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When my husband and I got married we had 1 Corinthians 13 read by our best man and maid of honor.  If you don’t mind I’d just like to write that out for you…I’ll start with vs. 4.

“Love is PATIENT,
love is KIND.
It does NOT envy,
it does NOT boast,
it is NOT proud.
It does NOT dishonor others,
it is NOT self-seeking,
it is NOT easily angered,
it keeps NO RECORD of wrongs.
Love does NOT delight in evil but REJOICES with the truth.
It ALWAYS protects, ALWAYS trusts, ALWAYS hopes ALWAYS perseveres.
LOVE NEVER FAILS.”
You stand at the alter with your husband and all these words are read and your future looks so bright, so full of promise.  Everything will continue going just right.  Your tank is full and overflowing.  But then some bumps come along the way: your first fight after being married (!), the realization of how hard it is to actually do a REAL budget, your first notice of delinquency on a bill, the differences in the way you do things….  All of these (and so many more) start taking away from your tank and soon you don’t know why you feel so alone and so… everything that is opposite of the verses above.  You start to question if you married the right person or what am I doing wrong that I can’t seem to do things right anymore.  You begin to realize how impossible it is to faithfully do everything written in 1 Corinthians 13.
But I am here to tell you that there is a way to overcome all of this.  You won’t do it perfectly all the time, but it will help! All you have to do is to start focusing on “the tank”.  Now what is this tank that I am I talking about?  This tank is what fills us up when we feel loved, when we feel cherished, when we feel respected.  We need to constantly be working to fill that tank up in our spouse.  Then the times that we mess up and take a little bit (or a lot) from that tank it won’t be as harsh as it could be if the tank is standing there bone dry.
My hubby and I have talked about these tanks for a long time. We have struggled for a long time trying to figure out each others love languages.  It finally hit me earlier this year what my love language is.  My love language is Words of Affirmation!  Once the reality of that hit me it made so much sense.  I am always looking for what people are thinking about what I am doing, making sure that they are happy.  Wanting so desperately to hear approval.  Criticizing words always hurt the most.  It was like a dagger to the back.  I always hated competitions because I knew I would have to hear hard words.  I know that it’s all in making me a better wife, mom, friend, and person in general but words hold so much power to me, which is probably why I love to write.  (I wrote a whole post of my realization on my other blog if you wanted to read it.)
Anyway, I can’t remember how I came across this but I found that The Five Love Languages book by Gary Chapman had a quiz that you could take to figure out what your love language is.  So I took it!  And sure enough Words of Affirmation was my top love language. Followed by Acts of Service, Physical Touch, Gifts, and Quality Time.  Since I felt validated in what my love language was I wanted to figure out my husbands.  So at 11:30pm the other night I gave him the quiz and his results were: Physical Touch and Quality Time were tied, Words, Acts of Service, and finally Gifts.  It is so much easier to pour into my hubby Words of Affirmation because that is my natural response, but that’s not his at all.  One of his top love languages is my bottom love language!  This could be a very interesting challenge for me.
How many times I have felt like this.  I am pouring “words” into you and I am getting nothing back!  Or my hubby saying that he gives me hugs all time, rubs my arms, spends time with me but it doesn’t seem to be working.  Then you start thinking maybe it’s just not there anymore…  But I assure you it is there!  We just aren’t speaking the right language because it is foreign to us!  I know that I can’t undo all the times that I have drained my hubby’s tank, but I can from now on make the choice to consciously fill it up.  I need to be more intentional at giving him hugs, grabbing his hand,  kissing his cheek, just touching him in a loving way.  I used to give him back rubs all the time when we were dating, I need to start doing that more often again.  I think I am going to struggle more with Quality Time.  He needs me to be present and there.  It is much easier to give him that “quality time” when he and I are on a date, but if the kiddos are around my attention gets divided, and I need to remember that He needs to be a priority too.
We are all constant “works in progress” and we need to be given grace while we figure this all out…how to love on our spouses the way they deserve.  I encourage you to take the quiz and have your hubby take it as well.  It may open your eyes to something you never thought about before.  No one ever said that marriage was going to be easy, but if you go all in and fight for your marriage, more often than not, it’s well worth it.
Many Blessings,
Heather C.
Romans 12:10 “Be devoted to one another in love.  Honor one another above yourselves.”