Receiving Gifts
"Don’t mistake this love language for materialism; the receiver of gifts thrives on the love, thoughtfulness, and effort behind the gift. If you speak this language, the perfect gift or gesture shows that you are known, you are cared for, and you are prized above whatever was sacrificed to bring the gift to you. A missed birthday, anniversary, or a hasty, thoughtless gift would be disastrous – so would the absence of everyday gestures. Gifts are visual representations of love and are treasured greatly." - taken from 5lovelanguages.com
If you are not aware of The 5 Love Languages written by Gary Chapman, then this post may seem completely ridiculous to you. I highly recommend checking out the website or reading the book because it can explain so much about different relationships you have with others.
I DO NOT want to be mistaken as materialistic, that is not what I am discussing here. I want to challenge people to love those around them that enjoy receiving gifts, by giving them thoughtful and meaningful gifts for any and all reasons. And also learn how to love those that may speak a different love language than you. It's amazing how different we each feel loved.
My 26th birthday is coming up at the end of this month and my love language is very much receiving gifts. I just love unwrapping things and getting surprises (only surprises I don't know about - if I know there is a surprise, the anticipation drives me crazy!) I grew up in a family that celebrated birthdays with gifts and cake, a party with your favorite people, and lots of fun. Christmas was the same; surrounded by family, friends, and gift giving. Valentine's Day was a day for special gifts from my dad too, each of his girls would get at least a box chocolates, if not a sweet note or flowers too.
My husband does not understand the love language of receiving gifts. Birthdays weren't a huge deal in his house growing up and gifts just weren't all that important to him because his family did more things like extended trips together. His love language is physical touch and acts of service. But even though his love language isn't receiving gifts, he spoke that to me fairly well while we were dating. He bought me flowers on Valentine's Day, made me PB&Js to eat on campus together (and because I was too lazy to wake up and make myself lunch), tried to learn one of my favorite songs on guitar, wrote me love letters, and brought back gifts that made him think of me from Mexico. Oh, and my favorite gift he's given me, footsie pajamas for my 20th birthday! These things aren't expensive, but I remember every single gift he has given me and they are all so special and meaningful to me because he cared enough to give me a token of his love.
With my birthday coming up soon, I often ask him if he has a party planned or what he's getting me for my birthday. It mostly gives him anxiety, which to me seems so silly, but he really gets worried that he doesn't love me in my love language well enough. But he said something interesting to me the other night, adults don't get birthday presents. Which is mostly true, as adults we don't have the fun slumber parties or gifts from friends and family like we did when we were 8. And to be honest, that makes me sad. Not only because my love language is gifts - and what better day to receive gifts than on the anniversary of when you were birthed (which really I should forward my gifts to my mom for birthing me) - but also because I am still a child at heart. I LOVE celebrations! It is so fun to get your favorite people together for any sort of celebration. I like birthday parties, bonfires, baby showers, weddings, and even just themed parties for no reason at all! I like having a good time and on my birthday it doesn't hurt to receive a few gifts from those that mean the most to you, too.
I do want to quickly mention that if you do not speak the love language of gifts, ask someone who does. If you feel like you're bad at giving gifts, ask someone that understands the person you're selecting a gift for. My mother-in-law loves to go thrift shopping, and I do too actually. But sometimes it feels like she just found something random, that might be loosely related to something I like, and then wrapped it up for me. But what I really loved was the starfish necklace she bought me because of the story of the boy throwing starfish back into the sea, one by one. She shared that story with me years ago, and it had meant so much to me then and has been a beautiful reminder to reach out even if I can only help one person. To have a physical token of that story and that moment we had together was so incredibly kind and thoughtful. Also, gift cards to a place the person would enjoy or wouldn't go to themselves are acceptable gifts - for me personally, at least.
Practical gifts for those that have this love language don't exactly count as speaking our love language either. Since Anthony doesn't care for gifts, if someone wants to buy him something he WANTS it to be practical. Whereas practical gifts feel sort of lazy and thoughtless to me, unless it's something specific I've been wanting - like brand new pots & pans. I know - it's a complicated love language.
So why is it that when we have more responsibility, we can no longer have birthday parties or presents? Are we all too busy to celebrate each other? Do we feel like we've "grown" out of it? And what about the people that want to have parties and receive gifts? Should we just pretend we don't? I mean, it's clearly not the worst thing that can happen, but it's nice to be celebrated. Maybe it's all just personal preference, I mean love languages certainly are. But maybe we just need to be more aware of what love language those in our lives speak.
That may just be the whole point to this train of thought. Adults deserve parties and presents too sometimes. And we all deserve to be loved in our own love languages: physical touch, acts of service, words of affirmation, receiving gifts or quality time. I don't want to feel guilty or selfish when I ask for a birthday party or a small thoughtful gift from time to time. That's just how I feel loved and connected with others. So I don't want you to feel guilty either if that is your love language.
If you're a friend or family member that would want to give me a gift for my 26th birthday, just contact me and I would be happy to let you know what I like. But please, don't feel obligated to get me anything. I don't want to guilt anyone into buying me a gift either - that wouldn't feel good on either side. I just want to make the love language of receiving gifts a little more acceptable and a little less intimidating.
"Don’t mistake this love language for materialism; the receiver of gifts thrives on the love, thoughtfulness, and effort behind the gift. If you speak this language, the perfect gift or gesture shows that you are known, you are cared for, and you are prized above whatever was sacrificed to bring the gift to you. A missed birthday, anniversary, or a hasty, thoughtless gift would be disastrous – so would the absence of everyday gestures. Gifts are visual representations of love and are treasured greatly." - taken from 5lovelanguages.com
If you are not aware of The 5 Love Languages written by Gary Chapman, then this post may seem completely ridiculous to you. I highly recommend checking out the website or reading the book because it can explain so much about different relationships you have with others.
I DO NOT want to be mistaken as materialistic, that is not what I am discussing here. I want to challenge people to love those around them that enjoy receiving gifts, by giving them thoughtful and meaningful gifts for any and all reasons. And also learn how to love those that may speak a different love language than you. It's amazing how different we each feel loved.
My 26th birthday is coming up at the end of this month and my love language is very much receiving gifts. I just love unwrapping things and getting surprises (only surprises I don't know about - if I know there is a surprise, the anticipation drives me crazy!) I grew up in a family that celebrated birthdays with gifts and cake, a party with your favorite people, and lots of fun. Christmas was the same; surrounded by family, friends, and gift giving. Valentine's Day was a day for special gifts from my dad too, each of his girls would get at least a box chocolates, if not a sweet note or flowers too.
My husband does not understand the love language of receiving gifts. Birthdays weren't a huge deal in his house growing up and gifts just weren't all that important to him because his family did more things like extended trips together. His love language is physical touch and acts of service. But even though his love language isn't receiving gifts, he spoke that to me fairly well while we were dating. He bought me flowers on Valentine's Day, made me PB&Js to eat on campus together (and because I was too lazy to wake up and make myself lunch), tried to learn one of my favorite songs on guitar, wrote me love letters, and brought back gifts that made him think of me from Mexico. Oh, and my favorite gift he's given me, footsie pajamas for my 20th birthday! These things aren't expensive, but I remember every single gift he has given me and they are all so special and meaningful to me because he cared enough to give me a token of his love.
With my birthday coming up soon, I often ask him if he has a party planned or what he's getting me for my birthday. It mostly gives him anxiety, which to me seems so silly, but he really gets worried that he doesn't love me in my love language well enough. But he said something interesting to me the other night, adults don't get birthday presents. Which is mostly true, as adults we don't have the fun slumber parties or gifts from friends and family like we did when we were 8. And to be honest, that makes me sad. Not only because my love language is gifts - and what better day to receive gifts than on the anniversary of when you were birthed (which really I should forward my gifts to my mom for birthing me) - but also because I am still a child at heart. I LOVE celebrations! It is so fun to get your favorite people together for any sort of celebration. I like birthday parties, bonfires, baby showers, weddings, and even just themed parties for no reason at all! I like having a good time and on my birthday it doesn't hurt to receive a few gifts from those that mean the most to you, too.
I do want to quickly mention that if you do not speak the love language of gifts, ask someone who does. If you feel like you're bad at giving gifts, ask someone that understands the person you're selecting a gift for. My mother-in-law loves to go thrift shopping, and I do too actually. But sometimes it feels like she just found something random, that might be loosely related to something I like, and then wrapped it up for me. But what I really loved was the starfish necklace she bought me because of the story of the boy throwing starfish back into the sea, one by one. She shared that story with me years ago, and it had meant so much to me then and has been a beautiful reminder to reach out even if I can only help one person. To have a physical token of that story and that moment we had together was so incredibly kind and thoughtful. Also, gift cards to a place the person would enjoy or wouldn't go to themselves are acceptable gifts - for me personally, at least.
Practical gifts for those that have this love language don't exactly count as speaking our love language either. Since Anthony doesn't care for gifts, if someone wants to buy him something he WANTS it to be practical. Whereas practical gifts feel sort of lazy and thoughtless to me, unless it's something specific I've been wanting - like brand new pots & pans. I know - it's a complicated love language.
So why is it that when we have more responsibility, we can no longer have birthday parties or presents? Are we all too busy to celebrate each other? Do we feel like we've "grown" out of it? And what about the people that want to have parties and receive gifts? Should we just pretend we don't? I mean, it's clearly not the worst thing that can happen, but it's nice to be celebrated. Maybe it's all just personal preference, I mean love languages certainly are. But maybe we just need to be more aware of what love language those in our lives speak.
That may just be the whole point to this train of thought. Adults deserve parties and presents too sometimes. And we all deserve to be loved in our own love languages: physical touch, acts of service, words of affirmation, receiving gifts or quality time. I don't want to feel guilty or selfish when I ask for a birthday party or a small thoughtful gift from time to time. That's just how I feel loved and connected with others. So I don't want you to feel guilty either if that is your love language.
If you're a friend or family member that would want to give me a gift for my 26th birthday, just contact me and I would be happy to let you know what I like. But please, don't feel obligated to get me anything. I don't want to guilt anyone into buying me a gift either - that wouldn't feel good on either side. I just want to make the love language of receiving gifts a little more acceptable and a little less intimidating.
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