Do you know what really determines the way someone receives love? Explore with me how our love languages are formed, using my own as an example (Quality Time).
In case you are not familiar with that term "Love Language," it originated from one of the most popular books on love and relationships. In The Five Love Languages, author Gary Chapman created 5 categories in which people feel the most loved: words of affirmation, physical touch, receiving gifts, quality time, and acts of service. The gist of the book is aimed at identifying your own love language and that of your partner so both can better provide or ask for their needs. It can be kind of fun to take the quiz and figure out each other’s personal brand of love.
But I have long thought that it felt too formulaic. You go through this checklist and experiment by focusing on that expression to see if it fits. But there is more to the secret code than simple trial and error.
The theory I developed on the psychology of Love Languages is based on attachment theory, a matter of nurture more than nature. And no matter how much someone can express love to you in your self-identified language, it may not be enough.
The secret of the Love Language is one of scarcity. It seems like the most prominent because it is the one most neglected. If it was more abundant, you wouldn’t notice it as much. Think about the way you were shown love all throughout your life and notice if the one you identified was the one you received the least.
The love deficit is caused by the lack of its expression from childhood even until now in adulthood.
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While I could probably claim all of the love languages myself, I identify most with quality time.
I grew up as the youngest and only girl in a household of 4 brothers who excelled in math and computers, so our household dinner conversation consisted of formulas. No one asked me about my day, and I didn’t know to ask about theirs. We just talked at each other and lived parallel lives, oblivious that we expressed ourselves like book reports rather than lived experiences.
My mom was great at planning family activities. We went to the beach a lot and visited all the tourist destinations in our own backyard. San Diego was a great place to grow up with lots of amazing places. But the interesting thing is that none of my memories of our weekend activities included the people I went with. My mom required us to bring our own company, and I was often frustrated that most of my friends were too busy with sports or chores to come along. My brothers had more success, so I often felt like the odd man out.
My mom also required that we always bring things to occupy ourselves if we didn’t bring a companion. In an age before digital devices, we learned to bring books and toys. She modeled this herself by always reading a book while I played on the playground by myself.
As a toddler, we learn side-by-side play. That's pretty normal. But as I grew up, that was all I really had available to me. The only thing I ever did with girls was studying, and even that was side-by-side, unless we were quizzing each other in preparation for tests. It was neighborhood boys that were fun to me. There was no talking required when I went roller blading or hiking or shooting baskets with my guy friends. I grew up playing in the neighborhood until the street lights came on, sometimes with boys, and more often by myself.
I longed for company with whom to share my side-by-side play. In fact, the reason that I got married was so that I could have a playmate. My husband was very playful; he liked to joke around, tell silly stories, and cuddle. This was foreign to me; I was very serious. My idea of fun was completely different, more outdoorsy and exploratory and less interactive. My understanding of quality time was being in the same vicinity while we both did the same thing.
It wasn’t until much later that I discovered I had never learned how to be with someone. Growing up, I lacked a model of interactive play and conversational connection. My love language became quality time because I misunderstood what quality even was. Even when I got time, it lacked quality because I had no baseline to know what it looked or felt like.
I always felt like something was missing, but I didn’t know what it was. It was emotional neglect: the lack of interpersonal attunement. In simpler terms, quality time meant undivided attention with depth and mutual understanding.
Quality time felt empty, and yet I continued to reach for it, but in the wrong way. It was a lot later that I learned that the deficit I felt was not necessarily the fault of others, but it was actually from the deficit within myself. Nobody could give me something I couldn’t give myself. And how could I give it to myself if I didn’t even know what it was? This was the root of my self-neglect and the reason I didn’t know how to receive it.
When I got married, I had the misconception that my role was completely self-sacrificing and to continue doing enjoyable solo activities was considered selfish. My guilt at giving myself time to do things that didn’t directly serve my family prevented me from pursuing things I loved.
I spent all of my time trying to find activities that everybody else liked to do. I took my kids places that were more like chores for me. Like my mom, I took them out to keep them entertained…inadvertently perpetuating the same lack of interaction and emotional attunement.
“I am not your playmate,” my mom had repeatedly told me growing up. “Go find someone your age to play with.” I felt rejected from home, assigned to “find something to do” to stay out of my mom’s hair. And because I couldn’t find anyone my age to do anything with most of the time, I learned how to be happy doing everything on my own.
I believed independence was a virtue, and I didn’t need anyone. Except I was lonely, but I tried to push it away and be content. That belief carried with me as a parent myself. I even said the same thing to my own kids: “I am not your playmate. Go find someone your age to play with.” At least they had each other to play with, unlike me, the rejected little sister.
I took my kids to the park with my nose in a book while they played. Hearing my child on the monkey bars say “mommy, look at me,” I cringe to remember mirroring my own mom, barely looking up to give an obligatory “great job!” and returning to my book. I was not guilty of being distracted by my cell phone, but I had my own methods of ignoring my kids. My heart breaks to remember missing the fallout that happened between my son and another student during martial arts class because I was busy doing homework in the lobby instead of watching him. I thought I was killing two birds with one stone, but really I was just killing my child’s spirit.
One of my favorite activities with my kids was story time, and I took pride at my noble bedtime ritual. For years, I looked down at other parents for not reading to their kids, thinking their neglect for shared literacy was poor modeling. I look back now and think it’s a wonder that my kids don’t resent books because I seemed to value them more than sharing my own stories or listening to theirs.
I let them play in the kids’ section at the library while I searched for picture books. I pushed cars around and tossed balls, all the while watching the clock, anxious for the chore to be over. I tuned them out while they droned on about video games, trying to act like I was listening when I wasn’t. I loved nap time and school days so I could do household duties.
I was irritated by my kids’ need for attention, and was grateful when my husband would, on occasion, play with them. Unfortunately, my kids were not the only ones neglected. Like the Bible story about Mary and Martha with Jesus, I was put out by my husband’s desire for me to slow down and sit and talk because I thought it was more important to get things done. But the only way I knew how to engage in quality time was in sports and physical activities, and his body was wracked with pain during our whole marriage. I didn’t know the value of conversation or attunement because emotions were a nuisance to me in my cognitive world. Thinking back to those days, I notice now all the ways my husband had tried to give me quality time. Ironically, I claimed that was my love language because I defined it as doing fun stuff rather than being present.
After my divorce, I paired up with someone exactly like me, who talked very little, emoted even less, and loved to explore and adventure side-by-side with me. He was ideal for me and felt like my family.
But something was still missing.
We had similarly grown up learning to experience life solo and didn't know how to connect on a deeper level. I had tons of fun finally living the kind of life I’d dreamed of, exploring the outdoors, doing physical activities, and seeing new places with someone by my side. But the ache in my chest grew because we lacked a depth of connection while doing those amazing activities.
As my spirit began to wither, I begged my partner to connect with me, but I didn’t even know how to ask for it because I didn't know how to describe emotional availability. Eventually, grief piled upon grief from multiple factors in life, and I was forced to stop running around doing everything on my checklist. Emotional pain I couldn’t ignore brought me to seek out help which led me down a rabbit hole to discover that I had been starving myself of my most valued love language, even while I thought I was feeding it.
As I was forced to be still, I finally learned how to give myself quality time. And when I thought I was well acquainted with it, I was forced into isolation and developed it even more. I saw that I had been unconsciously avoiding being present with myself. But when I discovered how to give myself quality time, it stopped being so scarce. I still see it as the most vital way to connect with another person, but I am not seeking it from a place of lack. Indeed, the relationships that became the deepest during my quality time development were with my children, with whom I felt I had unintentionally withheld it the worst.
Quality time isn’t in the doing but in the being with present energy.
Some of the ways in which it can be shared are:
· Smiling and laughing together*
· Eye gazing
· Watching the stars lying next to each other
· Watching a movie or reading a book and talking about it
· Sharing the minute details and interactions during your day, rather than the tasks completed*
· Validating or sitting quietly while the other is crying or venting
· Being genuinely interested and asking curious questions*
· A five minute phone call*
· A text message, especially a heartfelt one*
*Notice that some of these examples don’t even require physical presence to engage in quality time. Some don’t even require an large quantity of time. Some don’t even require activities.
I think we should rename Quality Time as "Emotional Presence."
What about the other five love languages? How was love expressed...or not expressed...in your childhood, and how does it show up now?
More importantly, when was the last time that you gave yourself the love that you say is your love language?
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