I read the book almost 2 years ago. I also remember struggling to pinpoint what language would fit the way I want to experience love. For me, I want mental intimacy. “Being seen” is maybe a way of saying something similar, but I don’t know for sure if you mean the same thing.
For me this means:
Ability to discuss anything. Nothing is off the table.
Feeling comfortable revealing the things you normally mask for the rest of the world.
Interest in ideas the other has and their mental processes.
The desire to actually talk about things.
No knee jerk reactions of disgust, i.e. there aren’t assumptions that something unexpected the other person says is incredibly stupid or weird or wrong before discussing it more.
The ability to give honest feedback to each other.
Showing respect and appreciation for the other’s views and their willingness to share them.
The love languages book really seems to conflate intimacy with physical touch in its descriptions. And it misses something to say that “deep conversations” would be purely a form of quality time. And that bit about respect and appreciation in my last bullet would fall under words of affirmation...
So for me, it’s a book with a model that’s wrong. I really wanted it to be useful. It made the point that people have different expectations for love. But it left me with no clear sense of my own “love language,” and I’ve also found that attempts to categorize past partners hasn’t been any easier than categorizing myself.
This could be a sixth language of love, perhaps not described in the book because it is quite rare in real world (probably only happens among nerds).
I find myself somewhere in the middle between what the book describes and what you describe. Both the physical touch and the ability to discuss anything are very important to me. (On the other hand, gifts don’t mean anything, and spending too much time together can even feels creepy. I’d rather have my partner also spend some time doing their own hobbies; that makes the following conversations more interesting.)
I read the book almost 2 years ago. I also remember struggling to pinpoint what language would fit the way I want to experience love. For me, I want mental intimacy. “Being seen” is maybe a way of saying something similar, but I don’t know for sure if you mean the same thing.
For me this means:
Ability to discuss anything. Nothing is off the table.
Feeling comfortable revealing the things you normally mask for the rest of the world.
Interest in ideas the other has and their mental processes.
The desire to actually talk about things.
No knee jerk reactions of disgust, i.e. there aren’t assumptions that something unexpected the other person says is incredibly stupid or weird or wrong before discussing it more.
The ability to give honest feedback to each other.
Showing respect and appreciation for the other’s views and their willingness to share them.
The love languages book really seems to conflate intimacy with physical touch in its descriptions. And it misses something to say that “deep conversations” would be purely a form of quality time. And that bit about respect and appreciation in my last bullet would fall under words of affirmation...
So for me, it’s a book with a model that’s wrong. I really wanted it to be useful. It made the point that people have different expectations for love. But it left me with no clear sense of my own “love language,” and I’ve also found that attempts to categorize past partners hasn’t been any easier than categorizing myself.
This could be a sixth language of love, perhaps not described in the book because it is quite rare in real world (probably only happens among nerds).
I find myself somewhere in the middle between what the book describes and what you describe. Both the physical touch and the ability to discuss anything are very important to me. (On the other hand, gifts don’t mean anything, and spending too much time together can even feels creepy. I’d rather have my partner also spend some time doing their own hobbies; that makes the following conversations more interesting.)