Listen on Apple Podcasts here.
In this episode, I discuss:
the history of the 5 love languages and what they are
how the love languages concept can deepen relationships to ourselves and others
examples on practising self-love based on our love language
Podcast Transcript
Welcome to the Mindful Soul Collective Podcast, a safe space for your healing.
I'm your host Shorina, a counsellor, well-being coach, multi-bus owner and mum.
I'm here to talk all things mind, body and soul.
You can expect conversations on mental health, mindfulness, mindset, healing and whole body wellness.
I've completely redefined my relationship to myself and to my life.
And now it's your turn.
Hello and welcome back to the podcast.
Last week's episode we really dove into self love and I gave you a big rundown on what
self love really is, the lightness and the darkness to self love and I gave some practical
tips on practicing self love.
And in today's episode I'm going to be going a little bit deeper into self love and talking
about how we can use our love language for self love.
I'm going to provide some examples for each love language at the end as well so make sure you stay tuned and listen until then. But I did want to start off by saying that a lot of the examples I'm going to give are the light self love.
And if you haven't listened to last week's episode I highly recommend you go back, have
a quick listen, I think it's only 10, 15 minutes long. But I really discuss in what that light and dark self love is, why they're both important and why we need a balance. Like I said in my last episode, I love the light self love. It's the stuff that I book a month in advance and I wake up excited about. It's such a big part of my life and I'm sure many people's life. And like I said last week, the dark self love is so important. We need that. You need that.
We all need it. But we also need that light self love. You know, we need that beautiful balance of both.
So I'm sure that we have all heard of the love languages, but I'm going to briefly touch
on them just in case somebody's listening and they're not quite sure on who created
them where they came from, what the heck they are.
So the five love languages were developed by Gary Chapman based on his experience in
marriage counselling. So he found that couples seem to express their love differently from one another. And that created, I guess, a disconnect from one person to the other person because they weren't clear on how the other person liked to receive love.
The five love languages website describes this concept of five love languages as quite
simple. Different people with different personalities give and receive love in different ways by learning to recognize these preferences in yourself and in your loved ones. You can learn to identify the root of your conflicts, connect more profoundly and truly begin to grow closer. So you would essentially do the quiz, swap your results with your partner and then start showing love in the way your partner would like it and vice versa, which is going to bring you closer.
The five love languages concept can really be applied to any relationship that you may
want to deepen in your life. It doesn't have to be just with your partner. It could be with your parents, with your friends, with your friends. Sorry, I already said that one with your kids. Or it could be with yourself, which is what I'm going to get into in this episode.
There are five love languages.
The first is acts of service. And this is actually my highest rated love language personally.
So for these people, actions really speak louder than words. They appreciate when somebody makes their life easier. And that could be something as simple as, you know, running an errand or taking over a task or some sort of responsibility that they don't want to do or don't have to do then.
There's receiving gifts. So for these people receiving a, you know, a heartfelt gift is what's going to make them feel most loved. Physical gifts are kind of like a visual representation of their love. And something as simple as a bunch of flowers is incredibly appreciated.
The next one is quality time. So this language is all about giving the other person your undivided attention. So for these people, they really, really like one on one time without being distracted. And I think like date night, no phones kind of vibe.
The next one is words of affirmation. This language uses words to affirm other people.
So for these people, they really love to be told that they're appreciated and that they're
loved.
And the last love language is physical touch. So to this person, nothing speaks louder or more deeply than appropriate physical touch. So for these people, things like holding hands, hugging, massages and of course sexual acts, they all help them to feel loved and appreciated.
And all that info is from the five love languages website as well. So I'll give credit there.
While this concept was created to support relationships, like Gary Chapman was a marriage counsellor. That's why he created all of this and found this work. I've personally found amazing value in using it to support my own self love journey to my clients as well. So society has really made self love into a bit of an overdone topic, but it is still so important.
And again, if you haven't listened to last week's episode, please jump back. That's episode 10 and listen to that before we go any further today. So you can do your quiz to find out your love. So you can do the quiz to find out your love language at five love languages.com forward slash quizzes. And I'll pop a direct link in the show notes for you as well.
And I'd recommend jumping on doing the quiz and coming back and listening just so you
know, kind of where to pay extra attention.
And to be honest, the first time I did this quiz, it really opened my eyes because I knew
that I really appreciated when I would do things like tick off things off of my to do
list or I would feel even more appreciated when Karl, my partner would see my to do
list and he would tick things off of it.
And I guess I just kind of felt like deep appreciation, which of course, I think we
would all appreciate if somebody helped us. But for me, that was really, really big. And when I got my love languages results and number one being acts of service, it kind of made sense.
So this, you know, love languages is really, this is a tool. This is a tool for self awareness, self growth, personal development. It's a beautiful tool to just understand yourself a little bit more and yeah, highly recommend doing the quiz.
When you do the quiz, you may also find that you actually have an appreciation for each
love language, so it comes back in percentages if I'm remembering that correctly. But one or two of the love languages are going to stand out the most. Like I said, for me, that was acts of service. It was like, I think it was like 60% or something. It was it was massive.
That one love language is really, really important to me. So yeah, you might find you have a couple, maybe take a second as well. You know, which one do you think your love language is going to be if you're not sure yet? And then do the quiz because you might be surprised.
So I'm going to share some ways we can show our self, self love with our love language.
And as always, take what sounds good, leave the rest behind. This is just a bit of a fun episode. Again, the light self love, the self love we all enjoy and feels really good. Let's start off with acts of service because that's my love language.
If your love language is acts of service, you may show yourself love by completing a to-do list, getting an appointment done like your hair or your nails.
It could be cleaning or decluttering.
It could be booking an appointment you've been putting off.
It could be setting and tracking goals, cooking a beautiful meal for yourself.
It could be taking care of an errand right away instead of kind of leaving that for another
day.
If your love language is receiving gifts, you might show yourself love by buying yourself
flowers or taking yourself out on a date.
It could be investing in your hobbies or business or educational self development or, you know, filling the blank.
It could be splurging you on something that you've been eyeing off and you've really
wanted for a while.
It could be booking a trip away.
If your love language is quality time, you might show yourself love by going on a walk
alone without headphones.
It might be reading a book or meditating.
It could be watching the sunset or having a bubble bath.
It could be journaling, taking yourself out on a date again.
It could even be going to therapy, like doing that deep work, diving deeper into yourself
and giving yourself that space and time.
If your love language is words of affirmation, you may show yourself love by doing a gratitude practice.
It could be reading a self development book or listening to a self development podcast
or a podcast like mine.
It could be practicing affirmations in the mirror.
It could be setting up affirmation reminders in your phone.
It could be complimenting yourself.
You know, you do something really great and you say, wow, Shurina, you did so amazing.
It could be writing yourself a love letter.
And then if your love language is physical touch, you might show yourself love by getting a massage, dry brushing your skin, moisturizing, taking time with your skincare routine, stretching, getting super cozy in bed with fluffy blankets and soft pillows.
It could be self-touching, non-sexually like rubbing your arms or your legs and then also
self-touching in sexual ways as well, like masturbating.
We can utilize a lot of tools in our mental health and wellbeing journey. And I really think that the love languages tool and concept is a really simple and easy way for us to connect to ourselves on a deeper level, which I know so many of us want to do. I want to do it. All my clients want to do it. I know that, you know, we're in an, I guess we're in a time where everybody does want to know themselves better. They want to do this work. And this is such an easy and fun way to do that.
You deserve love and not just from other people, but more importantly from yourself.
So take the time to learn about your love language. Use this episode as inspiration to practice self-love in the way that you're going to enjoy it the most.
And there's a really beautiful quote by Buddha that I wanted to end on. You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself. And that person is not to be found anywhere. You yourself as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection.
I hope this episode was helpful. I hope you got a couple of ideas. As always, take what feels good. Leave the rest, create your own lists and start showing yourself the love that you deserve. And that feels really good for you. So lots of love and support.
And I will speak with you next week.
Bye-bye.
With love & support,
Shorina | Mindful Soul Collective
Counsellor & Wellbeing Coach
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