X number of months ago, my boyfriend and I were one of the most intimate couples ever. We do everything together and we care for each other. But now?! I just don't think he loves me as much anymore! And the same goes to me! Why is this happening!?!?
If this is happening to you, read on. If not, read on still to prevent this from happening (because inevitably, it'll happen).
In the scope of intimate love relationship, I am writing from my perspective as a woman engaged in a love relationship with a man, whom I call "boyfriend". If you're a man, simply change "boyfriend" to "girlfriend" and "him" to "her".
Going back to the situation above, 2 highest possible reasons are either or both of their "emotional love tank" is empty (or almost empty) or they've past the "in love" stage. In this post, I will cover the first reason "Emotional Love Tank".
What is Emotional Love Tank?
Emotional love tank is an invisible tank that is filled with love and affection. It resides in every human. When an emotional love tank is full, you feel loved and wanted. When it's empty, you feel no one loves you anymore, and might lead you to look for love in other ways (sometimes wrong ways).
I also believe you also can fill up your own emotional love tank, by yourself. That is self-love. However, self-love is another huge topic which I will cover in later parts of Relationship Tips series.
Emotional love tank from child to adulthood
All parents love their child, and those love are expressed in extremely different ways. We know. Some grants all of their child's wishes, and they call it love. Some beats up their child and they call it love.
However, are all parents speaking their child's love language? Maybe not. That is why we have underage crime and sex cases.
Children with empty emotional love tank will misbehave because they are purely expressing that "I want to feel loved and wanted!!!". They will grow up and bring these to adulthood. They will constantly look for love from outside to fill up their emotional love tank.
They are not taught of what LOVE is, and what SELF-LOVE is.
If you're a parent, I highly recommend you to take the 5 Love Languages quiz in my Relationship Tips #1 and do it with your child. Know and speak your child's love language so that their emotional love tank is fill up.
My Story
My primary love language is Words of Affirmation. And my current "emotional love tank" is, let's say, 50%. To fill it up, my boyfriends needs to show love and affection to me and he's using different ways to do so.
- Giving gifts
- Hugging
- Complimenting my work
- Treating me a meal
- Helping me with laundry
Out of all these ways, I feel the most loved on "Complimenting my work", because that is my primary love language. If I were to put them into ranks, they'll be,
- Complimenting my work - 20%
- Hugging - 10%
- Helping me with laundry - 10%
- Treating me a meal - 5%
- Giving gifts - 5%
What if my boyfriend thought giving gifts and treating me a meal is an expression of love? To him, it is a strong expression of love. But to me, they're just worth 5% each.
My "emotional love tank" will not be filled as easily and as fast. What if this continues on? My "emotional love tank" will keep decreasing and will never be full. Hence, the feeling of "not loved" emerges, because my boyfriend never speaks my love language, never fills up my love tank!
This is why speaking the correct love language is important, so that you can fill up your partner's love tank.
What about my own? I want to be loved too.
Do this exercise together with your partner so that both of you will benefit from this. You cannot clap with one hand. This has to be done by the TWO of you.
As long as we do what we like, we're filling up each other's love tank, aren't we?
True, to some extent, from my experience. At first, you will treat him in his favorite restaurants, buy him his favorite watches, go to your favorite countries, and etc. However, things will come to a bore. Continuously doing the same thing will result in boredom. And I believe, even in relationship, we need to be innovative.
Knowing my boyfriend's love language is a guide to help me focus on inventing new ideas to spark our relationship from time to time. His least love language is Receiving Gifts hence I will not focus on giving gifts. I will focus on his primary, which is Physical Touch and I mean out of bedroom Physical Touch :)
This keeps his love tank in check. And he's doing the same to me, fortunately XD
We are most certainly working on filling up our love tanks, but sometimes I feel my love for him is unlike last time. Why is that so??
This calls for the second situation, the "In Love" stage which I will cover in the next post. Stay tuned :)
On the scale of 0 - 10, how full is your love tank? 0 being empty, 10 being full.
This Relationship Tips series include practical how's and what's of speaking your partner's love language. If your partner's love language is Physical Touch and Quality Time, I will share firsthand experiences of what I've done and its results :)
Relationship Tips is one of my initiative to help people improve their relationship based on a book I was reading The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman and my experiences.
Check out my series here:
Relationship Tips #1: Know Your Partner's Love Language Here!
I believe having a good relationship will carve a positive path in all areas of your life. This belief is backed up by an 80 year-old research by Harvard University.
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