I kept feeling that and obviously, we were married, we were in law school, but we were later and then when we got married and lived together, it was even more so that.
7:33
[SPEAKER_00]: And reading love languages like answered that for me.
7:36
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, oh, okay, he is, my husband loves gifts.
7:41
[SPEAKER_00]: I do not, he and I love acts of service.
7:44
[SPEAKER_00]: He likes quality time.
7:46
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I enjoy the things she does but we just come at it from such different perspectives and I felt like as if I'm not I'm sure many everybody tells you this but I was like, oh, I feel seen and he feels seen because now I realize love doesn't have to fit the way we love people doesn't always hit the same way it doesn't always fit in a square box and what a gift that is.
8:06
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's amazing when people realize that what makes the other person feel alive is different from what makes us feel alive.
8:14
[SPEAKER_01]: And we tend to express love in our own language, you know, effects of services in our language, and we tend to do acts of service.
8:21
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, we may have been taught to do acts of service.
8:23
[SPEAKER_01]: That's another thing if our prayer is taught us to do acts of service.
8:26
[SPEAKER_01]: So we do it.
8:28
[SPEAKER_01]: But the important thing is to find out what makes the other person genuinely feel love.
8:31
[SPEAKER_01]: Because that's what we want to do.
8:33
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, we all agree basically that one of our deepest emotional needs on the human level is the need to feel loved by the significant people in our lives.
8:44
[SPEAKER_01]: And I say, I'm young children, I say, I believe every child has what I call a love tank.
8:51
[SPEAKER_01]: And if the love tank is full, that child feels love by the parents.
8:56
[SPEAKER_01]: They tend to grow up emotionally healthy.
8:58
[SPEAKER_01]: But if the love tank is empty and they don't feel love, they grow up with many internal emotional struggles.
9:05
[SPEAKER_01]: And the teenagers, they often go looking for love in their
9:09
[SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, and I think the same principle is true for adults.
9:13
[SPEAKER_01]: If you're married, the person you would most like to love you is your spouse, and if you feel them, life is beautiful, but if you feel like they don't love me, they wish they weren't married to me, life begins to look pretty dark.
9:25
[SPEAKER_01]: So, yeah, I think that's why the book is so needed in our culture to help people experience one thing wanted when they got married, a loving supportive caring relationship.
9:37
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and I love that you, through your practice, you saw this over and over.
9:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's probably clicked, you're like, man, these people love each other, but they're loving from different views of perspectives and not appreciating and how you connected those dots was brilliant as only the Lord could do in your life.
9:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And now you have this new and out that we could talk about, the love language that matters most.
9:58
[SPEAKER_00]: how to personalize love so they really feel it.
10:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Now listen, Dr. Chapman, I was like great.
10:04
[SPEAKER_00]: He wrote the lovely was a matter's most.
10:06
[SPEAKER_00]: He's going to say it's acts of service and I will give it to my husband and tell him.
10:10
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, I was right all these years.
10:12
[SPEAKER_00]: This one matters most, but it turns out that's not what you were doing.
10:16
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we knew that when people picked up the book, they were going to answer that question.
10:20
[SPEAKER_01]: Which one is it?
10:21
[SPEAKER_01]: Which one is it?
10:21
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.
10:23
[SPEAKER_01]: So we made it clear on the back of the book and the first chapter in the book.
10:28
[SPEAKER_01]: The most important love language is the love language of your partner.
10:33
[SPEAKER_01]: And the reason we did that is because, so many people, if they read the book, they perhaps take the quiz, they learn each other's language, and then a month now they're out there saying, now you know what my love language is.
10:45
[SPEAKER_01]: Now if you love me, you'll be speaking my love language.
10:48
[SPEAKER_01]: because all of us are self-centered and so we're just trying to focus on the other person, you know, and I understand that you know why we're concerned about ourselves because we have that need, but we just try to help them focus on how to effectively communicate love to the other person.
11:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, just how to curiosity.
11:06
[SPEAKER_00]: What's your love language or language?
11:08
[SPEAKER_01]: Words of affirmation.
11:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Words of affirmation.
11:10
[SPEAKER_01]: Words of affirmation.
11:10
[SPEAKER_01]: In my wife tells me I'm the greatest husband of the world.
11:14
[SPEAKER_00]: And you're like, yes, that's all I think.
11:16
[SPEAKER_01]: I know that's a high-perbly, but it feels good to me.
11:19
[SPEAKER_00]: And what is what is what is what are what are her, what's her leveling, what's her partner?
11:23
[SPEAKER_01]: Axe of service, Axe of service.
11:24
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's why I watched Disney's in Mac and Floors of clean toilets.
11:29
[SPEAKER_01]: I did say to her, though a few years ago, I said, honey, do you think it would be just as meaningful to you if I had someone to come in every other week and back in the Floors and do the laundry, and all that kind of stuff, you know?
11:41
[SPEAKER_01]: And she said, well, we can try it.
11:44
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, I did.
11:46
[SPEAKER_01]: And now that lady is one of her best friends.
11:51
[SPEAKER_01]: But that's still much of the issues.
11:53
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
11:54
[UNKNOWN]: Yes.
11:55
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I don't see ask me to do that.
11:57
[SPEAKER_00]: That's right.
11:58
[SPEAKER_00]: That's right.
11:58
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I read this quote in the new book.
12:01
[SPEAKER_00]: And by the way, again, everybody all link in podcasts notes.
12:03
[SPEAKER_00]: It's called the Love Language It Matters Most.
12:06
[SPEAKER_00]: And he read it with less and lessly parent.
12:07
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you know, if you don't know them,
12:10
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, they're psychologists and New York Times bestselling authors, and they've written all kinds of books and been on today's show, Oprah, all the places, and they're very prominent in speaking into marriage among other things.
12:23
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's so good.
12:23
[SPEAKER_00]: But one of the quotes I took note of, it says, this is really the key to marriage.
12:28
[SPEAKER_00]: We have to have an attitude of love that I'm here to serve.
12:31
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm here to help you become the person you believe God wants you to be.
12:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And I thought, well, that really answers a lot of the questions we struggle with a marriage.
12:42
[SPEAKER_00]: I think if we come at it from that place, like I'm here to serve, right, serving and to help you become the person that you believe God wants you to be.
12:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Talk just a little bit about that.
12:52
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think many times in our culture, we tend to think that love begins with a feeling.
12:58
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, if you've lost feelings, which we all do when we come down on that end love high, you just feel like, well, no, just don't feel like I used to feel.
13:07
[SPEAKER_01]: But really, I believe love begins with an attitude.
13:11
[SPEAKER_01]: And the attitude is, you know, I'm here to enrich your life.
13:15
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm choosing to do everything I can to help you.
13:18
[SPEAKER_01]: And here's the good news.
13:20
[SPEAKER_01]: We choose our attitudes.
13:23
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't choose our emotions.
13:24
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't choose one day.
13:25
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to go out today and get involved in love with somebody.
13:29
[SPEAKER_01]: It just happens when certain dynamics are there.
13:32
[SPEAKER_01]: And every day we have emotions, negative or positive.
13:35
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't choose them.
13:36
[SPEAKER_01]: They're just our emotional responses to our circumstances.
13:40
[SPEAKER_01]: But we choose our attitude every single day.
13:43
[SPEAKER_01]: And if we live with an attitude, if I want to enrich, not only my spouse, I want to enrich the life of everybody I encounter today.
13:50
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I want to do something that's going to be helpful to people.
13:53
[SPEAKER_01]: Then you're going to express it.
13:55
[SPEAKER_01]: If you have the attitude, if you're being expressed in behavior,
13:58
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well, that's a good word.
14:00
[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, I remember just all these years of being married, different times where, you know, it just, well, we've all felt it.
14:07
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not clicking or whatever, and I went on this girls trip one time, and maybe I'd only been married less than a decade.
14:14
[SPEAKER_00]: and several of the girls, there's probably eight of us there.
14:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Several of them said, you know, do you ever think you marry the wrong person?
14:21
[SPEAKER_00]: I just wonder in all this, and I remember thinking that was a foreign thought to me, but it was obviously kind of common because these girls were saying it.
14:28
[SPEAKER_00]: And I remember just maybe the Lord speaking to me, but this isn't a right or wrong person.
14:32
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a right or wrong attitude.
14:34
[SPEAKER_00]: right and in the way we're approaching marriage and I remember talking to these girls and being like listen like we've we've made this covenant and with a lord and we're hard and people are hard and you know absolutely the things and marriage that that are grounds for doors so I'm like we're here so
14:49
[SPEAKER_00]: we're going to find what we're looking for.
14:51
[SPEAKER_00]: And I just remember those words and that had to be from the Holy Spirit and not me.
14:55
[SPEAKER_00]: And I've said that a lot over the years, like in marriage you find what you're looking for.
14:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And if I'm looking for the ways to serve my husband well to love him well and all those then it goes a lot better for me than when I'm looking for all the things that are negative, that are driving me crazy.
15:08
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh yeah.
15:10
[SPEAKER_00]: And I just think that this is such a good, this is a good word, that this is a calling in our lives and how we treat our spouses and what we're looking for in them and how to help them be who God created them to be.
15:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And so, yeah, it's a good one.
15:25
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what marriage is designed to be.
15:28
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, the very beginning of this is God says not good for men to be alone.
15:33
[SPEAKER_01]: going to make a partner, a partner, you know, and we're all the same team.
15:38
[SPEAKER_01]: We're a partner.
15:38
[SPEAKER_01]: We're there to help each other become, you know, what God wants us to become.
15:44
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
15:44
[SPEAKER_00]: So let's talk about this.
15:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you think it's easier, harder, or could go either direction?
15:49
[SPEAKER_00]: If you have the same love language versus having a different one, then your spouse, or doesn't matter?
15:55
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, you would think that it would be easier and theoretically, I've never done any research on it really, but you would think it would be easier.
16:03
[SPEAKER_01]: You have the same loved language, but here's what I have discovered.
16:07
[SPEAKER_01]: Even if you have the same loved language, you will likely have a different dialect on that language.
16:13
[SPEAKER_01]: For example, I had a lady just say to me, you're just gonna not long ago, she said, don't you have my husband, I have the same loved language.
16:19
[SPEAKER_01]: I said, wonderful, what is it?
16:21
[SPEAKER_01]: She said, acts of service.
16:23
[SPEAKER_01]: But the things I want him to do for me around the house that make me feel like are different things I want him to do for me to make me feel like.
16:31
[SPEAKER_01]: It's the same language, it's just different dialects of that language.
16:35
[SPEAKER_01]: But again, we don't choose our primary love language.
16:39
[SPEAKER_01]: And people have asked me, is it innate, you know, is it genetic or do we learn it?
16:46
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't really know, it'd be very honest with you, I don't know, I just know it's there very early in a child's life, for example.
16:52
[SPEAKER_01]: You can discover a child's love language by the time they're four years old by observing their behavior.
16:58
[SPEAKER_01]: How do they relate to you?
17:00
[SPEAKER_01]: My son's love language is physical touch.
17:02
[SPEAKER_01]: When he was that age, when I came home from work, he would run to the door and grab my legs and clam on me.
17:08
[SPEAKER_01]: He's touching me because he wants to be touched.
17:11
[SPEAKER_01]: Our daughter never did that.
17:13
[SPEAKER_01]: She would say, Daddy coming to my room.
17:15
[SPEAKER_01]: I want to show you something.
17:17
[SPEAKER_01]: She wanted quality time.
17:18
[SPEAKER_01]: She wanted my own divided attention.
17:20
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's there early in a person's life.
17:23
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know what all the dynamics are.
17:25
[SPEAKER_01]: I just know it's there.
17:26
[SPEAKER_00]: That's so interesting.
17:28
[SPEAKER_00]: When we're talking about this dialect, what's the best way to uncover that?
17:34
[SPEAKER_00]: And I assume this is why we've got the next book is because it's not enough to just say, okay, my husband likes gifts.
17:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, well, I'm just gonna buy him and I skipped a Christmas and then I'm frustrated and throughout my hands because it didn't work, right?
17:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Like it's digging that next level down is the intent behind this book.
17:51
[SPEAKER_00]: And so talk to us about that.
17:52
[SPEAKER_00]: How do we work towards knowing that dialect?
17:55
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, well, that's why I wrote this book after 30 plus years, two people have asked me two questions through the years about the original book.
18:03
[SPEAKER_01]: There's a document in that book you mentioned that the love language has had different dialects, different ways of speaking them, you know, just like the spoken language has dialects.
18:14
[SPEAKER_01]: But you didn't spell out what the dialects are.
18:17
[SPEAKER_01]: And you also said that personality interfaces with what went and where to speak a person's love language, but you didn't have to develop that.
18:27
[SPEAKER_01]: So that's what motivated me to write this book.
18:29
[SPEAKER_01]: And I teamed up with the last and last of the parrot because they're just great people related to marriage and family.
18:36
[SPEAKER_01]: And he has real skills.
18:38
[SPEAKER_01]: In fact, before we wrote the book, he actually put together what we're calling a premium assessment.
18:44
[SPEAKER_01]: which helps you identify not only your love language is and the percentages on each one of them, but also it spells out the particular dialect.
18:55
[SPEAKER_01]: Our dialect sometimes is one or two that really speak most deeply to you.
19:00
[SPEAKER_01]: And so the book of course parallels there and gives all that same information, but that's what motivated us to do it.
19:09
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's helping a lot of people.
19:11
[SPEAKER_01]: We've had a great response.
19:12
[SPEAKER_01]: It came out in January, but we haven't a great response to the book.
19:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
19:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, give us a practical example if you can, for maybe in your own life, to know that we know what your love language is.
19:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, tell us your dialect within that.
19:28
[SPEAKER_00]: I assume you know yours, because you've written the book.
19:30
[SPEAKER_00]: So, talk to us a little bit about what that looks like.
19:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
19:33
[SPEAKER_00]: What you would want, well, your wife knows it, because you got a great wife.
19:40
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, okay, there's encouragement in which you're encouraging them something that you know that they have an interest to hit.
19:47
[SPEAKER_01]: It's words of encouragement.
19:48
[SPEAKER_01]: And then there's words of their compliments.
19:52
[SPEAKER_01]: Usually focused on the way you look or some characteristic about you.
19:56
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, one of the things I read a lot about you is your smile, your smile just turns me on, you know.
20:04
[SPEAKER_01]: And then there's appreciation.
20:06
[SPEAKER_01]: verbal appreciation for something you've observed that I've done for you.
20:11
[SPEAKER_01]: And you know, there's a little shade of difference in all of those.
20:14
[SPEAKER_01]: And if you are only given encouraging words like you say to your spouse, I mean, you know, you'd be really good at writing an article, or you'd be good at having a podcast, and I'd add this one encouraging you, because I think you have the gifts for doing that.
20:31
[SPEAKER_01]: But she may not desire to do that, and she feels your words are pressure.
20:37
[SPEAKER_01]: You're putting pressure on her to do something so you've even done what to do.
20:40
[SPEAKER_01]: But in your mind, you're expressing love.
20:42
[SPEAKER_01]: You're encouraging her, you know?
20:44
[SPEAKER_01]: So the understanding is the difference between those.
20:48
[SPEAKER_01]: It's gonna be very, very helpful.
20:51
[SPEAKER_01]: Out of the three, my primary dialect is appreciation.
20:56
[SPEAKER_01]: When my wife tells me how much she appreciates what I do, you know, they're watching the dishes and all the other stuff I still do, whatever she asked me to do.
21:03
[SPEAKER_01]: Like today she said, honey, can you take that flower pot and then put it set it over there and do the sink form because she's kind of fragile and she said, I just don't understand all this stuff.
21:14
[SPEAKER_01]: And I said, sure babe, you know, and afterwards she said, thank you, honey, I just said, I'm really appreciate that.
21:21
[SPEAKER_01]: But I mean, that's my dialect.
21:24
[SPEAKER_00]: and hers yeah all in one place yeah all in hers you you talk a lot about empathy and let's let's have a moment on empathy because I think if you've you've been around you know Christian circles match or really self-help worlds we know there's a difference between sympathy and empathy but empathy and the context of loving people well why is it important that we understand that well I think many of our conflicts come because we don't have empathy
21:53
[SPEAKER_01]: That is, we're not listening with a view to trying to understand how the world looks from our spouse's eyes or the other person's eyes.
22:02
[SPEAKER_01]: Because empathy is the desire to see the world the way they see it, to see what's behind what they're saying and what they're feeling.
22:11
[SPEAKER_01]: And so we are asking questions to make sure we understand what they're saying, so that we get to the place where we can say, okay, I think I'm understanding what you're saying.
22:22
[SPEAKER_01]: because otherwise we get defensive and we say, well, that's not right.
22:26
[SPEAKER_01]: And we share our side and now we get into an argument because we didn't have empathy.
22:31
[SPEAKER_01]: We listen with a view that, you know, rebutting or giving an answer to it, rather than understanding where they're coming from.
22:39
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's why questions are so important.
22:42
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, you don't just let them say something and then you give a response.
22:45
[SPEAKER_01]: They say something, you say,
22:47
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, explain that to me.
22:49
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, what do I tell you exactly what you're thinking?
22:51
[SPEAKER_01]: And then you ask me another question, no question.
22:54
[SPEAKER_01]: And really, you can honestly say it a little bit.
22:57
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I see where you're coming from now.
22:58
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I can see how that makes sense.
23:00
[SPEAKER_01]: It doesn't mean you necessarily agree with it, but now you've empathized with them.
23:05
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I just think it's really important.
23:08
[SPEAKER_01]: And we're not my nature to do this.
23:12
[SPEAKER_01]: We're built to respond with the person saying, what we think the person means by what they say it.
23:18
[SPEAKER_01]: And often that's not what they mean at all.
23:21
[SPEAKER_01]: And if we ask questions, we're getting clarified.
23:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well, we can some of us, I won't mention names, but some of us, me, we can be bulldozers, right?
23:30
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, we just come in and maybe we have our own agenda, or we have our own position, or we, we're seeing it through our lens.
23:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And this idea of just having empathy and trying to ask questions, and by the way, not all questions are created equally, right?
23:44
[SPEAKER_00]: But doing it from a heart of again, going back to what we said earlier, this heart of how do I love you?
23:48
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, how do I help you be who God created you to be?
23:51
[SPEAKER_00]: It just changes the lens that we look at it.
23:54
[SPEAKER_00]: So I love that.
23:56
[SPEAKER_00]: I was wondering if we could because how often do you get to talk to Dr. Chapman?
24:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, for me twice apparently that I only showed up once.
24:03
[SPEAKER_00]: But for everybody else, I was thinking, could I just list out the each one and could we just go through it quickly and maybe just off the top of your head if you're loving someone that has this love language, what's your best advice for them?
24:19
[SPEAKER_00]: Like if I say quality time, could you just pull out maybe just a quick word of advice on loving someone who that is there?
24:26
[SPEAKER_00]: That is the love language?
24:27
[SPEAKER_01]: Again, understanding the dialects is so important.
24:33
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's the husband, for example, who knows that his wife's language is quality time.
24:37
[SPEAKER_01]: So Friday night, he says to her, honey, how about in the morning we get up early and let's go up to pilot mountain and let's hike together to spend the whole morning together.
24:48
[SPEAKER_01]: He thinks he's hitting a whole run because he knows her language is quality time.
24:52
[SPEAKER_01]: She says, honey, I've already got tomorrow planned.
24:56
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, you can just put that off the next Saturday.
24:58
[SPEAKER_01]: See it.
24:59
[SPEAKER_01]: Now she feels pressured because her dialect of quality time is planned time.
25:07
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's put it on the counter for two weeks from now.
25:10
[SPEAKER_01]: Then she's going to enjoy that high.
25:12
[SPEAKER_01]: It's going to really be good for her.
25:14
[SPEAKER_01]: But when you don't understand the dialects, you just, you all have as a broad language, you know, spending time together.
25:22
[SPEAKER_01]: And so
25:26
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's, that's so good.
25:29
[SPEAKER_00]: What about receiving gifts?
25:30
[SPEAKER_00]: Thoughts on that and the dialects within the gifts?
25:33
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think again, this is so important.
25:37
[SPEAKER_01]: But you hear some of the languages and dialects of that.
25:40
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, it is fanciful gifts.
25:43
[SPEAKER_01]: And sometimes that's all people think about.
25:44
[SPEAKER_01]: They think, well, you think gifts?
25:46
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, come out and go buy something expensive and you're something very fanciful for you, you know.
25:50
[SPEAKER_01]: And but really, they make refer functional gifts.
25:55
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, a new vacuum cleaner or a new vacuum cleaner.
25:57
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
25:57
[SPEAKER_01]: It's up in this functional are sent to lentil gifts.
26:03
[SPEAKER_01]: I give you an example of that.
26:05
[SPEAKER_01]: The husband said to me, he said, my wife's language is gifts.
26:09
[SPEAKER_01]: I was taking a walk one morning and I saw a bird feather.
26:13
[SPEAKER_01]: And I picked it up and brushed it off.
26:15
[SPEAKER_01]: When I got home, I said, honey.
26:17
[SPEAKER_01]: I saw this bird fed when I was walking, and he reminded me of you because you are the wind beneath my wings.
26:26
[SPEAKER_01]: Go on, that is so sweet!
26:31
[SPEAKER_01]: I can guarantee you if it was 15 years ago, she still has that feather, it's in a book somewhere.
26:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, and me, well, thank you.
26:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I hate birds.
26:41
[SPEAKER_00]: I hate birds.
26:41
[SPEAKER_00]: You bring me a bird feather.
26:42
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to be like, why do you hate me?
26:46
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's right.
26:47
[SPEAKER_01]: So that wouldn't be meaningful to some people.
26:49
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
26:50
[SPEAKER_01]: It was hugely meaningful to her.
26:52
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that.
26:53
[SPEAKER_01]: So understand, and there's different types of gifts that we give.
26:56
[SPEAKER_01]: And what you're going to, if you want to be effective, it's not that you go out and spend a whole lot of money every time on the give.
27:02
[SPEAKER_01]: We've always said just the thought that counts and that's why I know when they're dialect or one or two of them maybe, you know, who wants to kind of stand out above the other.
27:11
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, this is going to help people be more effective in doing what they really want to do, communicate love.
27:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
27:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Right.
27:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, my husband used to joke how every, you know, they, he said every smart husband as you never give a Christmas gift as a plug on it.
27:25
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, but except with my wife, um, because I love a good vacuum.
27:29
[SPEAKER_00]: I love a good practical.
27:30
[SPEAKER_00]: So again, that's not my love language per se, but it's up, you know, if I were to receive a gift like, I don't mind something practical that leads to an act of service.
27:39
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, knowing that dialect.
27:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, let's talk about, we've hit quality time receiving gifts access service.
27:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Thoughts on that and knowing that dialect.
27:49
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, one of them, one dialect is saving time.
27:52
[SPEAKER_01]: A person who is just, you know, going, going, going, going, going.
27:55
[SPEAKER_01]: And you do something that's helping them save time, man, that's the dialect that that's meaningful to them.
28:02
[SPEAKER_01]: Another one is alleviating stress.
28:05
[SPEAKER_01]: They're under stress, you know, because of something that's going on and you do something that alleviate some of that stress.
28:13
[SPEAKER_01]: And one is can just convey and care.
28:15
[SPEAKER_01]: you know, and it's you care about them.
28:18
[SPEAKER_01]: What can I do today that would make your life easier?
28:23
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, when you ask that for this kind of person, oh man, they're going to have to tell you something.
28:27
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, honey, if you could just take the car and get it washed or you could wash the car, go fill it up with gas or, you know, they'll have something.
28:36
[SPEAKER_01]: But you don't know until you ask, you know, and I'm sometimes said to my wife, would this be helpful to you?
28:45
[SPEAKER_01]: And so we don't just assume that we know what would be meaningful to them.
28:49
[SPEAKER_01]: We look at the dialects and then we ask questions and then we get answers if you ask questions.
28:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah.
28:56
[SPEAKER_00]: Last one is physical touch.
28:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's that one seems self-explanatory or sometimes it maybe it feels like to men that is self-explanatory word to women not as much.
29:08
[SPEAKER_00]: Thoughts on that one.
29:10
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I've had a lot of me and when they hear the love language
29:14
[SPEAKER_01]: I know about that of language, physical dance, physical dance, and they're talking about the sexual part of marriage, and I say to them, well maybe that is your language, but let me ask you a couple of questions.
29:25
[SPEAKER_01]: Do non-sexual touches make you feel loud?
29:28
[SPEAKER_01]: And first of all, they look at me like a deer in the headlights.
29:31
[SPEAKER_01]: Are they non-sexual touches?
29:34
[SPEAKER_00]: What is this you speak of?
29:36
[SPEAKER_01]: And I say, well, okay, you get out of the car.
29:38
[SPEAKER_01]: The two of you are walking into a shopping mall.
29:41
[SPEAKER_01]: And as you walk through the door, the wife reaches over and holds your hand.
29:45
[SPEAKER_01]: Does that make you feel like?
29:47
[SPEAKER_01]: And he says, no, that kind of irritates me.
29:51
[SPEAKER_01]: I said, okay, she's pulling you up of coffee.
29:53
[SPEAKER_01]: And she puts her hand on your shoulder as she pours the coffee.
29:57
[SPEAKER_01]: Does that make you feel love?
29:59
[SPEAKER_01]: And if he says, hmm, not really.
30:01
[SPEAKER_01]: I said physical touches, not your love language.
30:03
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, you like sex.
30:04
[SPEAKER_01]: I understand that.
30:05
[SPEAKER_01]: That's a different subject.
30:07
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
30:08
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and this is the one that has the most dialects.
30:10
[SPEAKER_01]: I just gotta, it's certainly one is comforting touch.
30:17
[SPEAKER_01]: one is affectionate touch and one is playful touch, you know, just giggling or throwing a little, not a heavy ball, but you know, something like that.
30:30
[SPEAKER_01]: And then there is romantic touch.
30:33
[SPEAKER_01]: It would be hugging and kissing and so forth.
30:36
[SPEAKER_01]: And there's protective touch in which you're in a situation where you just kind of step in front of the other person because you don't want whatever's happening there to harm
30:45
[SPEAKER_01]: And there's also a restorative touch when you go through struggle and sometimes you know you talk your way through it and then just a simple hug but it's restoring you know we're one and we're okay you know each other.
31:02
[SPEAKER_01]: So again, as I said, in all of these, there are the different dialects of the language, and that's where I think this book is going to help people, because most people haven't thought about it.
31:12
[SPEAKER_01]: They just hear the language, they think, oh, I don't know what to do about that.
31:16
[SPEAKER_01]: And so they do what they think would be meaningful, and they're missing the mark.
31:21
[SPEAKER_01]: And they wonder why, why don't you feel love?
31:23
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, this is your language.
31:25
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't understand why you don't feel love.
31:27
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, the reason is you're speaking it, but not in their dialect.
31:31
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, I think I'm excited about the book and I think it's been helping a lot of people.
31:36
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, me too, and I'm thrilled because I got an early copy.
31:39
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's sitting here.
31:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I say early.
31:42
[SPEAKER_00]: I guess it's all that early because the book's been out since January, but I do have a copy and I can attest the fact that it's really good.
31:48
[SPEAKER_00]: and very practical, okay, as we're wrapping up, I was wondering this as well.
31:53
[SPEAKER_00]: Do our lovely English just change as we get older?
31:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Have you noticed that they change or is it kind of one of those things that you could see it when I was four years old and you can see it when I'm 84 years old?
32:03
[SPEAKER_01]: I think there is a sense in which it tends to stay with us throughout life, however, having said that.
32:10
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, I think there are seasons of life and circumstances where another low language may jump to the top.
32:18
[SPEAKER_01]: For example, a wife who has an mother who has two preschool children, acts of service might not be her primary language, but during those years, it's likely going to jump to the top
32:32
[SPEAKER_01]: And then a circumstance.
32:34
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's say that your spouse is talking on the phone and they hang up and start crying.
32:40
[SPEAKER_01]: And you say, hey, what's wrong?
32:43
[SPEAKER_01]: And they say, I just heard him a brother died.
32:46
[SPEAKER_01]: Physical touch may not be their language, but in that circumstance, embracing them while they cry may be the most important than you could do.
32:55
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I think there are, there are circumstances.
32:58
[SPEAKER_01]: That's why one of the things I encourage couples to do, a real practical thing, you know, two or three weeks just said you're a spouse.
33:05
[SPEAKER_01]: How many on the scale of zero to 10?
33:08
[SPEAKER_01]: How full does your love take?
33:11
[SPEAKER_01]: And they say, if they say anything less than 10, you say, well, this week, what would be the most important thing I could do to communicate with you?
33:19
[SPEAKER_01]: and what they say may not be their primary love language is just that circumstances in their life hear something that would really be meaningful to me this week and so it's a different fun way to keep in touch with each other and the very fact that you asked the question in the case you're thinking about you're concerned about you want them to feel loved yeah
33:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
33:41
[SPEAKER_00]: And it is at one of those things with a feeling someone's love tank is easier.
33:46
[SPEAKER_00]: It's easier to keep feeling it once it's depleted.
33:49
[SPEAKER_00]: That gets tricky, right?
33:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Like you just want to always keep it going forward.
33:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course, we're all going to have our moments.
33:54
[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to have seasons in life.
33:56
[SPEAKER_00]: But once it gets depleted, that's a trick your place to be.
33:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Then just that continual maintenance of feeling that love tank.
34:02
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, off in that cost for apology, because if we just haven't received love in the right language, that and now we're into, you know, really feeling badly about the whole marriage, there's a place for apology, so honey, I just, you know, I've been thinking too much about everything else, and I neglected our relationship.
34:24
[SPEAKER_01]: And many times when you try to offer some seropology, I have another book called The Five Apology Languages, because we have different ideas on how to apologize.
34:34
[SPEAKER_01]: But anyway, an apology often is the first step in beginning to reconcile a situation.
34:42
[SPEAKER_01]: And then looking back on it and so I just said, I'm not spent when you're language for a long time.
34:46
[SPEAKER_01]: I can see what you're talking about.
34:49
[SPEAKER_01]: and I want to change that because that's not right, that's not good.
34:53
[SPEAKER_01]: And so yes, and there's sometimes counseling is very helpful.
34:56
[SPEAKER_01]: If you can't work your way through something like that counseling can be very helpful.
35:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
35:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I haven't read the apology book.
35:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Where have I been?
35:05
[SPEAKER_00]: So I got to get that one, but I also want to make everyone aware of there's love languages for children, right?
35:10
[SPEAKER_00]: And yeah, and I just think that that's so important to your point earlier on, just as we all have individual love languages are kids do and.
35:20
[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, I have three kiddos, one's adopted to our bio kids, and I will tell you something, my first and second are pretty close in how they, their languages and how they are, they love to be loved.
35:32
[SPEAKER_00]: And my third is totally different.
35:35
[SPEAKER_00]: Our adopted one, and I don't know that that's because he's adopted.
35:37
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know that it's different genes.
35:39
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't, I don't know why I just know that what,
35:42
[SPEAKER_00]: what looked like love the first two doesn't always with number three and so how important it is for as we are trying to figure that out day in and day out with him just so that he like to your point you know when they get in high school and it gets tricky you just want to make sure you've done everything you can to love them well in a way that they feel loved and so that's a great one too y'all be sure check out that book
36:03
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, also there's one, five blahblimes of teenagers.
36:06
[SPEAKER_01]: People are best with views.
36:07
[SPEAKER_01]: There's their love language, saying you can get to be teenagers.
36:10
[SPEAKER_01]: And I said, I don't think their love language changes, but you have to use new dialects because what you used to do, they think, is childish.
36:19
[SPEAKER_01]: so you have to express it in different ways.
36:20
[SPEAKER_01]: And also in different places.
36:22
[SPEAKER_01]: For example, the physical touch is their language.
36:25
[SPEAKER_01]: At eight or eight or ten years old, they play a sport.
36:28
[SPEAKER_01]: You got there in front of a hundred thousand people, a hug on a man.
36:31
[SPEAKER_01]: That's wonderful.
36:32
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't try that and they get to be teenagers.
36:33
[SPEAKER_01]: They don't push you away.
36:35
[SPEAKER_01]: They still eat physical touch, but not in front of everybody.
36:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's funny.
36:40
[SPEAKER_00]: There was this mom that my son played baseball with, and I don't remember her number, but she's like, I read a study, and even a teenage years, you need however many.
36:48
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, 30 moments of physical touch from parent a day, and so she would always like, I'm gonna go on in front of us and pat on, and he's like, I don't know where that study came from, but it's horrible, and so we would laugh about that, and so she was pretty funny about it.
37:01
[SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, I hear you.
37:03
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, how many books are you in now, Dr. Chapman?
37:06
[SPEAKER_00]: How many have you done?
37:07
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, they tell me I've written 60 books.
37:09
[SPEAKER_01]: I can't believe it.
37:10
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what they tell me.
37:12
[SPEAKER_00]: I say this every time.
37:13
[SPEAKER_00]: I wrote I've written two and it nearly put me in the grave.
37:16
[SPEAKER_00]: So thank you for your diligence and hard work because that is a lot of books.
37:21
[SPEAKER_01]: So thank you.
37:21
[SPEAKER_01]: They can go to five love languages.com and go to resources and I can see most of those if they're interested.
37:28
[SPEAKER_00]: That's perfect, okay, everybody.
37:30
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, the one that we've been talking about is the love language that matters most.
37:33
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, it's by Dr. Chapman in less and lessly parrot.
37:36
[SPEAKER_00]: And it is available.
37:37
[SPEAKER_00]: And then yes, go to his website, tell us one more time your website for all the resources.
37:42
[SPEAKER_01]: There's the number five, five love languages.com.
37:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Perfect, all right.
37:48
[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Chapman, you are such a jewel.
37:50
[SPEAKER_00]: And thank you for putting up with my nonsense and coming back and we're just so grateful for you.
37:55
[SPEAKER_01]: Bye, I'll thank you, Cynthia.
37:57
[SPEAKER_01]: It's good to be with you.
37:58
[SPEAKER_01]: You keep it the good work.
37:59
[SPEAKER_01]: I appreciate what you're doing, God bless you.
38:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you, too.
38:03
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, friends, I love Dr. Chapman.
38:05
[SPEAKER_00]: He's amazing, and his work is incredible.
38:07
[SPEAKER_00]: And I hope you get a chance to read this new book, the Love Language that matters most.
38:12
[SPEAKER_00]: And this helped you as you sort through the people around you, your spouse, maybe your kids, and trying to meet their needs and figure out exactly what makes them beloved.
38:21
[SPEAKER_00]: And so, a big thanks to Dr. Chapman.
38:23
[SPEAKER_00]: for being with us.
38:24
[SPEAKER_00]: And then again, if you have something coming up in the spring and it might be a good fit for me to come to speak to your group, go to sentiaianoff.com and you can fill out information there.
38:33
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, you guys, thanks for being a part of the Mesmerized family.
38:36
[SPEAKER_00]: You're the very best.