March 16, 2025 • 33 mins
🎙️ Feeling frustrated that your partner "should know" how to love you? Think love languages are the answer — but still feel disconnected?
In this powerful episode of Honey, We Need to Chat, we dive deep into how love languages are misunderstood, overused, and sometimes misused — and why understanding them properly could change your relationship forever.
We unpack:
- 💡 The biggest misconceptions about love languages
- 💡 Why "knowing each other’s love language" isn’t enough to feel loved
- 💡 How rigid love language thinking leads to disconnection, resentment, and unmet needs
- 💡 What to do when your love languages don’t match — and why that’s actually okay
- 💡 Why love languages change over time (and how to adjust when they do)
- 💡 Practical ways to use love languages as tools — not as weapons or labels
PLUS: The #1 question you should be asking each other every week to keep growing intimacy, connection, and partnership.
👉 If you’ve ever felt frustrated by the “love languages” approach — this episode is your must-listen.
💬 Join the conversation and let us know if you’ve been stuck in the love language trap!
💬 Join the Conversation: Have a breakthrough moment from this episode? DM us, tag us, or share your thoughts!
🔗Listen now: Anywhere you find your podcasts!
📺Watch on YouTube: Here
🌍Join the community & share your story: https://honeyweneedtochat.com/
love languages, marriage advice, healthy relationships, emotional connection, intimacy in marriage, relationship communication, marriage help, how to improve connection, love language mistakes, relationship tools, marriage problems, emotional intimacy, practical marriage advice
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:05):
Honey, we need to chat. Hey guys, welcome back to
another episode of Honey. We need to chat.
Hello, welcome. Yeah, I've got nothing now, so
focused on what I'd say. And I've chosen to absolutely
ignore it now because I that's why I've learned in parenting,
(00:28):
ignore the behaviours you don't like.
Just so you know, no try and I'mgoing to say what I said, try
and say something cheeky, cheekyor shocking or something to
throw Amy off when we first start recording.
Just nerve. Wrecking because I'm the one
that edits and what if one time I leave it?
We'll get cancelled. Yeah, we.
(00:49):
Won't get cancelled we. Won't get cancelled, people will
probably just listen more. Yeah.
Anyway, welcome back to honey. We need a chat.
Please excuse my amateur husband.
I don't know why he's my Co host.
I'll find another one, but for now he'll do.
Bonnie will fill in. Bonnie will fill in.
Yeah, we're back for a chit chattoday and we're chit chatting
about a good chat. Yeah, good topic.
That's right, I. Think this is something that we
(01:11):
have spent a lot of time in personally, like in our
relationship it's on the five love languages.
But how 5 love languages are misunderstood?
Yeah, is the topic for today. It's funny because love
languages is something everybody's, most everybody has
heard of. And if you haven't heard of it
is a bit of a groundbreaking concept.
So if you haven't heard of love languages, hop back and listen
(01:33):
to our original episode about itand even go on the website and
do the little quick quiz for you.
It can be incredibly helpful. But what's funny is that every
time someone mentions love languages, especially online,
there's such mixed responses. And I, I've always been a little
bit confused why it's such a controversial topic.
But I think what we talk about today, which is the
(01:53):
misunderstanding of it and the misuse I guess of of this
framework is probably why there's a bit of blended opinion
about it. Yeah.
And we're in this conversation today.
We're going to bring a little bit of what we've learned by
practising the this concept of five love languages.
Yeah. So there's areas where not that
we disagree with with the book and with the whole concept, but
(02:16):
things that we've, I guess, identified while going through
it, the book doesn't really capture.
And that's what we want to sharetoo.
Yeah, I would even challenge. I'm not sure it said.
The book doesn't capture. I think it's almost the movement
around it has taken it so far and it's happens all the time
with, and we'll dive into that as well.
It just happens all the time with stuff like this.
But yeah, it's it's stuff that it's almost like a grain of salt
(02:37):
to add to how you take on board this information.
Before we dive into the topic, though, we're just going to
touch on some impactful quotes that we've had this week or
comments. For one thing, last episode we
had a clip that I put up on TikTok and it was us talking
about a story that we'd read outabout the division of labour
between the houses. And we're talking the clip.
(02:59):
The clip is me saying, you know,if my job is to look after kids,
then there also has to be off time, just like a person working
outside of the house would have off time.
Anyway, Matty B commented on a TikTok and it was something that
I was like, that is so well put.So I thought we would share it
on here just as like a little aside to that episode.
And she commented and said that the smartest thing she ever
heard was aiming for equal rest instead of equal work.
(03:22):
And I thought that was really good because we also had
somebody on Instagram asking howdo you navigate this
conversation? How do you navigate this dynamic
in relationship? And we kind of chatted back and
forth there a little bit, but itis a tough one.
And I think if you're trying to start dividing the labour within
your house, it gets really complicated because what counts
(03:43):
as labour? What's more or less weighty in
that space? But when you look at it from
this perspective, which is aiming for equal rest instead of
equal division of labour or equal work, I think that's so
helpful. Absolutely.
So just some context to that episode.
So my mum's mum was at home, Shewrote in to Reddit, she was at
home looking after their baby all day while the dad went out
(04:06):
and played golf all day. And he came home and he, he
needed his rest because he was out all day.
And he was, she was the mum was saying, well, then when's my
rest? Like, I'm still, you know, I've
been with the baby all day. I'm still with the baby, like
when's my rest? And so that's where that there's
riding on TikTok. That was actually amazing and
real a great tool. Yeah.
(04:26):
Just to think through it's like,well, OK, cool, you've, you're
tired, that's cool. But when am I going to get my
rest? And having that conversation
discussion is, yeah, really helpful.
Yeah. So thanks for commenting that
Matty BI, don't know where you got that.
You said you heard it from someone, so maybe it's a well
known phrase I've never heard before, but I think that's a
really good lens to put on when you're navigating these
conversations. So that's our little side note
(04:48):
for the Reddit episode. If you haven't listened to that
one, hop on over and have a look.
Alrighty. So a couple of little pieces of
information as we go into this episode that we think is a good
kind of perspective and lens to listen to the rest of the
episode, the rest of the discussion with.
And we just wanted to share themhere and kind of give them a
little bit of a space so that that can be in your mind as
(05:08):
you're listening to the rest of the stuff we're chatting about.
Yeah, absolutely. So the first one here is from
Tony Robbins. Do the things you did at the
beginning of the relationship and there won't be an end.
And I think this is something that we we've tried to encourage
on this podcast is man, we, we in the early days, we spend so
much time of being intentional. We have this huge attitude of
(05:30):
curiosity and this eagerness to grow and to learn about the
other person. And we're excited about that.
And I think this is a really great phrase or, or quote to
have in that to help us with thelens of that, you know, to to be
intentional, to still be intentional, to still set aside
time, to still be excited and eager and all that sort of
(05:51):
stuff. So thinking back to those early
days when you guys first startedgetting together or interested
with each other, having that as a lens really helps these
conversations. And obviously that doesn't mean
like learning all the new thingsabout your partner because life
has changed, seasons have changed, you've changed and
developed as a couple. But yeah, having those
intentionality. So there's a few things like
(06:12):
listening deeply and showing genuine curiosity.
We talk about that all the time in the podcast, prioritising
quality time and creating meaningful moments.
Like there was just so much moreintentionality around that
before we got married or when wewere first together.
Expressing, expressing appreciation regularly, that's
another thing that as the years go on and especially if you grow
(06:33):
a family or you fall into the rhythms of life, it's really
easy to forget those things. It's really easy, not that you
don't feel them, but just to actually express it because a
lot is unspoken and communicating with kindness and
excitement and being eager to connect, I think that's
something as well as life goes on and things get harder, it's,
it's harder to feel excited or communicate your excitement of
(06:53):
being with each other. It's even hard to like recognise
your excitement of being with each other and communicating
with kindness that that can become really hard when you fall
into everyday rhythms and fall into patterns of communication.
So those kinds of things, even though there's a lot from the
beginning of your relationship, you can't just transfer to now
because of how much deeply, how much more deeply you know each
(07:15):
other. There is ways of going about
relationship that we can. And, and it doesn't have to look
the exact same as when you firststart getting together, right?
Like, so you know, one thing that comes into my mind, you
know, we used to go out for datenights weekly, right?
And that was great. And now I'm like, I get tired at
a certain point. I never had that back then,
(07:36):
right? Like it was, you know, it was
nice, it was nice being out whenI was younger, you know, we
could stay out later and stuff like that and I wouldn't get as
tired. And I was thinking through this
actually, like even with my mates now, right?
We go out for dinner, we try andgo out as soon as we can.
And then we're, we're ready to come home at 8:30.
You know what I mean? Like I'm, I'm home.
Like we're just tired. And that's, but it's, it's, it's
(07:57):
so great though, because we're good, you know, that's fine for
us. We're all in the same boat.
We're like, you know, we're dads.
We're going to get up early. We're going to get waking up
through the night. Let's go home.
We caught up, we had quality time, we encourage each other,
and then we went home and that was good.
So again, like it's not that youhave to do the exact same things
as you used to do. It's your approach to whatever
(08:19):
it is, your circumstances now that's that's really the
challenge. Yeah.
And the second one that we were gonna just highlight before we
dive in. Yeah, is by Stephen R Covey from
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.
The biggest communication problem is we do not listen to
understand, we listen to reply. Yeah.
And I get that a lot, especiallyif we're in an argument, you
(08:41):
know, my response is like, I'm trying to listen.
I'm trying to build up ammo, ammo so I can get back to you,
you know? Well, when I'm, when I'm being
prideful in a, in a unintentionally, unintentionally
prideful in an argument, I'm listening to build ammo to fire
back at you. Yeah.
I think that's a good thing to take into any conversation.
(09:01):
But as well, as we said, diving into this conversation, just
listening to learn, listening tounderstand instead of listening
for what we can come back with. And I actually just made a tick
tock yesterday about that because I feel like sometimes
resources like our podcast can be used almost as ammo.
So people will listen be like, that's great for my partner.
(09:25):
And we do that all the time. All the time.
Yeah. So even if it's not listening to
them, it's not that you're doingthis listening to them.
You could also be learning for them because you're not learning
to understand yourself. Cool.
All right, well, let's dive in. Let's chat about why love
languages might be a little bit misunderstood then.
So it's funny because tools likelove languages, personality
(09:47):
tools, a lot of these things, even phrases that people take on
board so often get used as they become, they morph, they turn
into something that can be a helpful tool, something that can
be a helpful reminder or perspective.
And they turn into a rule that people stick to and boxes that
people put people into. And then and it's like rigid and
(10:08):
not flexible and it becomes unhelpful because of how they've
made it. And this is not unique to the
love languages and it's not the problem of the person who
created the love languages. It is the use of it that has
become an issue. And that is, I think a lot of
the time what we see with thingslike this.
So the five love languages is just a tool to equip you in your
(10:30):
relationship to love each other the best.
Like things like you know, the enneagram, I don't know if you
guys have heard of that, but I've heard of it so many times
it becomes like a oh, I'm a 7 soI can't date a blah blah.
I don't understand the enneagram.
And I've tried and I love personality tests.
I have tried so hard and I thinkit's because I don't fit.
So half of you are probably screaming like you don't
(10:51):
understand it and I don't. Please send it to me if you have
any tips. But that's one of these things
you can see people being like, no, A7 wouldn't work with a
three or whatever or the love language is like, oh, he's acts
of service and I'm words of affirmation and that just
doesn't work. We're not compatible.
Even things like phrases, as I said before.
So like the one who cares the less has the power.
A phrase like that can be helpful because it puts
(11:12):
something onto a pattern that someone's recognised and it can
be a helpful tool until it becomes a rule and then it's
like, then it's just toxic. Then it's not constructive.
It's something that people believe to be true.
It's something that plays out. So you know, someone will be
like, I can't date someone with this kind of personality.
That's not true. I've heard people say that
because we're opposites and we've done these things, we come
(11:34):
up opposite on almost every test.
And I've had conversations with people where they'll be like,
it's really good. We're so similar on tests.
So we we really are compatible and that's great for them.
But then we've also had the flippart of it being like, are you
compatible? If you're complete opposites,
yeah, you can be, yeah. These aren't strict rules that
mean you can't work together, no.
And and from our experiences be as we because we're complete
(11:57):
opposites, we actually work really well together because you
feel the gap of like you know your strengths and my weaknesses
and vice versa, right? And my strengths are your
weakness. What?
I don't know. And we communicate good.
Yeah, words. All right, cool.
So I'm going to read through just so we're all on the same
page here, what the five love languages are from based on the
(12:19):
the exercise here. So words of affirmation which is
verbal appreciation and encouragement, acts of service,
doing things to ease your partner's burden, receiving
gifts, thoughtful tokens of love, quality time, undivided
attention and physical touch which is affecting cuddling
intimacy. And this is a framework that was
(12:42):
pulled together by Gary Chapman,and there's a lot of resources
in this space about it. And basically his whole point is
that we often express love in a certain way and we expect to
receive it in a certain way. And when there's a
misunderstanding there or there's not clarity there,
that's when relationships can find themselves in trouble.
And if you've listened to many of our episodes, you would have
heard us say in response to a lot of the Reddit stories that
(13:05):
love language discussions could be a helpful tool in a lot of
these situations. So it does come up a lot.
It is something that people can miss pretty easily.
Again, in in our last Reddit, wewere talking, it was a lady that
wrote in and she was saying about how she's doing all these
things for her partner and he's not doing it back.
And straight away. I mean, I were like, oh, I feel
(13:26):
like, you know, she could possibly be acts of service is
her love language. Because we give what we want to
receive. It becomes a lot.
It's a lot more natural for us, but his might not be.
So that then learning that together could actually help her
and help help him to understand what she actually needs and what
that looks like, but also helps her to understand.
(13:46):
Well, expectations are going to be different.
For different exactly. So yeah, just a great tool.
Yeah, so helpful. It's helpful, and then can
become unhelpful. So these are some of the biggest
misconceptions about the love languages where it might start
to go a little bit wrong. So number one, if I know my
partner's love language, I've cracked the code.
So like my partner's love language is quality time.
(14:06):
That means I just need to schedule a date every week and
we're good. So it's like taking the foot off
of the accelerator and just coasting because you're like, Oh
no, I've got a cheque mark. Or tick in the box, right?
So I've ticked that box. I've ticked that box like I've
I've booked a date night. Why?
You know why you got a problem? I've done it.
I've done a job. Yeah, a really good example of
this is gifts. And Blair has a a tendency
(14:27):
towards gifts, but a gift just any random gift.
Me buying you anything doesn't necessarily communicate the same
love. No, it's it's about the
intentionality behind it. So yeah, a little check box of
that is not, it's not a track list basically.
It's not something to just say. Yeah, so for example, my my
favourite gift from Amy is a mug, right?
And it's it's not any mug. It's a specific mug.
(14:49):
So it's the cheapest gift she's probably got me, but it's the
most sentiment to me. So there's a lot of meaning
behind the gift itself. There's thought there's it's not
just AI want things. It's a actually, you've gone out
of your way to think about me. And so you've got something
based on what you know about me and that that was that's a
special part of the gift. So you can't tick that box.
There's intentionality behind that gift.
(15:11):
Which as a person who's so not gifts most of the time, it's
really overwhelming to think like that.
But instead of it being overwhelming because I have to
get it perfectly right, it's more about having these love
languages as like a thing you'recurious about and you're
learning through and you're exploring together.
And this can be part of what we spoke about before, that fresh
(15:31):
intentionality you have at the beginning of the relationship.
This can be something you keep being fresh and you keep being
intentional in. Yeah.
So it's not Amy missed the mark.She got the wrong mug or she got
the wrong present. It's a learning thing.
And and. And the other misuse of this too
is expecting. Amy's gonna know that.
Yeah, we know you'll. Get to you're diving right
ahead. Oh my, God knows.
All right, so the second one is I only need to show love in
(15:53):
their love language. Similar thing to the first one.
It's not just about, oh, I got it right.
And that's all we have to do. I only ever have to do the
dishes for him and he will be happy.
I only ever have to buy him a gift every weekend or whatever
and he's going to be happy. Love languages are not this is
your only way of showing love and that's the only thing that
matters. And there's something that he
(16:14):
talks about in the books that you were referring to earlier
when we were chatting about thisepisode called The Love Tank.
It's not just about you found that love language and that's
all you have to do. That's actually not helpful and
actually not the complete picture because even though
someone probably has a main preference or a main 2
preferences out of that list that we've listed, we've read
out to you, all of them are important to everyone in
(16:37):
different ways at different times.
And so no, you don't just get tobe like, this is his love
language. This is her love language.
And now that's all I have to cater for.
It's again that fresh perspective, that fluidity and
that flexibility and exploring what they might need and
recognising the seasons that arecoming up and what might change.
The third one is my partner should automatically know my
(16:57):
love language and cater to it. So as Blair said before, that
this expectation that they're just going to know what you want
to be. And we say this about
everything. It's not just about this, but
just expecting. They're going to know how you
feel loved and how they should be catering to them.
You can't just expect that, especially because it could be
(17:18):
totally off their radar, which is the same with us.
The present thing totally off myradar.
When we first got together, it wasn't even a thing.
So I I could very easily just assume you don't really care
about gifts. And you could very easily have
just assumed she doesn't really care about me because she's not
really focusing on gifts. And the thing here too, we also
make the sort of reference to, you know, our careers, right?
(17:41):
So how we put so much emphasis in growing and learning in our
careers to equip us, we ought todo those jobs well.
And you know, organisations likecompanies hire people to come in
and to help their team understand their take each
other, right. Like they come in, they do these
personality tests, they do thesetrainings to help the team
(18:01):
actually know the other person better.
Because again, it helps you understand their way of
thinking, what you know, their, their learning style, their work
style, everything right the game.
You and I are so different. And this was a big thing when we
first started dating. I mean, I were doing an
internship together and we did this personality test.
It was, I think it was a light bulb moment for us.
(18:22):
It wasn't the five love languages.
And it was VTi, I think it was. Yeah, I don't know what that is,
but. Myers Briggs.
That's it. Yeah.
And anyway, it was helping to really understand where actually
our working styles are so different and we're kind of
getting frustrated at each otherbecause I'm well planned, like
I've got a structure, I've got like this is all the different
things that we're doing. And Amy is.
(18:44):
Very last minute well. Very and last minute.
Well, yeah, exactly. Well planned last minute, yeah,
but that's where she operates. She does really well in that
area where I struggle. I stress out because I'm like,
man, we've got all these things to do, but you're you cram,
you'll be like get it done. It'll be good and it'll but
it'll be all last minute and it stresses me out.
(19:06):
So again, like it's those learnings that we had in a
professional sense really helpedus in our.
Personal. Personal relationship, yeah.
Helping understand the person more.
Yeah, and it's, it goes even further to even if you've had
that conversation and like we spoke about the mug, if you were
to say this is my love language,I've communicated that with you.
And then just expect that it's, you know, like a demand that
(19:29):
that I love you in this way or I, I just understand what that
means for you. That's also missing the mark.
It's about that conversation andguiding your partner.
And it helps you understand if you're reflecting as well.
And doing that process, it helpsyou understand yourself more
too. And your reactions, like the
Reddit story, she, she was upsetbecause he wasn't doing stuff
for her. Her doing that process is
(19:50):
helping her understand, oh, why does this matter to me so much?
That's probably why. Yeah.
And the last and the fourth one is love languages never change.
So what worked for you five years ago might not be what's
working for you now. It's actually quite a fluid
thing and quite a changeable thing in the seasons.
And we found this so much with parenthood.
So much, especially because mineinitially was physical touch was
(20:11):
quite high. And then when we had kids, I was
touched all the time. Like I just felt completely like
touched out having kids on me, the babies on me all the time.
And so that totally shifted. And quality time as well.
Like we work from home together now and we're with each other
all the time. So there's an element of quality
time that probably isn't as important as before.
It's probably a different type of quality time.
(20:33):
Yeah. And so Gary talks about love
tanking his book. And this is where we've learned
a little bit more in this area area from our experience, right.
So Gary talks about in, in the five line of languages about,
you know, your, your love tank, which is essentially it's your
measuring stick, right? So if your love tank is empty,
you're not going to feel appreciative.
And how do you feel that love tank?
Well, Gary talks about speak their love language and that
(20:56):
tank's going to feel. What we've come to realise for
us is actually there's multiple tanks and, and they cover for
all of the love languages. There's a tank for every love
language because so if again, again, I am my lowest is words
of affirmation, right? It's my lowest one.
But if I never get words of affirmation from Amy, I feel
(21:16):
neglected. I feel not appreciated, right?
But if you but it takes a while for that to happen.
It's like if you never do that. So it's it's not just a matter
of speak their love languages and your sweet.
It's that it's that check in. It's like, well, how are you
feeling in this area? How are you feeling in this
area? How are you feeling in this
area? And it's like growing in all of
(21:37):
those things. And it's, it's a life time
growth just to be really, reallyclear.
Like, I think that's really important to state too.
You're not gonna like read this book or do any of these like
little course things and be like, cool, we've got this now.
This is a tool for the life, thelifelong journey of growing in a
relationship. Yeah, you're not gonna ever nail
it. We're never gonna nail it.
(21:58):
And we're going. We we're always learning and
always adapting because seasons always change and our needs
always change. The nailing of this concept is
is allowing it to be something that informs your conversations,
your curiosity. That's the nailing of it and.
Nailing of it, in my opinion, isthe committing to the growth and
to the intentionality of these things.
(22:18):
So the fifth and last misunderstanding that might come
with love languages is that lovelanguage, love languages, Oh my
gosh, I can't even speak languages is they aren't an
excuse for imbalance. So if your partner is telling
you they're feeling disconnected, your response
can't be. But I've been giving you words
of affirmation like you said youliked.
Or the flip side of that is like, but I love in words of
affirmation. So I'm giving you words of
(22:39):
affirmation like you should justsee that this is my love.
So it's not an excuse for anything and it's definitely not
an excuse for imbalance. It's not an excuse to be like,
well, I'm not gonna put the effort in because of is this and
this. Hey guys, as you know, we love
to interrupt your listening right now and bring in a little
AD time. If you're loving these
conversations and want to take your relationship growth even
(23:01):
further, we've got things for you.
Yes, we have a number of free relationship resources on our
website. We've put together some really
powerful tools and they, some ofthem specifically relate to
episodes as well. So if you are wanting little
challenges or extra content, please hop on over to our
website at Honey, we need to chat.com and look at our
freebies page and see what mightbe there that can be helpful.
(23:23):
It's already ready for you. It's free and if you sign up, we
can also remind you as the new ones come out as well.
So. If you're ready for deeper
conversations and exclusive content, the link will be in the
description below. All right, that's it, that's
what we heard. Let's get back to the episode.
OK, so we've talked about why love languages are
misunderstood, potentially why it might go a little off the
(23:45):
rails. Let's just discuss a few ways
that might be more constructive to think about love languages.
So one, love languages are tools.
They're not labels. We've said this over and over in
this episode, but that having that framework, having that in
your mind as you're navigating this is really important.
They're not rigid categories. They're not boxes you're going
to fall into and never be moved from them.
(24:06):
They are just a way to recogniselove and the way that your
partner's expressing it and the way that you're expressing it
and a way to work together. Sort of an example of this,
instead of saying I only feel loved when you write me
heartfelt text messages, you could say I love words of
affirmation, but I also appreciate it when you make me
coffee or hold my hand. So it's just, it's a matter of
using it as a tool to recognise those those love bids.
(24:30):
And a little question you can ask yourself in this space is,
are you only focusing on how youwant to be loved or are you
noticing that there's love already there?
So the second one is asking the question, what would make you
feel loved this week? And I actually love this one.
I feel like this is a really practical way to navigate these
things. Love needs shift depending on
your life circumstances, and youcan't always assume that your
(24:52):
partner needs the same thing as we've said.
So an example of this is a partner who usually loves
physical touch might prefer actsof service after a long work
week or when they've had a baby instead of a hug.
They might just want you to handle dinner.
So instead of letting that be something that's scary and
overwhelming, you can let it be a good practical thing that
you've like discussed together about how do you how would you
(25:14):
best feel loved this week? So make it a weekly habit to
ask, what's one thing I could dofor you this week that would
make you feel really loved? I love that.
I love that there's such a practical question to ask, you
know, because again, a lot of the time we, we do things with
the best intention, but it just doesn't hit the mark, you know,
take the guessing out of it. It's like, no, this is how I
know. But even asking that question is
(25:35):
going to make the other person feel loved.
Yeah. And make them feel loved and
make them think about it. Yeah.
Well, yeah, absolutely. But it's just like, you know, if
you came in to me one day, like I really want to, like, show my
love to you this week, how wouldthat best be?
I would feel that just from thatquestion alone.
But if you didn't do it, I'd be pissed off.
Well. What would it?
Be pissed off. I would feel, I would feel like,
oh, it's just like I want to seeyou back it up.
(25:58):
Yeah, and but you after them be careful to not fall into the
I've told them now, so they've better do it this way.
That is a trap. So don't do that to me.
I wouldn't, especially if it's some really expensive gift.
But the other part of that too is, and I think this is the
challenge is not allowing that to them becoming a rule.
And then it's the mental load side of things.
So you're not just like I, everyday, every week, I'm going to
(26:18):
ask them how they want to be, feel loved, and I'm going to
remove the load mentally of thatfrom myself and make them have
to answer me. So it is a, it's a delicate
balance of using this as a constructive tool that helps
inform that conversation rather than an excuse to leave that to
them. Does that make sense?
Yeah, yeah. I'll get.
(26:39):
You, yeah. So yeah, just having that as a
check in point, and when you do your weekly check in with all
the other things we've talked about, having check insurance
with, this could be something that you put in there as well #3
is love is about effort. It's not just about preference.
So a strong relationship isn't just about being loved in your
own way or loving your partner in their own way.
It's about recognising the efforts that go into that, even
(27:00):
when it's love that's expressed differently.
And I think it can be hard when there's a pattern of love being
expressed in a way that's not catering for you or especially
if you've had the conversation before and it's not changing.
But the effort that goes into someone expressing love is
really important to be aware of as well.
Because that is, even if it's not hitting the mark, it is is
(27:22):
still valid. It's still something that
they've put effort into and it'simportant.
So if your love language is quality time, but your partner
is all about acts of service, you might crave deep
conversations while they're busyfolding laundry and filling your
car with gas, but they are showing you love.
You just need to see it, but youalso need to be able to have
that conversation. So again, this one comes with a
grain of salt, kind of balancingflexibility with it as well.
(27:46):
And the last one is notice your partner's love bids, which is
similar to what we've just discussed.
Love bids is something they talkabout in the book as well.
And that's the small everyday little attempts that people put
towards making connections. So holding someone's hand,
saying, I love you like these little things that we just
injected into our days. Those are called love bids.
Sending a meme a really funny reel could be a love bid.
(28:11):
Is it the first one? Maybe the 100th one?
Come on. It's 100 little love bids.
So the mistake is ignoring love bids because they don't look
like romantic gestures, but it is important to recognise the
heart behind them. So an example, your partner
mentioned something random abouttheir day and you brush it off.
But that was a love bid in a small way where they were
(28:31):
reaching for you, they were reaching for a connection.
And I think one of the things that is a really common
distraction from these moments is people's phones.
And I definitely find this as well, like being distracted by
your phone or your social media or your connection to the wider
world and just not having the time to be present.
So I think there's things that play a part in our everyday
(28:53):
lives that make it hard to recognise those little love
beds, especially when it's things like little conversations
or little moments. But it's important to try and
take moment to recognise them. And I find this a lot with our
kids. There's a lot of times where I
just am so zoned out and I just,I feel like I can't be present
for every single little love bidthat they give me of pieces of
(29:16):
information and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Which is I have a lot of grace for myself and every parent
because it is a lot, especially when you've got four of them at
the one time doing. But it's a good example of this
where there's moments of love bids being like little dropped
around and it's very easy to just not see them.
So just being aware of those things.
So a challenge for this one is for the next 24 hours, pay
(29:39):
attention to all the little waysyour partner tries to connect
instead of overlooking them. Respond even in small ways.
So every time your partner touches your back as they walk
past or your butt, who knows, every time you know they say I
love you or every time they're telling you something about
their day, try and notice it as a love bid to connect and being
aware of those small things. So those are some of the ways we
(30:01):
can think better about love languages and kind of reframe it
and use it in a constructive wayinstead of allowing it to become
something that we misunderstand.It's love languages, guys.
Oh. We nailed it.
We nailed it. We nailed that love language.
Yeah, we're gonna move into our reality check corner now.
Make this a little practical this season.
We really want it to be practical.
(30:22):
We really want you guys to be able to, if you want to take
that challenge right now, today and be like, actually, yeah, I'm
gonna try this. This is worth trying.
And so we've incorporated this reality check corner to have
some really quick, easy things that you can do in your
relationship by yourself, even to reflect on your relationship
right now if you want. So the first one is our
reflection prompt. This is just something I want
(30:44):
you to think about. Just take a moment to assess how
you're going personally with this.
When was the last time you askedyour partner how they needed to
be loved rather than assuming you already know?
And as we said, hop on over to Patreon if you want to see us
talk about this, because I've already got answers.
Cheating. Blair hasn't thought about this
for ages. That's not what we want you to
do. All right?
(31:05):
Connection challenge. This is a little challenge you
can do so for the next 24 hours.Ask your partner in the next 24
hours, I should say not for the whole 24 hours because that will
become annoying in the next 24 hours.
Ask your partner, what is something I can do today that
would make you feel really loved?
And then try and do it. Obviously some things are easier
(31:26):
done than others, but be creative and work on around the
suggestion that they have and just having a moment where
you're being incredibly intentional with that as a
challenge to yourself, I think is really helpful. 24 hours,
easy to do, not hard. All right now we've got a future
pace exercise. And this is where I just want
(31:48):
you to try and really, really visualise, think about, reflect
on what I'm about to read out. And we're, we're trying to
project a future that we want and they were aiming for.
And then we're trying to gather the emotions and the feelings
and the senses that we have and the things we're seeing,
feeling, whatever in that and borrow from that for now.
(32:09):
Because that helps you in terms of motivating how you go
forward. So you can close your eyes if
you want, or you can just sit and think about what I'm about
to read out. I want you to Fast forward five
years into the future. You're sitting across from your
partner, laughing, feeling deeply connected.
There's an ease between you thatwasn't always there because you
both finally figured out how to love each other well.
(32:30):
And when you think back, you remember 1 specific conversation
that changed everything. I want you to just sit there for
a second and picture what that looks like, how you guys are
sitting or standing, how you're talking, what your partner's
face looks like, how you're feeling inside, what the
scenario around you might be. And just really picture that
future. Now I want you to ask yourself
if you had that conversation that changed everything right
(32:53):
now. If you sat down and asked your
partner what is one way I can love you better, What might
shift, what might come up in that conversation?
And what is stopping you from having that conversation if you
haven't had it? Good questions, Amy.
Great questions, Amy. All right.
Well, thanks guys for being herefor love languages and what
might make them a little misunderstood.
We hope this is a helpful episode in terms of clarifying
(33:14):
some of that. And if it is helpful, please let
us know. If you disagree with anything,
please let us know because again, this is an area where we
want to grow in. Yeah, we'll continually grow in
learning. So yeah.
Or just comments, let us know. We want to hear from you guys.
We don't want to hear from our chatters, even though we love.
Hearing We love hearing from ourchatters, but.
We want to hear from you too, sosend in.
Yeah. And share it with a friend.
(33:34):
If you think it's helpful, shareit with a friend, review rate.
All of those things go a really long way to supporting the
podcast and helping us keep going.
Yeah, great. Thanks, guys.
Thanks, guys. Bye.
Honey, we need to chat. Hey guys, welcome back to
another episode of Honey. We need to chat.
Hello, welcome. Yeah, I've got nothing now, so
focused on what I'd say. And I've chosen to absolutely
ignore it now because I that's why I've learned in parenting,
(00:28):
ignore the behaviours you don't like.
Just so you know, no try and I'mgoing to say what I said, try
and say something cheeky, cheekyor shocking or something to
throw Amy off when we first start recording.
Just nerve. Wrecking because I'm the one
that edits and what if one time I leave it?
We'll get cancelled. Yeah, we.
(00:49):
Won't get cancelled we. Won't get cancelled, people will
probably just listen more. Yeah.
Anyway, welcome back to honey. We need a chat.
Please excuse my amateur husband.
I don't know why he's my Co host.
I'll find another one, but for now he'll do.
Bonnie will fill in. Bonnie will fill in.
Yeah, we're back for a chit chattoday and we're chit chatting
about a good chat. Yeah, good topic.
That's right, I. Think this is something that we
(01:11):
have spent a lot of time in personally, like in our
relationship it's on the five love languages.
But how 5 love languages are misunderstood?
Yeah, is the topic for today. It's funny because love
languages is something everybody's, most everybody has
heard of. And if you haven't heard of it
is a bit of a groundbreaking concept.
So if you haven't heard of love languages, hop back and listen
(01:33):
to our original episode about itand even go on the website and
do the little quick quiz for you.
It can be incredibly helpful. But what's funny is that every
time someone mentions love languages, especially online,
there's such mixed responses. And I, I've always been a little
bit confused why it's such a controversial topic.
But I think what we talk about today, which is the
(01:53):
misunderstanding of it and the misuse I guess of of this
framework is probably why there's a bit of blended opinion
about it. Yeah.
And we're in this conversation today.
We're going to bring a little bit of what we've learned by
practising the this concept of five love languages.
Yeah. So there's areas where not that
we disagree with with the book and with the whole concept, but
(02:16):
things that we've, I guess, identified while going through
it, the book doesn't really capture.
And that's what we want to sharetoo.
Yeah, I would even challenge. I'm not sure it said.
The book doesn't capture. I think it's almost the movement
around it has taken it so far and it's happens all the time
with, and we'll dive into that as well.
It just happens all the time with stuff like this.
But yeah, it's it's stuff that it's almost like a grain of salt
(02:37):
to add to how you take on board this information.
Before we dive into the topic, though, we're just going to
touch on some impactful quotes that we've had this week or
comments. For one thing, last episode we
had a clip that I put up on TikTok and it was us talking
about a story that we'd read outabout the division of labour
between the houses. And we're talking the clip.
(02:59):
The clip is me saying, you know,if my job is to look after kids,
then there also has to be off time, just like a person working
outside of the house would have off time.
Anyway, Matty B commented on a TikTok and it was something that
I was like, that is so well put.So I thought we would share it
on here just as like a little aside to that episode.
And she commented and said that the smartest thing she ever
heard was aiming for equal rest instead of equal work.
(03:22):
And I thought that was really good because we also had
somebody on Instagram asking howdo you navigate this
conversation? How do you navigate this dynamic
in relationship? And we kind of chatted back and
forth there a little bit, but itis a tough one.
And I think if you're trying to start dividing the labour within
your house, it gets really complicated because what counts
(03:43):
as labour? What's more or less weighty in
that space? But when you look at it from
this perspective, which is aiming for equal rest instead of
equal division of labour or equal work, I think that's so
helpful. Absolutely.
So just some context to that episode.
So my mum's mum was at home, Shewrote in to Reddit, she was at
home looking after their baby all day while the dad went out
(04:06):
and played golf all day. And he came home and he, he
needed his rest because he was out all day.
And he was, she was the mum was saying, well, then when's my
rest? Like, I'm still, you know, I've
been with the baby all day. I'm still with the baby, like
when's my rest? And so that's where that there's
riding on TikTok. That was actually amazing and
real a great tool. Yeah.
(04:26):
Just to think through it's like,well, OK, cool, you've, you're
tired, that's cool. But when am I going to get my
rest? And having that conversation
discussion is, yeah, really helpful.
Yeah. So thanks for commenting that
Matty BI, don't know where you got that.
You said you heard it from someone, so maybe it's a well
known phrase I've never heard before, but I think that's a
really good lens to put on when you're navigating these
conversations. So that's our little side note
(04:48):
for the Reddit episode. If you haven't listened to that
one, hop on over and have a look.
Alrighty. So a couple of little pieces of
information as we go into this episode that we think is a good
kind of perspective and lens to listen to the rest of the
episode, the rest of the discussion with.
And we just wanted to share themhere and kind of give them a
little bit of a space so that that can be in your mind as
(05:08):
you're listening to the rest of the stuff we're chatting about.
Yeah, absolutely. So the first one here is from
Tony Robbins. Do the things you did at the
beginning of the relationship and there won't be an end.
And I think this is something that we we've tried to encourage
on this podcast is man, we, we in the early days, we spend so
much time of being intentional. We have this huge attitude of
(05:30):
curiosity and this eagerness to grow and to learn about the
other person. And we're excited about that.
And I think this is a really great phrase or, or quote to
have in that to help us with thelens of that, you know, to to be
intentional, to still be intentional, to still set aside
time, to still be excited and eager and all that sort of
(05:51):
stuff. So thinking back to those early
days when you guys first startedgetting together or interested
with each other, having that as a lens really helps these
conversations. And obviously that doesn't mean
like learning all the new thingsabout your partner because life
has changed, seasons have changed, you've changed and
developed as a couple. But yeah, having those
intentionality. So there's a few things like
(06:12):
listening deeply and showing genuine curiosity.
We talk about that all the time in the podcast, prioritising
quality time and creating meaningful moments.
Like there was just so much moreintentionality around that
before we got married or when wewere first together.
Expressing, expressing appreciation regularly, that's
another thing that as the years go on and especially if you grow
(06:33):
a family or you fall into the rhythms of life, it's really
easy to forget those things. It's really easy, not that you
don't feel them, but just to actually express it because a
lot is unspoken and communicating with kindness and
excitement and being eager to connect, I think that's
something as well as life goes on and things get harder, it's,
it's harder to feel excited or communicate your excitement of
(06:53):
being with each other. It's even hard to like recognise
your excitement of being with each other and communicating
with kindness that that can become really hard when you fall
into everyday rhythms and fall into patterns of communication.
So those kinds of things, even though there's a lot from the
beginning of your relationship, you can't just transfer to now
because of how much deeply, how much more deeply you know each
(07:15):
other. There is ways of going about
relationship that we can. And, and it doesn't have to look
the exact same as when you firststart getting together, right?
Like, so you know, one thing that comes into my mind, you
know, we used to go out for datenights weekly, right?
And that was great. And now I'm like, I get tired at
a certain point. I never had that back then,
(07:36):
right? Like it was, you know, it was
nice, it was nice being out whenI was younger, you know, we
could stay out later and stuff like that and I wouldn't get as
tired. And I was thinking through this
actually, like even with my mates now, right?
We go out for dinner, we try andgo out as soon as we can.
And then we're, we're ready to come home at 8:30.
You know what I mean? Like I'm, I'm home.
Like we're just tired. And that's, but it's, it's, it's
(07:57):
so great though, because we're good, you know, that's fine for
us. We're all in the same boat.
We're like, you know, we're dads.
We're going to get up early. We're going to get waking up
through the night. Let's go home.
We caught up, we had quality time, we encourage each other,
and then we went home and that was good.
So again, like it's not that youhave to do the exact same things
as you used to do. It's your approach to whatever
(08:19):
it is, your circumstances now that's that's really the
challenge. Yeah.
And the second one that we were gonna just highlight before we
dive in. Yeah, is by Stephen R Covey from
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.
The biggest communication problem is we do not listen to
understand, we listen to reply. Yeah.
And I get that a lot, especiallyif we're in an argument, you
(08:41):
know, my response is like, I'm trying to listen.
I'm trying to build up ammo, ammo so I can get back to you,
you know? Well, when I'm, when I'm being
prideful in a, in a unintentionally, unintentionally
prideful in an argument, I'm listening to build ammo to fire
back at you. Yeah.
I think that's a good thing to take into any conversation.
(09:01):
But as well, as we said, diving into this conversation, just
listening to learn, listening tounderstand instead of listening
for what we can come back with. And I actually just made a tick
tock yesterday about that because I feel like sometimes
resources like our podcast can be used almost as ammo.
So people will listen be like, that's great for my partner.
(09:25):
And we do that all the time. All the time.
Yeah. So even if it's not listening to
them, it's not that you're doingthis listening to them.
You could also be learning for them because you're not learning
to understand yourself. Cool.
All right, well, let's dive in. Let's chat about why love
languages might be a little bit misunderstood then.
So it's funny because tools likelove languages, personality
(09:47):
tools, a lot of these things, even phrases that people take on
board so often get used as they become, they morph, they turn
into something that can be a helpful tool, something that can
be a helpful reminder or perspective.
And they turn into a rule that people stick to and boxes that
people put people into. And then and it's like rigid and
(10:08):
not flexible and it becomes unhelpful because of how they've
made it. And this is not unique to the
love languages and it's not the problem of the person who
created the love languages. It is the use of it that has
become an issue. And that is, I think a lot of
the time what we see with thingslike this.
So the five love languages is just a tool to equip you in your
(10:30):
relationship to love each other the best.
Like things like you know, the enneagram, I don't know if you
guys have heard of that, but I've heard of it so many times
it becomes like a oh, I'm a 7 soI can't date a blah blah.
I don't understand the enneagram.
And I've tried and I love personality tests.
I have tried so hard and I thinkit's because I don't fit.
So half of you are probably screaming like you don't
(10:51):
understand it and I don't. Please send it to me if you have
any tips. But that's one of these things
you can see people being like, no, A7 wouldn't work with a
three or whatever or the love language is like, oh, he's acts
of service and I'm words of affirmation and that just
doesn't work. We're not compatible.
Even things like phrases, as I said before.
So like the one who cares the less has the power.
A phrase like that can be helpful because it puts
(11:12):
something onto a pattern that someone's recognised and it can
be a helpful tool until it becomes a rule and then it's
like, then it's just toxic. Then it's not constructive.
It's something that people believe to be true.
It's something that plays out. So you know, someone will be
like, I can't date someone with this kind of personality.
That's not true. I've heard people say that
because we're opposites and we've done these things, we come
(11:34):
up opposite on almost every test.
And I've had conversations with people where they'll be like,
it's really good. We're so similar on tests.
So we we really are compatible and that's great for them.
But then we've also had the flippart of it being like, are you
compatible? If you're complete opposites,
yeah, you can be, yeah. These aren't strict rules that
mean you can't work together, no.
And and from our experiences be as we because we're complete
(11:57):
opposites, we actually work really well together because you
feel the gap of like you know your strengths and my weaknesses
and vice versa, right? And my strengths are your
weakness. What?
I don't know. And we communicate good.
Yeah, words. All right, cool.
So I'm going to read through just so we're all on the same
page here, what the five love languages are from based on the
(12:19):
the exercise here. So words of affirmation which is
verbal appreciation and encouragement, acts of service,
doing things to ease your partner's burden, receiving
gifts, thoughtful tokens of love, quality time, undivided
attention and physical touch which is affecting cuddling
intimacy. And this is a framework that was
(12:42):
pulled together by Gary Chapman,and there's a lot of resources
in this space about it. And basically his whole point is
that we often express love in a certain way and we expect to
receive it in a certain way. And when there's a
misunderstanding there or there's not clarity there,
that's when relationships can find themselves in trouble.
And if you've listened to many of our episodes, you would have
heard us say in response to a lot of the Reddit stories that
(13:05):
love language discussions could be a helpful tool in a lot of
these situations. So it does come up a lot.
It is something that people can miss pretty easily.
Again, in in our last Reddit, wewere talking, it was a lady that
wrote in and she was saying about how she's doing all these
things for her partner and he's not doing it back.
And straight away. I mean, I were like, oh, I feel
(13:26):
like, you know, she could possibly be acts of service is
her love language. Because we give what we want to
receive. It becomes a lot.
It's a lot more natural for us, but his might not be.
So that then learning that together could actually help her
and help help him to understand what she actually needs and what
that looks like, but also helps her to understand.
(13:46):
Well, expectations are going to be different.
For different exactly. So yeah, just a great tool.
Yeah, so helpful. It's helpful, and then can
become unhelpful. So these are some of the biggest
misconceptions about the love languages where it might start
to go a little bit wrong. So number one, if I know my
partner's love language, I've cracked the code.
So like my partner's love language is quality time.
(14:06):
That means I just need to schedule a date every week and
we're good. So it's like taking the foot off
of the accelerator and just coasting because you're like, Oh
no, I've got a cheque mark. Or tick in the box, right?
So I've ticked that box. I've ticked that box like I've
I've booked a date night. Why?
You know why you got a problem? I've done it.
I've done a job. Yeah, a really good example of
this is gifts. And Blair has a a tendency
(14:27):
towards gifts, but a gift just any random gift.
Me buying you anything doesn't necessarily communicate the same
love. No, it's it's about the
intentionality behind it. So yeah, a little check box of
that is not, it's not a track list basically.
It's not something to just say. Yeah, so for example, my my
favourite gift from Amy is a mug, right?
And it's it's not any mug. It's a specific mug.
(14:49):
So it's the cheapest gift she's probably got me, but it's the
most sentiment to me. So there's a lot of meaning
behind the gift itself. There's thought there's it's not
just AI want things. It's a actually, you've gone out
of your way to think about me. And so you've got something
based on what you know about me and that that was that's a
special part of the gift. So you can't tick that box.
There's intentionality behind that gift.
(15:11):
Which as a person who's so not gifts most of the time, it's
really overwhelming to think like that.
But instead of it being overwhelming because I have to
get it perfectly right, it's more about having these love
languages as like a thing you'recurious about and you're
learning through and you're exploring together.
And this can be part of what we spoke about before, that fresh
(15:31):
intentionality you have at the beginning of the relationship.
This can be something you keep being fresh and you keep being
intentional in. Yeah.
So it's not Amy missed the mark.She got the wrong mug or she got
the wrong present. It's a learning thing.
And and. And the other misuse of this too
is expecting. Amy's gonna know that.
Yeah, we know you'll. Get to you're diving right
ahead. Oh my, God knows.
All right, so the second one is I only need to show love in
(15:53):
their love language. Similar thing to the first one.
It's not just about, oh, I got it right.
And that's all we have to do. I only ever have to do the
dishes for him and he will be happy.
I only ever have to buy him a gift every weekend or whatever
and he's going to be happy. Love languages are not this is
your only way of showing love and that's the only thing that
matters. And there's something that he
(16:14):
talks about in the books that you were referring to earlier
when we were chatting about thisepisode called The Love Tank.
It's not just about you found that love language and that's
all you have to do. That's actually not helpful and
actually not the complete picture because even though
someone probably has a main preference or a main 2
preferences out of that list that we've listed, we've read
out to you, all of them are important to everyone in
(16:37):
different ways at different times.
And so no, you don't just get tobe like, this is his love
language. This is her love language.
And now that's all I have to cater for.
It's again that fresh perspective, that fluidity and
that flexibility and exploring what they might need and
recognising the seasons that arecoming up and what might change.
The third one is my partner should automatically know my
(16:57):
love language and cater to it. So as Blair said before, that
this expectation that they're just going to know what you want
to be. And we say this about
everything. It's not just about this, but
just expecting. They're going to know how you
feel loved and how they should be catering to them.
You can't just expect that, especially because it could be
(17:18):
totally off their radar, which is the same with us.
The present thing totally off myradar.
When we first got together, it wasn't even a thing.
So I I could very easily just assume you don't really care
about gifts. And you could very easily have
just assumed she doesn't really care about me because she's not
really focusing on gifts. And the thing here too, we also
make the sort of reference to, you know, our careers, right?
(17:41):
So how we put so much emphasis in growing and learning in our
careers to equip us, we ought todo those jobs well.
And you know, organisations likecompanies hire people to come in
and to help their team understand their take each
other, right. Like they come in, they do these
personality tests, they do thesetrainings to help the team
(18:01):
actually know the other person better.
Because again, it helps you understand their way of
thinking, what you know, their, their learning style, their work
style, everything right the game.
You and I are so different. And this was a big thing when we
first started dating. I mean, I were doing an
internship together and we did this personality test.
It was, I think it was a light bulb moment for us.
(18:22):
It wasn't the five love languages.
And it was VTi, I think it was. Yeah, I don't know what that is,
but. Myers Briggs.
That's it. Yeah.
And anyway, it was helping to really understand where actually
our working styles are so different and we're kind of
getting frustrated at each otherbecause I'm well planned, like
I've got a structure, I've got like this is all the different
things that we're doing. And Amy is.
(18:44):
Very last minute well. Very and last minute.
Well, yeah, exactly. Well planned last minute, yeah,
but that's where she operates. She does really well in that
area where I struggle. I stress out because I'm like,
man, we've got all these things to do, but you're you cram,
you'll be like get it done. It'll be good and it'll but
it'll be all last minute and it stresses me out.
(19:06):
So again, like it's those learnings that we had in a
professional sense really helpedus in our.
Personal. Personal relationship, yeah.
Helping understand the person more.
Yeah, and it's, it goes even further to even if you've had
that conversation and like we spoke about the mug, if you were
to say this is my love language,I've communicated that with you.
And then just expect that it's, you know, like a demand that
(19:29):
that I love you in this way or I, I just understand what that
means for you. That's also missing the mark.
It's about that conversation andguiding your partner.
And it helps you understand if you're reflecting as well.
And doing that process, it helpsyou understand yourself more
too. And your reactions, like the
Reddit story, she, she was upsetbecause he wasn't doing stuff
for her. Her doing that process is
(19:50):
helping her understand, oh, why does this matter to me so much?
That's probably why. Yeah.
And the last and the fourth one is love languages never change.
So what worked for you five years ago might not be what's
working for you now. It's actually quite a fluid
thing and quite a changeable thing in the seasons.
And we found this so much with parenthood.
So much, especially because mineinitially was physical touch was
(20:11):
quite high. And then when we had kids, I was
touched all the time. Like I just felt completely like
touched out having kids on me, the babies on me all the time.
And so that totally shifted. And quality time as well.
Like we work from home together now and we're with each other
all the time. So there's an element of quality
time that probably isn't as important as before.
It's probably a different type of quality time.
(20:33):
Yeah. And so Gary talks about love
tanking his book. And this is where we've learned
a little bit more in this area area from our experience, right.
So Gary talks about in, in the five line of languages about,
you know, your, your love tank, which is essentially it's your
measuring stick, right? So if your love tank is empty,
you're not going to feel appreciative.
And how do you feel that love tank?
Well, Gary talks about speak their love language and that
(20:56):
tank's going to feel. What we've come to realise for
us is actually there's multiple tanks and, and they cover for
all of the love languages. There's a tank for every love
language because so if again, again, I am my lowest is words
of affirmation, right? It's my lowest one.
But if I never get words of affirmation from Amy, I feel
(21:16):
neglected. I feel not appreciated, right?
But if you but it takes a while for that to happen.
It's like if you never do that. So it's it's not just a matter
of speak their love languages and your sweet.
It's that it's that check in. It's like, well, how are you
feeling in this area? How are you feeling in this
area? How are you feeling in this
area? And it's like growing in all of
(21:37):
those things. And it's, it's a life time
growth just to be really, reallyclear.
Like, I think that's really important to state too.
You're not gonna like read this book or do any of these like
little course things and be like, cool, we've got this now.
This is a tool for the life, thelifelong journey of growing in a
relationship. Yeah, you're not gonna ever nail
it. We're never gonna nail it.
(21:58):
And we're going. We we're always learning and
always adapting because seasons always change and our needs
always change. The nailing of this concept is
is allowing it to be something that informs your conversations,
your curiosity. That's the nailing of it and.
Nailing of it, in my opinion, isthe committing to the growth and
to the intentionality of these things.
(22:18):
So the fifth and last misunderstanding that might come
with love languages is that lovelanguage, love languages, Oh my
gosh, I can't even speak languages is they aren't an
excuse for imbalance. So if your partner is telling
you they're feeling disconnected, your response
can't be. But I've been giving you words
of affirmation like you said youliked.
Or the flip side of that is like, but I love in words of
affirmation. So I'm giving you words of
(22:39):
affirmation like you should justsee that this is my love.
So it's not an excuse for anything and it's definitely not
an excuse for imbalance. It's not an excuse to be like,
well, I'm not gonna put the effort in because of is this and
this. Hey guys, as you know, we love
to interrupt your listening right now and bring in a little
AD time. If you're loving these
conversations and want to take your relationship growth even
(23:01):
further, we've got things for you.
Yes, we have a number of free relationship resources on our
website. We've put together some really
powerful tools and they, some ofthem specifically relate to
episodes as well. So if you are wanting little
challenges or extra content, please hop on over to our
website at Honey, we need to chat.com and look at our
freebies page and see what mightbe there that can be helpful.
(23:23):
It's already ready for you. It's free and if you sign up, we
can also remind you as the new ones come out as well.
So. If you're ready for deeper
conversations and exclusive content, the link will be in the
description below. All right, that's it, that's
what we heard. Let's get back to the episode.
OK, so we've talked about why love languages are
misunderstood, potentially why it might go a little off the
(23:45):
rails. Let's just discuss a few ways
that might be more constructive to think about love languages.
So one, love languages are tools.
They're not labels. We've said this over and over in
this episode, but that having that framework, having that in
your mind as you're navigating this is really important.
They're not rigid categories. They're not boxes you're going
to fall into and never be moved from them.
(24:06):
They are just a way to recogniselove and the way that your
partner's expressing it and the way that you're expressing it
and a way to work together. Sort of an example of this,
instead of saying I only feel loved when you write me
heartfelt text messages, you could say I love words of
affirmation, but I also appreciate it when you make me
coffee or hold my hand. So it's just, it's a matter of
using it as a tool to recognise those those love bids.
(24:30):
And a little question you can ask yourself in this space is,
are you only focusing on how youwant to be loved or are you
noticing that there's love already there?
So the second one is asking the question, what would make you
feel loved this week? And I actually love this one.
I feel like this is a really practical way to navigate these
things. Love needs shift depending on
your life circumstances, and youcan't always assume that your
(24:52):
partner needs the same thing as we've said.
So an example of this is a partner who usually loves
physical touch might prefer actsof service after a long work
week or when they've had a baby instead of a hug.
They might just want you to handle dinner.
So instead of letting that be something that's scary and
overwhelming, you can let it be a good practical thing that
you've like discussed together about how do you how would you
(25:14):
best feel loved this week? So make it a weekly habit to
ask, what's one thing I could dofor you this week that would
make you feel really loved? I love that.
I love that there's such a practical question to ask, you
know, because again, a lot of the time we, we do things with
the best intention, but it just doesn't hit the mark, you know,
take the guessing out of it. It's like, no, this is how I
know. But even asking that question is
(25:35):
going to make the other person feel loved.
Yeah. And make them feel loved and
make them think about it. Yeah.
Well, yeah, absolutely. But it's just like, you know, if
you came in to me one day, like I really want to, like, show my
love to you this week, how wouldthat best be?
I would feel that just from thatquestion alone.
But if you didn't do it, I'd be pissed off.
Well. What would it?
Be pissed off. I would feel, I would feel like,
oh, it's just like I want to seeyou back it up.
(25:58):
Yeah, and but you after them be careful to not fall into the
I've told them now, so they've better do it this way.
That is a trap. So don't do that to me.
I wouldn't, especially if it's some really expensive gift.
But the other part of that too is, and I think this is the
challenge is not allowing that to them becoming a rule.
And then it's the mental load side of things.
So you're not just like I, everyday, every week, I'm going to
(26:18):
ask them how they want to be, feel loved, and I'm going to
remove the load mentally of thatfrom myself and make them have
to answer me. So it is a, it's a delicate
balance of using this as a constructive tool that helps
inform that conversation rather than an excuse to leave that to
them. Does that make sense?
Yeah, yeah. I'll get.
(26:39):
You, yeah. So yeah, just having that as a
check in point, and when you do your weekly check in with all
the other things we've talked about, having check insurance
with, this could be something that you put in there as well #3
is love is about effort. It's not just about preference.
So a strong relationship isn't just about being loved in your
own way or loving your partner in their own way.
It's about recognising the efforts that go into that, even
(27:00):
when it's love that's expressed differently.
And I think it can be hard when there's a pattern of love being
expressed in a way that's not catering for you or especially
if you've had the conversation before and it's not changing.
But the effort that goes into someone expressing love is
really important to be aware of as well.
Because that is, even if it's not hitting the mark, it is is
(27:22):
still valid. It's still something that
they've put effort into and it'simportant.
So if your love language is quality time, but your partner
is all about acts of service, you might crave deep
conversations while they're busyfolding laundry and filling your
car with gas, but they are showing you love.
You just need to see it, but youalso need to be able to have
that conversation. So again, this one comes with a
grain of salt, kind of balancingflexibility with it as well.
(27:46):
And the last one is notice your partner's love bids, which is
similar to what we've just discussed.
Love bids is something they talkabout in the book as well.
And that's the small everyday little attempts that people put
towards making connections. So holding someone's hand,
saying, I love you like these little things that we just
injected into our days. Those are called love bids.
Sending a meme a really funny reel could be a love bid.
(28:11):
Is it the first one? Maybe the 100th one?
Come on. It's 100 little love bids.
So the mistake is ignoring love bids because they don't look
like romantic gestures, but it is important to recognise the
heart behind them. So an example, your partner
mentioned something random abouttheir day and you brush it off.
But that was a love bid in a small way where they were
(28:31):
reaching for you, they were reaching for a connection.
And I think one of the things that is a really common
distraction from these moments is people's phones.
And I definitely find this as well, like being distracted by
your phone or your social media or your connection to the wider
world and just not having the time to be present.
So I think there's things that play a part in our everyday
(28:53):
lives that make it hard to recognise those little love
beds, especially when it's things like little conversations
or little moments. But it's important to try and
take moment to recognise them. And I find this a lot with our
kids. There's a lot of times where I
just am so zoned out and I just,I feel like I can't be present
for every single little love bidthat they give me of pieces of
(29:16):
information and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Which is I have a lot of grace for myself and every parent
because it is a lot, especially when you've got four of them at
the one time doing. But it's a good example of this
where there's moments of love bids being like little dropped
around and it's very easy to just not see them.
So just being aware of those things.
So a challenge for this one is for the next 24 hours, pay
(29:39):
attention to all the little waysyour partner tries to connect
instead of overlooking them. Respond even in small ways.
So every time your partner touches your back as they walk
past or your butt, who knows, every time you know they say I
love you or every time they're telling you something about
their day, try and notice it as a love bid to connect and being
aware of those small things. So those are some of the ways we
(30:01):
can think better about love languages and kind of reframe it
and use it in a constructive wayinstead of allowing it to become
something that we misunderstand.It's love languages, guys.
Oh. We nailed it.
We nailed it. We nailed that love language.
Yeah, we're gonna move into our reality check corner now.
Make this a little practical this season.
We really want it to be practical.
(30:22):
We really want you guys to be able to, if you want to take
that challenge right now, today and be like, actually, yeah, I'm
gonna try this. This is worth trying.
And so we've incorporated this reality check corner to have
some really quick, easy things that you can do in your
relationship by yourself, even to reflect on your relationship
right now if you want. So the first one is our
reflection prompt. This is just something I want
(30:44):
you to think about. Just take a moment to assess how
you're going personally with this.
When was the last time you askedyour partner how they needed to
be loved rather than assuming you already know?
And as we said, hop on over to Patreon if you want to see us
talk about this, because I've already got answers.
Cheating. Blair hasn't thought about this
for ages. That's not what we want you to
do. All right?
(31:05):
Connection challenge. This is a little challenge you
can do so for the next 24 hours.Ask your partner in the next 24
hours, I should say not for the whole 24 hours because that will
become annoying in the next 24 hours.
Ask your partner, what is something I can do today that
would make you feel really loved?
And then try and do it. Obviously some things are easier
(31:26):
done than others, but be creative and work on around the
suggestion that they have and just having a moment where
you're being incredibly intentional with that as a
challenge to yourself, I think is really helpful. 24 hours,
easy to do, not hard. All right now we've got a future
pace exercise. And this is where I just want
(31:48):
you to try and really, really visualise, think about, reflect
on what I'm about to read out. And we're, we're trying to
project a future that we want and they were aiming for.
And then we're trying to gather the emotions and the feelings
and the senses that we have and the things we're seeing,
feeling, whatever in that and borrow from that for now.
(32:09):
Because that helps you in terms of motivating how you go
forward. So you can close your eyes if
you want, or you can just sit and think about what I'm about
to read out. I want you to Fast forward five
years into the future. You're sitting across from your
partner, laughing, feeling deeply connected.
There's an ease between you thatwasn't always there because you
both finally figured out how to love each other well.
(32:30):
And when you think back, you remember 1 specific conversation
that changed everything. I want you to just sit there for
a second and picture what that looks like, how you guys are
sitting or standing, how you're talking, what your partner's
face looks like, how you're feeling inside, what the
scenario around you might be. And just really picture that
future. Now I want you to ask yourself
if you had that conversation that changed everything right
(32:53):
now. If you sat down and asked your
partner what is one way I can love you better, What might
shift, what might come up in that conversation?
And what is stopping you from having that conversation if you
haven't had it? Good questions, Amy.
Great questions, Amy. All right.
Well, thanks guys for being herefor love languages and what
might make them a little misunderstood.
We hope this is a helpful episode in terms of clarifying
(33:14):
some of that. And if it is helpful, please let
us know. If you disagree with anything,
please let us know because again, this is an area where we
want to grow in. Yeah, we'll continually grow in
learning. So yeah.
Or just comments, let us know. We want to hear from you guys.
We don't want to hear from our chatters, even though we love.
Hearing We love hearing from ourchatters, but.
We want to hear from you too, sosend in.
Yeah. And share it with a friend.
(33:34):
If you think it's helpful, shareit with a friend, review rate.
All of those things go a really long way to supporting the
podcast and helping us keep going.
Yeah, great. Thanks, guys.
Thanks, guys. Bye.
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