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What if knowing your loved one’s love language isn’t enough?
Kicking off this new year, Juli sits down with Dr. Gary Chapman to unpack how it is that we can know each other’s love language and still feel disconnected.
Whether you’re married, parenting, or navigating close friendships, this episode will challenge you to love more intentionally—and more effectively.
Guest: Dr. Gary Chapman
Dr. Chapman (00:00.12)
I’ve had many couples, Juli, through the years come up to me and say, Dr. Chapman, we just want to share with you that book, The Five Love Languages, saved our marriage 20 years ago. 20 years ago, we were at the point of giving up because we just felt like we’d married the wrong person. It wasn’t working. We were too different. And we read that book and the lights came on and we took the quiz and we learned each other’s language and we started speaking it. And it changed the whole emotional connection that we had with each other.
Juli
Well, hey friend and happy new year. Welcome to another year of Java with Juli. I am your host, Dr. Juli Slattery. And this podcast is an outreach of authentic intimacy, which is a ministry helping people make sense of God and sexuality. Now you might remember a few months ago, we asked you all to fill out a survey, just to let us know what you’d like us to be talking about on Java with Juli. And we had almost 900 people fill out that survey, which is great because we got to know you and about the things that you care most about. And a lot of you said you want more content on how to build healthy relationships, specifically how to build healthy relationships within marriage. And so we’re headed in that direction as we kick off the new year. I am talking with one of my favorite guests on Java with Juli. You will be very familiar with him, Dr. Gary Chapman, who is most well known for his groundbreaking and bestselling book, The Five Love Languages. And now The Five Love Languages has sold, I think it’s over 20 million copies. It’s been translated into about 50 languages around the world. And you really can’t live in Western culture without hearing references to The Five Love Languages.
So this book really has shifted the culture of how we understand how to love one another. Dr. Chapman is a pastor. He is passionate about counseling couples and individuals and given the nature of his work, he’s also passionate about teaching us how to show love to one another well. And so the conversation I’m going to have with him today is not just for marriage because we want to know the love language and how to love people well in all of our relationships, our friendships, our children, our parents. And Dr. Chapman is the guru on this.
And he recently released a new book called The Love Language That Matters the Most and he wrote this book with Drs. Les and Leslie Parrott, who are two psychologists who go deeper with this concept. And we’re going to unpack some of what they’ve discovered and written about in this book.
Juli
But Dr. Chapman, this is your ninth appearance on Java with Juli. So welcome back.
Dr. Chapman
Well thank you, it’s always good to be with you.
Juli (02:54.538)
It’s so good to have you. And I have been able to follow your journey a little bit with the five love languages, the many iterations that you have built off of that main brand. But this book feels unique. The love language that matters most. Can you tell me a little bit about how it came about?
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, it is unique and I am very, very excited about it. You know, through the years, people have asked me various questions about the original book and the concepts and so forth. And a couple of those things have been how does personality relate, you know, to the love languages? Another is, you mentioned dialects in that book and what are dialects and how do you figure that out? Well, we’re answering those questions in this book, among other things.
And I turned to Les and Leslie Parrott because they’re just great with that sort of thing. Les had put together for us a premium assessment online now that brings these two factors in, among other things, at which we’ve really been excited about the response to that. And this book parallels that assessment. So I’m excited about it. I think it’s going to help a lot of people who already have the basic concept go deeper and more specific in how to communicate love to each other.
Juli
Yeah, I did have a chance to take that premium assessment, as did my husband, and I’ve had a chance to read through this new book. And I would say, you know, the five love languages, those are great handles, just to relate to people in your life, relate to your spouse and friendships. But this book takes it so much deeper in terms of even what can go wrong when you think you know someone’s love language, and you’re just not hitting it. So I appreciate the work and the thought that you and the Parrotts have put into this. It’s pretty remarkable how deep it goes.
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, I’m excited about it. think if people haven’t read the original book, I’d say read it first. This book is built on that book. So there’s 20 million out there who you can read the new book now.
Juli
Yeah, there you go. Yeah, they say for every book that’s sold, like, I don’t know, five or ten people read it. So you’ve impacted a lot more than even 20 million people, which is pretty overwhelming. But yeah, for the sake of this conversation, I would say what is the basic information that people need to know about the five love languages before we dive deeper?
Dr. Chapman
Well, I think basically we have to understand that what makes one person feel loved doesn’t make another person feel loved. And what makes you feel loved doesn’t necessarily make the other person feel loved. We just assume that if something makes us feel loved, it’ll make them feel loved. No, just as we have different spoken languages in the world, we have different love languages. And if we don’t learn the other person’s love language and learn how to express our love in their language, we will not be successful in meeting their emotional need for love. And that’s what the love language is all about. It’s meeting the basic need that all of us have to feel loved by the significant people in our lives.
Juli (06:11.086)
Boy, it’s so profound, and you know, I was able to guess my husband’s love languages, like his primary and secondary out of the gate, because I’ve lived with him for 31 years, and we’ve had a lot of conversations. But then I started to think about, do I know my children’s love languages? And I don’t. Like, I actually sent them the assessment. I’m like, hey, can you guys take this because I can kind of guess, but I don’t know them that well. Like I would know my spouse. So again, this is helpful, not just for romantic relationships or marriage. It’s for the important people in our life. Like if you really want to know how to love them, you have to know the language they speak. So it’s groundbreaking. I don’t know how that’s played out in your personal life, Dr. Chapman.
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, well, of course, in my early life with my wife, I knew nothing about love languages. But I do remember early on, I was giving her what I would want to receive. And I wouldn’t have called it words of affirmation, but that’s what I was giving her. How nice she looked, how much I appreciated what she did. And one evening she said to me, you know, and I told her dozen times a day, I love you. I am just so glad I married you. I just love you, love you, love you.
And one night she said to me, you know, you keep on saying I love you. If you love me, why don’t you help me? And I said, what do you mean? She said, well, you don’t ever offer to wash the dishes or vacuum the floor or clean the toilet. And I didn’t say this, but what I was thinking, what are you talking about? My mother did those things. Whoa.
Juli
It’s a really good thing you didn’t voice that.
Dr. Chapman (07:51.726)
I know, we bring our history with us. In my mind, I was loving her, you know, by all the words I was giving her. Looking back on that, she was actually telling me her love language was acts of service. And in her mind, I wasn’t doing things for her, you know. So yeah, I think a lot of people stumbled upon what makes the other person feel loved. You know, people had good marriages before the book came out 33 years ago. But if so, it’s because they stumbled upon the reality, oh this is what makes them feel loved. I’ve got to start doing things for them or whatever their language is.
Juli
Yeah, and boy that involves I have to know my love language in order to be able to communicate it to my husband or the people around me. Like this is how I feel love. So it requires some of that self-awareness. It’s not just hoping somebody is a mind-reader, right?
Dr. Chapman
That’s right. We can’t read someone else’s mind and we don’t always understand ourselves. If people have never seen the concept or heard the concept, they’re just likely loving the other person the way they’d want to be loved. And if it works fine, if it doesn’t work fine, they don’t know what else to do.
Juli
Well, you mentioned two of the love languages, words of affirmation, acts of service. Really quickly, what are the other three?
Dr. Chapman (09:14.658)
One of them is gifts. It’s universal to give gifts as an expression of love. The gift says, they were thinking about me. Look what they got from me. And then there’s quality time, giving the other person your undivided attention. I do not mean husband and wife sitting and watching TV together. Someone else has your attention. I’m talking about TV is off, computer is down. We’re not answering our phone. We’re giving each other our full attention. Or we could be walking down the road and talking and going out to eat, assuming we talk. We’ve all seen people, couples at the table in a restaurant, and they each have their phone out answering text messages. That’s not quality time, okay? And you don’t always have to be talking. Sometimes it’s just being with them, doing something they want to do. It may be planting a flower garden together or anything. But if they have your full attention, that’s the key.
Dr. Chapman
And then number five is physical touch. We’ve long known the emotional power of physical touch. That’s why we pick up babies, hold them, kiss them, and cuddle them. Long before the baby understands the meaning of the word love, the baby feels love by physical touch. So those are the five love languages. And of course, the basic idea is each of us has a primary love language. And if you don’t discover what that is and learn to speak that language, the other person will not feel loved, even though in your mind you are loving them because you’re speaking one of the other languages.
Juli
And what do you think is wrong with a person who would just say, you know what, this is just how I’m wired. For example, I’m not a touchy person. I’m married to somebody who has physical touches of love language, but that’s just not me. They just have to accept that I buy gifts instead.
Dr. Chapman (11:08.6)
Well, I think that person in a very real sense is being very selfish. They’re saying, I’m not willing to change anything in order to meet a need for my spouse. I am who I am. I’m not going to change anything. They don’t feel love. That’s their problem. That attitude of selfishness is never going to lead to a healthy marriage. Two people who have a selfish attitude will not have a healthy marriage, but to choose the attitude of love. And it starts with an attitude, not with a feeling. Now the in love thing starts with a feeling, but we all know we come down off that experience. And the long-term love, it really is an attitude. And the attitude of love is, I want to do everything I can to enrich your life. If I can find out how to enrich your life and help you become the person you believe God wants you to be, that’s what I want to do. Two people who have that attitude, the love language concept gives you the ability to effectively meet one of their needs, and that is the need to feel loved.
Juli
You use this term, love tank, to kind of describe not just the love languages, but what we’re trying to do with the love languages. Can you explain what a love tank is?
Dr. Chapman
It’s a metaphor. I’m using a gasoline tank as a metaphor. If your gasoline tank in your car is full, you can drive a long ways. If you’re near empty, you better be looking for a gas station or you’re going to be stranded beside of the road somewhere. But what I’m saying is we all have an emotional love tank. If the love tank is full, then you can flourish.
Dr. Chapman (13:05.326)
But if you feel like they don’t really love me, I don’t know if they even want to be married to me. Your life’s not gonna flourish, I can tell you that. And so, I use it as a picture that couples can use in talking with each other. know, once they have discovered each other’s language, I say every two or three weeks, why don’t you just say to your spouse, on a scale of zero to 10, how full is your love tank this week? And if they say anything less than 10, you say, what could I do this week to fill it?
And they may tell you something that’s not even their primary language because that particular week, certain things, certain circumstances, but they tell you, now you’ve got real information on the moment. that’s what I need to be doing this week. All right, I’m up to it. So it’s just a concept that I think the average person can understand. And consequently, what we want to do is to keep the other person’s love tank full.
Juli
Yeah, boy, that’s a question that any of us can ask. It’s non-threatening and it gives us practical next steps. When you talk about somebody’s love tank running empty or just that concept in general, I think we have to recognize that it’s not just our marriage that impacts the love tank. People come to marriage with different capacities to love with different, I think you call them in your book, like leaks in your love tank that it may have nothing to do with marriage, but might have to do with wounds they have or what’s going on around them with relationships or work. Can you talk a little bit about that concept so we can understand just the larger context of what impacts a love tank?
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, I think first of all, I would say there is a sense in which people have different sizes of tanks. For example, a person that grew up in a home where they always felt loved as a child and through the teenage years, they always felt loved. They have a large love tank. And so you can speak their love language and fill their love tank and they can run for a while on that. I mean, they just, they did. It’s just wonderful for a while. But there are people who grew up in homes where they did not feel love growing up.
Dr. Chapman (15:15.852)
Their parents did not speak their primary love language, they have a small love tank. And even if you know their love language, you’re have to fill their tank more often than that person who has a full, a large love tank. But the other aspect of that is what you mentioned. Just as speaking their love language in a positive way fills their love tank, speaking their love language in a negative way, the opposite of love, is like putting a dagger in the side of their heart. The love just leaks out. For example, if words of affirmation is their love language, and you give that person angry words, harsh words, critical words, I can tell you the love thing’s gonna shh.
Juli
Hmm.
Dr. Chapman
And what we’ve discovered, and we share this in the book, it takes about five positives to even get back to normal after you’ve done a negative like that. Because it’s hurt them so deeply, it’s emptied the tank so empty that just one, speaking their love language one time is not gonna fill the love tank. It’s gonna take probably five positives in speaking words of affirmation to them in order to get back to level ground so that they have a tank now that’s beginning to get full again. So, you know, that whole concept of how do you deplete the love tank on every one of the love languages. Maybe gifts is their language. And the first Valentine’s Day, I’m talking about in a marriage now, you don’t even get them anything. Or their birthday, you don’t give them a gift because in your family growing up, they didn’t give gifts on birthdays. Everybody just saying happy birthday.
Juli (16:57.71)
Mm.
Dr. Chapman
But this is their love language. I’m telling you, you have just made a serious mistake. We could go through all the love languages in that way. But when we deplete the love tank, whatever the size of the love tank, when it’s depleted, then we got to focus on really learning to speak their love language. And here’s another thing, Juli. You some people grow up and they never received some of these languages growing up. I remember a father who said to me, he said, Gary, my wife and I read your book on children, The Five Love Languages of Children, and my 10-year-old son, we discovered his love language is physical touch. And he said, Gary, I hate to say this, I have never hugged my son. He said I was never hugged by my mother or my father. I have no memories of being hugged by either one of them. And I don’t know how to do that. And I said, well, you are where you are. We can’t change our history.
Dr. Chapman
But I said, here’s the good news. You can learn to speak any of these languages as an adult, even if you didn’t receive them as a child. Now that you know how important it is that you speak that child’s love language or the other person’s love language, you can learn how to do it. So I said to him, why don’t you come over and stand beside me? He did, and I said, now take your right hand and just tap me on the shoulder. He said, really? I said, yeah, not hard, just tap me. He said, okay. I said, now that’s your assignment this week. I’m not asking you to hug your son. I’m asking you to walk up to him and just tap him on the shoulder. Okay? So he came back and he did. And then I said next week, said, tap me on the shoulder and then give me two little pats on the back. He did. I said, that’s your assignment this week. And I just kept going like that. Juli, I’ll never forget the day I said to him, I said, now’s the day. And I stood up in my office. said, now come and hug me. He said, oh, Dr. Chapman, you, you, you really, you, hahaha
Juli (18:50.03)
You tricked him into it.
Dr. Chapman
And what happened, he stood there and I just had my arms down beside him. His arms were like lead, but he finally got them up there and I waited for him to step in and he didn’t. So I reached out and grabbed him and pulled him in.
Juli
He survived.
Dr. Chapman
And he hugged me. And then I said, okay, man, this is the week. I want you to go home. I don’t care what time of day. I don’t care what day of the week, but I want you to hug him. I said, you can hug him from the side, you can hug him from the back, you can hug him from the front, but this is the week to do it. And he said, I hope I can do it. I said, man, you just did it to me, you can do it.
Juli
You can learn any of these.
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, that’s it. You can learn any of these languages. If you understand why it is so important that you learn to speak that language and don’t take the attitude that you mentioned earlier of, that’s just not who I am. I’m just not a touchy feely person and they got to get over that. Okay. Well, you just set yourself up not to have a positive relationship with that person.
Juli (19:59.278)
Well, hey friend, I’m jumping in just for a quick minute to let you know that you still have time to join one of our online book studies this winter. Groups will start at the end of January and we still have spots available for women, whether you’re single or married, and for couples. We’ve even got one specifically for moms. So we’re gonna be going through books like Surrendered Sexuality, Finding the Hero in Your Husband, and God’s Sex in Your Marriage, and also Sex and the Single Girl, which I’m currently rewriting, so you will be part of that brand new rewrite of Sex and the Single Girl if you jump in on this study. Now each study includes a weekly Zoom meeting with your group and a trained volunteer. You’ll have access to online discussion groups and you’ll have a live Q &A at the end with me. So just go to authenticintimacy.com and grab your spot today. And we’ll drop that link in the show notes as well. All right, let’s head back to the coffee shop.
Juli
This concept of love languages is so key. I mean, for a lot of people who are familiar with it, it sounds simple. But I think about the example you just shared and how many families does that little boy just grow up not ever getting the physical touch he needs because nobody identifies this as this is the way he experiences love. yeah, I mean, it’s it’s transformative. How many marriages do you have people just walking around feeling unloved when it’s just because they don’t know how to communicate it in the right way. So it’s really profound.
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, I’ve had many couples, Juli, through the years come up to me and say, Dr. Chaman, we just want to share with you that book, The Five Love Languages, saved our marriage 20 years ago. You the book’s been out 30 years now, 33 years now, actually. 20 years ago, we were at the point of giving up because we just felt like we’d married the wrong person. It wasn’t working. We were too different. And we read that book and the lights came on and we realized what had happened.
Dr. Chapman (22:02.284)
And we took the quiz and we learned each other’s language and we started speaking it and it changed the whole emotional connection that we had with each other. so, yeah, because it’s dealing with a really fundamental emotional need that we all have, that need to feel loved.
Juli
Yeah. Well, we mentioned how this new book takes the concept even deeper. You know, there are some couples who would say, I learned my spouse’s love language. I know how to do that. I do it all the time, but we’re still not connecting. Because in this book, you really write about some of the nuances of how this can get in the way, even. Like if I just think, my husband likes words of affirmation, so I’m just going to affirm them all the time and then that’s all there is to it. You’re like, no, there’s a lot more to it in terms of understanding personality, understanding maybe secondary love languages, context. How do you help us understand where we need to go beyond just identifying a primary love language?
Dr. Chapman
Well, I think first of all, we have to ask ourselves, why am I speaking their love language or trying to? Because I think there’s some people, and I’ve had them say this to me, we read the book and took the quiz. And so I started speaking their love language and I spoke it for three weeks or four weeks, but they didn’t start speaking mine. So it’s not working. And I say, well, let me make sure I understand you. You’re speaking their love language so they will speak your love language? That’s manipulation. You’re doing that to get something. That’s selfish. God loved us unconditionally when we were dirty rotten sinners. He sent Christ to die for us. That’s the kind of love that the Bible calls us to. So you love them because you choose an attitude of love. And you know that God has told us that we’re to love others, love God first and then love others.
Dr. Chapman (24:04.466)
And so sometimes people have the wrong attitude. They’re really trying to get something for themselves. I think sometimes also you mentioned the secondary love language. Sometimes they overlook that and they just just speak only the primary love language. And for some people, their secondary love language is very close to their first love language. I call them bilingual. Either one of those are going to speak deeply to them. So if you just ignore all the others and only speak their primary and they have a secondary that’s pretty close. That may be why they’re not feeling loved in the way you feel like, well, they ought to feel loved. I’m speaking their love language. And of course, another factor in that is you may not be speaking the dialect of their language. You’re speaking the general language, but you’re not speaking the specific type of words, for example, that would communicate most deeply to them. And that’s a place where this book is going to really help people because they’re going to discover that.
And I think another thing also is that we often don’t even talk about personality or think about personality and how the personality might fit into the love language. I’ll just give you one example. If they, for example, are an introvert and their love language is words of affirmation, and so you think to yourself, I’m going to really speak them and I’m going have a party for them. And while they’re there, I’m going tell all these people how wonderful they are. And you do that and you’re up there telling all these positive things about them and an introvert is sitting there saying, oh man, don’t do that. They need words of affirmation, but it needs to be in private, not in front of other people. But if they’re an extrovert, then yeah, get up there and brag on them in front of everybody. They love it.
Dr. Chapman
And in the book, of course, we talk about how all the personalities interface with the love languages and what the dialects of all of them are. This new book is going to help a lot of people, I think, be much more effective than they have been, even though they’ve got the basic concept down.
Juli (26:13.248)
Yeah, you break down different aspects of personality. One you mentioned was introvert versus extrovert. There were a few other defining characteristics of personality that you guys address. Can you share what those others are?
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, one of them is being cautious, very cautious about what you do. And the other side of that is being very curious. So one person, for example, who’s very cautious about things, may say to the other person on a Friday night, maybe his wife’s language, let me say, is quality time. So on Friday night at dinner, he says, honey, why don’t we in the morning get up early and you and I go take a hike up at Pilot Mountain?
We just spend a whole day up there together. And she said, honey, I’ve got my day planned tomorrow. And he said, you can push those things back to next Saturday. Well, she just feels like he’s running over her. And when she says, I can’t do that, then he feels that he’s been rejected. But it wasn’t taken into account her personality. She’s not the kind of person that’s curious and wanting to always do new things. I mean, she’s very cautious, and she’s very planned and very organized. And so I think that’s why if we understand personality, we’re less likely to make mistakes in doing things that we think are going to really be meaningful to them when because of their personality, no, it’s not something real loving. It’s something that they feel like, you should know me better than that.
Juli
Yeah, for sure. And if you just have that basic understanding of, your love language is quality time, it doesn’t help you really with how you actually apply that in real life situations. You know, like another example might be, let’s say you’re with somebody who their love language is gifts and they’re married to somebody who’s really cautious and spending an extravagant amount of money on a gift, like that’s gonna be really tough for them. So how do they navigate the love language and the personality dynamic too?
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, that’s exactly right. And the dialect of that. You know some people, their dialect is fanciful gifts. jewelry, things like that. man, that’s amazing and wonderful. There are others, that’s not the kind of gift they want. They want a sentimental gift. You just put frame a picture of some experience the two of you had together a year ago, and you give that to them. Oh man, that’s gonna speak loudly to them. You went to all the trouble of getting this framed and all of that. Man, this is one of the best gifts you’ve ever given me. So it’s not just knowing the language. It’s knowing how the personality fits in with it or what the dialect in that particular language is most meaningful to them.
Juli
Now, I have a little bit of a bias in asking this question. Do love languages change with time? Because I feel like mine have changed. So from when I first took this test, like way back in the day to where we are today. So that’s my bias, but.
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, through the years I’ve kind of said I think the love languages tend to stay with us for a lifetime. But I’ve come to realize that yes, there are seasons of life and circumstances where another love language may become the primary language. For example, a mother who has two preschool children acts of service may not be her primary love language. But during those years, it’s likely going to jump to the top because she’s overwhelmed.
Dr. Chapman (29:56.192)
Or for example, a circumstance. Maybe you hear your spouse get off the phone and as soon as they hang up the phone, they start crying. And you say, honey, what’s wrong? And they say, I just got word that my mother died. And then they’re just weeping. Physical touch may not be their language, but in that circumstance, you walk over and just hug them and hold them while they cry. It’s probably the most powerful thing you could do to communicate your love. I’m with you in this. You don’t have to say a word. I’m with you in this.
So yes, I think there’s seasons of life and there are circumstances in life. And that’s why I sometimes encourage couples to check in and say, on that scale of zero to 10, how full is your love tank this week? And if they say anything less than 10, you say, well, what could I do this week that would be most important? And what they tell you may not be their primary love language. It’s just that certain things this week, this would be most important. So now at least you know. So yeah, I do think it fluctuates depending on circumstances and the stage of life.
Juli
Yeah, a lot of this requires intentional work. In the book, you talk about the importance of listening and how most of us are not good listeners, which is why we don’t really understand what our loved one needs in the moment. How do we learn that skill of not just listening to words, but really leaning into listen to what it means to love someone in this season.
Dr. Chapman (31:30.946)
Well, you know we’ve always said that communication is to a relationship what oxygen is to the body. It’s essential. And communication involves essentially two things. One is sharing something with the other person talking and the other is listening. And most of us are better talkers than we are listeners. And if we are not a listener, we’re going to have to learn how to be a good listener. It will not come natural for us. So many times, if a person says something, we will say, well, you know what, I think what would help you with that is if you would do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, you know? And in fact, I had a lady in my office not long ago, and she said, you know, I share with my husband, you know, that I’m struggling or I’m kind of feeling down this week or today. And she said, he will say, well, I think what you ought to do is da, da, da, da.
And she said, in my heart, I don’t want an answer. I just want him to hear where I am. And that involves asking questions. Once she says, I’m feeling down or I’ve had a hard day today. He said, well, tell me about it, honey. What was the hardest part of today? And so she shares the hardest part of the day. And then you ask her a question. Why do you think you felt that so down about that particular thing? Well, da da da. And she tells you more, you know. And you just keep on asking questions as long as she has something else to share about it. And then you can say, well, you know, I can see how you would feel that way. If I were in your shoes, I’d probably feel the same way. And you would. So what you’re trying to do when you’re listening is to see the world through the other person’s eyes and have the sense of what they’re thinking and what they’re feeling and be able to affirm that to them.
Dr. Chapman
So you’re not trying to fix their feelings or you’re not trying to tell them, well, that’s no big deal. You shouldn’t feel that way about that. No, no, you’re identifying with their pain and their hurt. Now, if they then say, or you can say, is there anything I could do, honey, that might be helpful to you through this? And then, yeah, if they ask that, you can share an idea of what you think might be helpful to them. But don’t try to fix them before you’ve heard them.
Dr. Chapman (33:51.598)
And that’s a very common thing in marriage. And I think, I could be wrong, but I think men are more likely to fix it than women are to fix the man when he’s his things. So, but at any rate, personalities and all factor into that. learning how to be a good listener is a process. We’re not born listeners. We have to learn how to listen with our ears and with our heart so that we can affirm the other person’s experience and the feelings that they have in that experience, whether it’s positive or negative.
Juli
Mm-hmm. You and Carolyn have been married for how long?
Dr. Chapman
64 years.
Juli
64 years. That is a long time.
Dr. Chapman (34:38.047)
Now Carolyn says, how could that be possible? I’m only 49.
Juli
I know, I don’t know how that’s possible. Yeah, but you know, I think when you’ve been married for a long time, as you and Carolyn have, I wonder like, do you ever lose the curiosity? Do you ever just settle into we know each other so well, there’s no need to listen. And if so, how do you push past that?
Dr. Chapman
I think that does happen to a lot of couples. Actually for us, I’m more concerned about asking questions now because it seems as we’ve got older, she doesn’t tell me the whole story to start with. She used to go on and on just on her own and tell me all the details, but she’ll say something, you know, a statement about something. And if I don’t ask a question, that’s the end of it. And I think I know what she’s talking about, but I’m not sure that I do.
So I’m asking questions. In fact, she’ll often start telling something about somebody, but didn’t tell me the name. And I said, well, honey, who are you talking about? I didn’t catch that. She didn’t say it. That’s why I didn’t catch it. I didn’t catch that. She said, okay, I got it now. Now go ahead and finish what you were telling me about it. And both of us are that way. I think we’re asking more questions now maybe than certainly in the earlier years. But I don’t think we ever get old enough, and simply being together a long time doesn’t mean we can read each other’s mind. We still have to ask questions. And asking questions is the first step in learning to become a good listener.
Juli (36:17.76)
Are there any uniquenesses to having been married a long time in terms of how all this plays out in general? Like I feel like there’s so many great marriage books that address the first seasons of marriage, maybe the busyness, but there aren’t a lot of marriage books that help couples who’ve been married for 40 years or longer. What are some of the unique challenges in that season?
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, I did write a book on that topic, and it’s called, what’s it called?
Juli
One of the challenges is you can’t remember the books, right?
Dr. Chapman
Yeah, that’s right. I’m also having trouble remembering names of people I’ve known forever. And I asked my doctor, said, is that the early stages of Alzheimer’s? He said, no, Gary, that’s just old age. It’s called Happily ever after:the joys and challenges of the second half. We were trying to discern what are the characteristics of couples that thrive in the second half and those that just survive?
And one of the things we came up with was that those who are thriving in the second half have come to accept the things that used to irritate them, but their spouse would never change those things. And then not only have they come to accept them, but now they kind of laugh at them and they laugh about it because it was a big issue early in the marriage. For example, a big issue in the early stages of our marriage, was the way Carolyn loaded the dishwasher.
Dr. Chapman (37:50.754)
I’m organized, everything is in a right place. If you get them in the right place, nothing gets broken and everything gets clean. And in those early stages, I would argue with her and show her broken glasses and spoons with peanut butter between them after they were supposedly washed and trying to convince her. And her response in those early days was, honey, I don’t have time to organize the dishwasher when I’m cooking.
Juli
Mm.
Dr. Chapman
Okay, so that was her side. And so anyway, that was one of our biggies. But not only that I come to realize she’s not gonna change that, so let’s accept it. What’s the big deal about that? So we break a glass now and then. How much does that cost? And so I have to wash the peanut butter off the next morning. What’s the big deal about that? We come to accept it. And then we come and I’ve come to laugh about it. In fact, I was gone overnight, the night before last, and I came home and I got home at midnight and I always unloaded the dishwasher, because I’m a morning person. And so I looked in the dishwasher and I literally laughed because there was a knife laying over here that, you know, they’re supposed to go like that. It was laying over here and there were, the plates were all mixed up and some were leaning and touching each other. And I looked in there and I just laughed again, you know.
Dr. Chapman
And I’ll tell you something else that impacted me along those lines. 12 years ago, my wife had cancer and, uterine cancer. And they did the surgery, they did the chemo, she lost her hair. She calls it her lost year because she had no energy and all of that for the whole year. And she’s fine now. It’s all gone in the past and she’s been doing great. But after I went through that experience with her that year and she came back, I looked in the dishwasher some nights, you when she did it.
Juli (39:23.148)
Mm.
Dr. Chapman (39:45.991)
And tears came to my eyes and I just said, God, thank you that she’s still here to mess up the dishwasher.
Juli
Wow.
Dr. Chapman
You know, you just realize when you begin to weigh the whole thing of losing a spouse, you’re just glad they’re still there. It doesn’t matter what they do, you’re glad they’re there. So you not only learn to accept and laugh at it, but you also come to thank God that they’re still here so they can do their thing.
Juli
What a beautiful change of perspective. Thanks for sharing that story. When you talk about the dishwasher, my husband could tell the same story because he’s the neat one. So you’re convicting me at the same time, but yeah. Dr. Chapman, this book is so rich. We can hardly get into it just in the conversation we’ve had. Your co-authors, Dr. Les and Leslie Parrott, I have a conversation scheduled with them in a few weeks that our listeners are going to get to hear where we’re going to go more in depth into the dialects of each of these five love languages. But thank you for the work that you’ve done. Thank you for your faithfulness to this work and this message. I see you all the time out there traveling. I don’t know how you’re still doing this so effectively, but God has just given you energy and just such a grace to go alongside with it. And thank you for your investment in literally millions of lives and families.
Dr. Chapman
Well, thank you, Juli. Some people ask me what’s my secret in my age to still be going so strong, and I say the short answer is God, and the long answer is God. I just think he’s still got things for me to do, and he’s given me energy to do it, and I’m very, grateful. And it’s always good to be with you. I appreciate what you have done through the years and what you’re doing now. So let’s both of us be faithful to the end, okay?
Juli
Amen. Amen.
Juli
Whether the five love languages is a new concept for you or it’s something you’re familiar with, this book that Dr. Chapman has co-authored with the parrots really takes you deeper into the practical application in your most intimate relationships. I hope you got a sense of that. It’s called The Love Language That Matters Most and that actually means the love language of the person who you love. It’s not a trick question. But that comes out January 16th you can pre-order it now pretty much anywhere you like to buy books and we’ll drop a link to that as well as the new premium assessment in our show notes. And don’t forget to stop by authenticintimacy.com to find more resources to help you love others well and to build more intimate relationships or just to strengthen your marriage. Thanks for listening and I look forward to having coffee with you next time on Java with Juli.