Do You Love Me?
In John 21, after his resurrection, Jesus asks Peter three times....”Do you love me?” We all need to feel loved. But according to Dr. Gary Chapman, a Baptist counselor who has specialized in couples and family issues, we feel especially loved when it is expressed to us in a language we understand. Some of us respond best to compliments and other words of affirmation. Others feel most loved during quality time – when receiving undivided attention from someone close to them. Or some feel it is important to get gifts or tangible expressions of love. The two other most common ways people feel particularly loved is through physical touch and acts of service. My own daughter responds well to hugs, but my son lights up when I make him a sandwich even though he’s quite capable of fixing his own meals.
It is a natural tendency for parents to express love in the way we most want it ourselves. But parenting is not always about doing what comes naturally. In Five Love Languages of Children, Dr. Chapman and his co-author Ross Campbell suggest that when our child misbehaves, we stop and wonder, “What does my child most need right now?” One way to discern how to love your child in a way most effective for her is to listen to what she complains about most often. You can also watch your child with his friends to see how he expresses love to them. Or when you child seems sad or whiny, offer her a choice between activities like getting a backrub or playing a game together. Children who grow up in a loving household become loving people. Though it feels to me that the term “love languages” was manufactured to sell books, many of the child-rearing suggestions by the authors are quite sound. The primary premise seems to follow Maria Montessori’s suggestion that to help a child learn what s/he most needs to learn, we “follow the child.”
Kathleen Capcara
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