If you desire to experience deeper relationships with those in your life, this is the episode for you! Co-Hosts Lori Few and Jimmy Williams share the Five Languages of Love and how you can use these simple, yet powerful, strategies to create greater unity in your life, your community and the world.
Episode Keys
- The proper implementation and importance of utilizing the Five Love Languages in your life.
- How to show that special someone you truly care without speaking a word!
- When to use each of the languages for greater trust development with the people in your life.
- Why the languages work and the science behind them.
- The importance of peace and unity in our lives and communities.
Podcast Transcription
JW:
Good morning! This is Jimmy Williams with Live a Life By Design, your Monday morning moments of motivation. And today, we’re tackling something that I believe could cure what ails our country, our families, and our communities. And I have with me someone to discuss a very, very sensitive, yet important topic on the languages of love. And we’ll explain a little bit more about that in just a moment. I do want to let everyone know our Facebook page has had a little technical difficulty and we’re currently in Facebook jail. For whatever reason, we don’t know, but they’re telling us they’re getting it fixed. So if you’ll bear with us and you have any comments to send us, send them to our email at info@livealifeby.design and we’d be glad to hear from everyone. You know, this is a topic before I introduce my co-host, that is near and dear to my heart. I’m celebrating a big, big anniversary yesterday. So we celebrated yesterday on Sunday, and I’m going to get into a little bit of that, but before I get any further than that, I have got to bring out the lady that brings the real class to this, if you will, podcast, I’d like to introduce my co-host with the most. Good morning, Lori Few. How are you?
LF:
Good morning! I am great this Monday morning.
JW:
Well, I got to tell you friend you have made my day great just joining me here decaffeinated, I think at this point, have you had caffeine anytime today?
LF:
Absolutely!
JW:
Wonderful. Lori, we’ve got a tough topic here and I know you know all about this, but I’d like to kind of bring up a topic here that we’re basically going to discuss a book. This book was published in 1992, so a long time ago, but I believe it’s still very applicable today, maybe even more relevant today, and the book is called The Five Love Languages by Dr. Gary Chapman. Now this book I haven’t read personally, but I have read excerpts of this book and some information, and Lori has gotten more familiar with it than me. So that’s why she’s the expert on this episode. Any hard questions need to be sent to Lori and she’ll answer them. But I just want to a saying, I’m telling everyone I celebrated 34 years with my beautiful wife. 34 years.
LF:
So you married her when she was four?
JW:
She was four, but the laws were different back then. As long as your parents signed consent, Lori, it wasn’t a problem.
LF:
Oh my goodness. Well, when this book was written in 1992, I just have to be honest. I was 12.
JW:
Yeah, I’ve got to say, you were young lady we’ve been married, I think longer than Lori is old. Anyway you know, I often tease my wife, and we men know that a marriage takes and gives. I mean, you gotta have one with give and take in every relationship you have, at work, at marriage, and so forth. And I always tell my wife, I am thankful that she gives mostly and I take, I think it works out perfect for me, but anyway…
LF:
Perfect for you. Yes, absolutely. Yes.
JW:
So, Lori, I’m just kidding about the giving and taking… If my wife… And I know she listens to this, she’s going to probably want to call me to the couch and talk to me. But I need Lori’s expert opinion here. We’re going to start this off with a discussion of each of these five languages of love Dr. Chapman published. Now the good news about all of this is that there is some truth to each of these. And you may not be practicing all these. We’re hoping that you may be communicate with your mate, your spouse in a way that helps show respect. And the whole goal here is, is that these can be translated, I think – now, Lori, you correct me if I’m wrong, – it could be translated to not only having better families, then you’ll have better communities, and I think then a more unified and loving nation. And that’s kind of my goal here today is to share with Lori and with everyone, our thoughts on how we can get our nation unified. And I’m calling this thing the unity solution. What you think of that>
LF:
I like that, unity solution. And I think you’re right. I think all five of these different love languages can be applied both inside and outside the home and inside the home where relationships start. You know, I recently saw a meme on social media. I know you’re probably not seeing them because you’re in Facebook jail, but it said something to the effect of, “children get an opportunity to see what marriage is for 18 years until they go start their own.” And so the example that you set for them in the first 18 years is really critical. And really, I was kind of taken aback by it. I hadn’t really thought about it that way, but it’s really true.
JW:
I’ve got to be honest. We’ve now been married 34 years. I think I just really figured this out Lori, about two years ago, what this is all about on marriage.
LF:
Two years? I’m only at 17. So I’m going to need you to… I’m going to need some coaching.
JW:
Let me just tell you, lady, I learned from the school of hard knocks on marriage. Matter of fact, there’s some days when I come home from the office, my wife – and I have grown to love this woman so much – but I can just see in the non-verbal communication that I just must ask one question, “may I be excused to go to my room now?”
LF:
But at least you ask for permission, if you own it.
JW:
If not men, we’ve got to sit down on that couch of dread and just sit there and take it like a man. That’s all I can tell you. What every man should do, suck it up and go buy flowers, take her to dinner, and jewelry, that works nearly most of the time, anyway.
LF:
Perfection. Only add coffee to that for me. But there you go.
JW:
Yes. And I’m talking the good stuff. Don’t buy any of that cheap stuff with the crystals and all that. So Lori, let’s tackle this first language of love. Now, these five languages of this book, this gentleman that wrote the book obviously was a psychologist type person and studies relationships and things of that nature. So, his first language he says is words of affirmation. So how do you think we men could be more supportive to our wives partners with our words, and why is this important to show love and respect to our partner and wife? What’s your thoughts?
LF:
Well, I think the marriages are founded on things like respect and love and communication. And for words of affirmation, I think that, it’s not necessarily what we say, but in sometimes it’s in the tone of how we say things and that’s why, with young people now, you have those conversations about, “oh, don’t read into that text message.” You don’t understand the tone. It could be just a legitimate conversation or question. And so we tend to make assumptions about the tone of how people use their words, because I mean, this new generation or younger generation, even for me, it’s difficult to navigate in relationships. I can’t imagine having a young relationship now. It’s overly complicated and overly dramatic for sure. They don’t see it that way, but we do. We finally reached that threshold of, “oh, I think I’m too old now. I’m not cool anymore.” But for husbands it’s oftentimes not what you say, but how you say it.
JW:
You know, I’m going to relate to that big time. I’ve got to tell you my younger daughter, junior at a major university here in the state, and she continues to tell me things I don’t know Lori, because she said, “Dad, you’re just too old. You won’t understand.” I keep telling her, be careful with her words of affirmation and her debit card account. But anyway. You know, to me, words of affirmation can be utilized in the workplace. So a lot of times what I do when I see a team member that’s really trying hard, maybe almost got the football to the goal line – cause you know, we’re in football season now, Lori. You know, I’m a football fan…
LF:
Yes. Big football fan.
JW:
So when you see one of your teammates trying to get this project done and everything, it’s some kind words, sometimes is all that’s needed for them to spur that extra energy or that thought of, “Hey, he really is caring and concerned about me doing well in my career.” To me, those kinds of words of affirmation really bring home the fact that you’re in a relationship with that person. It may be, you know, an employment relationship, but at the end of the day, you’re still friends and who better than The Beatles to come out with all you need is friends, right? To make the world a better place. Burt Bacharach, right? Remember one of those great songs he had, right, about friends? And so my point here is, is that these are not applicable strictly to a marriage, right, Lori?
LF:
They’re not. And we’ve all been in those situations in terms of volunteer work or not necessarily in a paid setting, but it’s how you respond to people and how you… Positivity. I know we talk about that a lot, Jimmy. I feel like every time I’m on, we just, we always go back to positivity. And I love that because who doesn’t have enough of that in their lives? We all need more of that. But it is, it’s absolutely true. You can change someone’s total commitment to a project, their outcome in a tense situation just by walking by and saying, “great job today, you did a great job.” And you know, most of the time, people are so defensive not to take a compliment. “Oh no, that wasn’t good.” Or, “oh, that was terrible. I didn’t do well on that.” We are our own worst critics. And so we have to be willing to accept those words of affirmation and believe that they’re from a sincere place in someone’s heart.
JW:
You know, I’ve worked for people in my younger days before my professional career. And they would always find that one or two things that you didn’t do right. So they wouldn’t tell you what you did right. But they’d find the one or two things you didn’t do right. And they’d say, “Well, you need to do a better job on this next time.” And I would always say something, you know, just being a kid, I’d just say something. “Well, what about these other things I got right?” And he said, “Yeah, I expected that.” You know, I’m like, well, even though I expect it, I expect great outcomes of all of our people on our team. But you know, sometimes it’s nice to hear that kind word. As you said, to be that little boost of ego, maybe even a boost of confidence, a boost of compassion to say, “Hey, you know, he’s at least paying attention to what I’m doing in my work and making sure that I did it the right way.” So, so words of affirmation to me, Lori means positive. As you said, we get into positivity, but hey, that’s what we’re about, right? I hope people listening every Monday, get something positive from all these things we share because that’s the intent. And so at the end of the day, the most important thing I could say for me on words of affirmation is to be plentiful in sharing them in a sincere way.
LF:
Plentiful in sharing them. I like that. I think that should be on a coffee mug.
JW:
But knowing you, you probably have one that says that. If not, we’ll get you one, ok?
LF:
I have a lot of sayings. But I digress. I can talk all day on that. One of the next of the five love languages is quality time. And I know if I know anything about Jimmy, Jimmy is very careful and meticulous about his time and his schedule. So how do you define the love language of quality time?
JW:
So there was a time in our that my poor wife didn’t get much quality time with me. You know, you’re starting out in an entrepreneurial world. You’d take a lot of time getting things going and growing, as I say. And I’ve been way more conscious of that about the last, well, 15, 20 years when the girls came along, our daughter., You look at the schedule you have, and I’ll tell you what I did. I went to my assistant at the time and I said, “let me give you the priority for my calendar.” And I gave her all of our daughters, dance, competitions school functions, whatever they were in… softball games, whatever it was. And I said, “you put those on my calendar first.” And then we’ll fill in between those events, our client events, and all of our other team needs and all that.
JW:
And she looked at me real funny. She said, Well, what are you doing?” And I said, ‘This is how the priority has to be. I only have 18 years to impress upon these two daughters of mine, how important they are before I released them to the world.” And that really let’s them know they’ve got support at home. So, to me, that quality time, you know, too often people say, it’s not the quantity of time, it’s the quality of time. But I think it’s a little bit of both, and I’m not disagreeing with Dr. Chapman on the quality, but quality time to me means turn the phone off, pay attention. Like our younger daughter, Gabrielle, I’d be so busy in something, and she cannot tell a story, in what I call the cliff notes version. Now, Lori, she tells you as we say in the old good old book of the Bible, we say chapter book and verse. I mean, she does whole backstory. And she was telling me a story one time, she was only about two years older, three, maybe just talking, just jibbering up a storm. And she was serious. She had been to Pre-K three and she had come home and she had some story that evening. And of course I had something on my mind. I’m sure going on that day. And she grabs, if you could picture this, my cheeks in her hands and forces my face to turn around to her. And she says, “Daddy, your eyes aren’t listening.” And she did that, and I’m like, whoa, this is a three-year-old kid. And she said, “Your eyes aren’t listening.” And that rung a bell to me. So when you read the day that I entered that in my journal that evening, as I was writing, I said, what a profound statement from a three-year-old child. She said, you may be listening with your ears. She didn’t say that, but that’s what she’s inferring, but your eyes weren’t paying attention to her and her story. And so to me, quality time means that that person you’re spending time with has your heart, soul, mind, and attention on whatever they are wishing to share with you, because to them, it’s vital and important. Even if she’s three years old, it was vital and important for her dad to hear this story. And I just never have forgotten that story.
LF:
I love it. That takes the cake right there. Because in my mind you said what I was thinking. I thought, wow, what a profound statement for a three-year-old. And I, I am like Gabby. When I tell stories, I have to tell you the setting and the date and the time and all the key players. So I can totally relate to that. I’d probably put my parents through numerous hours of unnecessary facts, you know, stick to the facts, lady, stick to the facts. I have a friend that’s a very, very, the definition to a T of quality time. She could care less about anything in the world, but if she calls and says, “Hey, I miss your face, I need to see your face. Let’s sit down. Let’s talk.” I know, we’ve been friends long enough that I know that that is important to her. And that is something that she is in desperate need of, and she rarely asks. But when she does, that’s how you know that someone is a quality time person and it absolutely no phones, no interruptions. There’ve been many times where, you know, we’ve just had to take a drive and she just lets it all out and has her quality time, or I, you know, I let it out and we tag team, and I think relationships that are based on quality time are important because you don’t necessarily have it frequently or often. But when you do, you know that that is a solid commitment in a friendship or relationship and even a work commitment, you know, working relationship. That that is very, very, very important to them.
JW:
You know what I believe to be the worst distractor of quality time between individuals? Would, you know what I think it is?
LF:
I was going to say the cell phone.
JW:
Absolutely. These electronic gadgets have been so wonderful in our lives. We get our calendars, we can look things up, we can communicate and text or whatever by voice, but there comes a time when we need to have that one-one-one verbal and nonverbal communication with whomever’s in our company. And I can tell you that I have been pretty bad at this from time to time when you’re in a real busy part of the year or something, and we’re at dinner and we’re at one of the nicest restaurants in the area and I’ll whip out that phone because it vibrated. You know, all you gotta do is turn it off, you know, like my dad does. So I got my dad cell phone. You know, the person when I did, I didn’t get this newest one he’s got, but I got him a cell phone and I called down there and he would never answer. And then finally, one day he calls me at like the next day he called me and he said, “Son, I just want to visit with you for a minute.” I said, “Dad, I have called you five times yesterday. You never picked up on one of them.” He said, “Well, I want to tell you something. I turned the phone off unless I need to use it because the battery will go down.” And this is my now 82 year old dad. And I’m telling you, technology to him is a hammer to chisel. And so at the end of the day, it was so funny. He said, “I turned that thing off unless I need to use it.” Now I’m going to say this word again, but that’s pretty doggone profound if you’re trying to have quality time with your mate, your child, your coworker, your friend, whomever. And I just think, how often do we not turn that thing off so we can turn our quality time on?
LF:
Yes. And we need to do more of that. You know, we, at the Few family household, we have cell phone jail, you know, it’s just a little bucket there and they go in there and they don’t come out until we’re done doing whatever it is that we need to do or want to do. You know, dinner time is a very important quality time for us. It’s the one time during in the day that we’re all we try to be together. And sometimes, you know, it’s on the road, sometimes it’s in between events, but you know, from the mouths of babes, you know, we have three-year-old profound statements and 82 year old profound statements. So that just goes to show you that, you know, wisdom can come at any time at any age in your life, in any season. So I think that’s great. Turn it off. I, myself, with COVID and the news and the world and the state that it’s in, I have found myself doing the same thing. And it is in a moment of panic because when you do go off the grid for a moment, you know, people will text you and call you. “Where are you?” you know. And it’s okay because we can still do that in function without the, you know, mini computer in our hand.
JW:
Absolutely. I’m going to also take this a little step further than Dr. Chapman did in the materials I’d read. I believe you need quality time with yourself. What I mean by that is, is get away from the world, get away from everyone. So you can spend quality time thinking about your future, about your day, where your mindset is, your attitude, give you a little checkup from the neck up. So to speak.
LF:
I like that. I’ve never heard that.
JW:
I stole that from Zig Ziglar by the way. That was not mine. That was a gig, but I will tell you, in my experience, my journaling, of course, you people are listening, you’ve heard me say it a million times if I’ve said it once, has been my real ability to give quality time to myself. It’s that few minutes a day I get to sit down with that Montblanc writing instrument in that journal and just get it all out on paper and by doing so, it really gives me an opportunity to reflect on myself. Am I meeting my standards I imposed on myself for my family, for my friends, for my coworkers, for my team, for my clients, whatever group? You know, you just need to have that time to yourself. So quality time to me, Lori can be with others, of course, as it’s intended by Dr. Chapman’s book, but also for yourself. And that’s kind of one of the ways I interpreted that.
LF:
I like it. I like your interpretation.
JW:
So Lori, this is another touchy subject. So this next one, and we’re not going to get too graphic on this, but one of the areas of language of love by Dr. Chapman is the physical touch. So tell me real quickly, how can we show love and respect to someone with a physical touch?
LF:
Well, my problem, I don’t know that it’s a problem. But it’s been a problem during COVID because I’m a hugger. I like to hug people. I don’t know, maybe it’s a Southern thing. Maybe it’s the way I was raised. Maybe. I don’t know, but I do like to give hugs and, you know, with COVID I’ve had to catch myself. You know, we don’t shake hands, we don’t hug, we don’t touch, you know, we elbow bump because we’re not even supposed to touch hands, you know? And so it’s been hard. That’s one of the things for physical touch for me, I don’t know. I just… it makes me feel better. I feel like my hugs are good and everyone should receive my hugs. I don’t know if you’ve heard the story of it was on the news several years ago, but there was a woman in San Francisco that she would go around and just give hugs to people. And it kind of picked up in the nightly news. I mean, back then there was no social media. So she was kind of an anomaly. The newspapers wrote about her, but you know, for a while there, she was like the free hug lady. Free love, you know, essentially. And so for me, I just have always enjoyed that thought that, you know, maybe someday I’ll probably be that little lady that, you know, that would give hugs to people and people will think I’m weird. But you know, looking forward to my son’s generation physical touch for them… And it is the craziest thing. I do not understand junior high boys. Noah is almost to that junior high level. We’re in sixth grade. Now they have this thing where they smack each other in the head, like just bop each other on the back of the head. And somehow that is like a signal of “you’re cool, I like you, like, you’re my friend. What’s up.” And so I asked him once I said, “Why do y’all do that?” That can’t be something that people like.
JW:
That sounds pretty funny. I’ve got to tell you, I was a junior high boy once and they’d thump me behind the ear, with their finger. Boy, I mean, those high school boys would pick on you, you know?
LF:
But that’s a status thing I guess.
JW:
Yeah, that’s not a physical touch I enjoyed, I’ll put it that away. I will say though, and you’re going to laugh when I tell you this, but to me also, that physical touch can just be simply, as soon as I get home from work, the first thing I do is I hug my wife. Now, I know that sounds corny, and it sounds silly, but it’s just something about reconnecting with those you love and you care about. When I first see my daughter at the university and we go see her on a game day, the first thing I do is I go up and hug her and give her a kiss. Then when I get to our daughter in California, the first thing I do is I run to her cat and I get Gidget. And… I mean, I hold my daughter for just a minute, excuse me. Now, Gidget, I don’t leave her our either. Gidget’s our grandkitty and she thinks she’s special just like the rest of those girls. But my point is, is that hug to me is transmitting a couple of things, Lori. It’s first and foremost saying in that moment, you care about that person in a special way. There’s nothing outlandish, nothing sexual about it. It’s just, you hug your wife. That’s all it is. And I think a lot of people, particularly, now, I’m going to say this because you have a son and your husband, a lot of that is, is those people when they’re young boys, it’s proven they need more hugs from dad than they do when they’re grownups. So what I’m saying, and I’ve done some studying on this sociologically young boys need that affirmation of dad’s love, support, guidance, and mentorship early in their lives through their teen years. So I still hug my 82 year old dad when I see him and give him a kiss on the cheek. And he does hugs me back with the biggest old hug. And I’m telling you when he’s gone someday, I’m going to miss that chance to have that physical touch, to show love and respect to him.
LF:
It’s important. I think I agree with you. I don’t think you’re ever too old to do that. I hope that I never lose my hug ability, for lack of a better word.
JW:
Yeah. You know, and at the end of the day, guys, it’s a very simple action that has a significant meaning. So I think that’s where Dr. Chapman is going, right?
LF:
I think so. But let’s talk about my favorite one. This is my favorite one. This is my personal love language. Acts of service is one of the most powerful methods of showing your love for anyone, your spouse, your coworkers, your friends, your family. So I’m curious because I know Jimmy Williams to be an acts of service person. What’s your favorite act of service?
JW:
Oh man, I’ve got a whole list of my hope of those. You’ve listening to this, our loyal subscribers and listeners, have a pen and paper handy to take notes. I do things that are really simple yet mean a tremendous lot to my wife. So for example, I’ll come home and she’s not expecting it. And she’s been gone and maybe our house isn’t in tip-top shape it needs to be, I will do clothes in the wash. I will wash clothes. I’ll have them dried. I’ll have them put up. I’ll have the beds made. I mean, we hire people to help with this, but it’s just sometimes meaningful for us to do it. I’ll take her car. I’ll fill it up, when she’s not suspecting it, with gas, I’ll wash it. I’ll detail it out. She just comes out and it’s a nice clean car. Again, you can hire people to do this. And I do a lot of the times, but some days it just says, “Hey, I love you and care about you enough. I want to do this act of service for you.” I even leave – don’t laugh – but I leave little notes all around the house that are little love notes, now, since the kids aren’t here, and it says good for one free foot massage at anytime. I just do stuff, it’s weird. I do stuff like that. That’s not weird, but for me, it says to my wife, “Hey, I’m taking the time to care and I do care.” So anyway, that’s kind of my acts of service approach.
LF:
Well, I, I totally, I love that. And I’ll take it one step further. It’s funny that you say notes. My husband, Mr. Green, you know, he’s very environmentally friendly and he’s probably gonna be really upset if I tell this, but he despises the greeting card industry because he says you can spend five or $6 on a card and pay for itnd it’s going to get thrown somewhere in a drawer in the trash, well, years later, or you can just write it down yourself. And so he will write his own notes. And most of the time they are cheesy, they’re corny, but I laugh and I love them and I seek them and I make sure that I don’t get rid of them, you know, and I appreciate cards. I do. And I’m a really big thank you note writer. So what he doesn’t purchase from the greeting card companies I make up for because I’m a big thank you note writer. But he does that as well. And I love that and I love that about him. And it’s just kind of quirky. For me, acts of service… I’m a checklist person, you know this about me. I make lists and I check those lists off. And in the work world setting, what I find is that I sit in so many different meetings and serve on so many different committees that once you really kind of get to know someone and you understand their motivation and what excites them and what things that they like and what burdens they’re carrying or work that they’re carrying on their plate. I always like to take a note. And if it’s something that, you know, they need this report and I can help facilitate that. Like, I’ll go do that. Or if they need a coffee run, I am always the coffee run girl. No, no problem.
JW:
Not a lot of arm twisting there, folks.
LF:
No. But you know, if they need to communicate or correspond with someone or they need to send something, you know, we have multiple buildings that we, you know, work in and out of. And so I’m an active service person in that regard. Like I want to help people accomplish their to-do list. It’s great for me. It’s mental floss, if you will. It helps me kind of stretch my brain and think about other things and how other people accomplish those things or how, how they work through, you know, daily things. And a lot of times people will say, “Well, I didn’t know you could do that.” Or “I didn’t know, you could do it that way.” And that’s what I love about acts of service in the work setting for me, because I get to show people that well, yeah, great. You can think outside the box, you can do it this way or your way, or sometimes they teach me things and sometimes I teach them things. And so that’s really why I enjoy acts of service. That may sound kind of weird.
JW:
You know, I’ve got to be honest with you. I take the team out and purposely do so every week. I take everyone on the team out to lunch. If they’re working, you know, locally, if they’re virtually, obviously I can’t get that done, but when they’re working locally, I take them out to lunch every week. And we don’t talk about work. Some of that may slip in, but the primary subject matter is, what’s going on in your world with your family, your children, your church, your whatever. And you’re going to laugh. You really get on some very neat comical, sometimes deep discussions over what’s going on in some people’s lives. This COVID has just been so disruptive. A lot of our topic has been, “Hey, you know, our church is online now and it’s just, just not the same.” And you know, that kind of thing. And I will tell you, 99% of the time, we’re laughing though, when we get through, because I’ll give them some story that I’m going through, that’s really happened. I’m not going to tell you what it is right now in the air here. But I will tell you, there are some comical things that I didn’t intend to be comical. And they turned out that way. My team is just laughing their head off and I’m going, that really happened. And they’re just laughing their head off. And I’m like, “Oh, that’s okay.” So the point I’m getting at is act of service, those sharing that food, sharing those comments, really just sharing your soul, right? We’re sharing ourselves with people. And the more we can pour out ourselves to other people, the better the understanding between us will be, which means then what? Back to that community being better, the nation being better. If we all seek first to understand, and then be understood as Dr. Stephen Covey wrote in his book, that is the key I think, to unifying this country where we need it to be the United States right now is in a very defensive, divisive nature. And I’ll be honest with you, Lori. I can’t take it. I’m an old boy scout. I love God and country. And I think we live in the greatest country on the planet, but we do have some challenges before us that we’ve got to change the way we do things and the way we speak to people. And a lot of that is going to start with social media. It’s going to start with us being kind to those that we typically aren’t kind to, because everyone deserves respect. Everyone deserves that act of service of kindness for certain, that costs us nothing, right?
LF:
Absolutely.
JW:
I heard something the other day that just made me feel wonderful. It said, “Smile until your cheeks hurt and then smile some more. And you’ll be getting your point across that you can be kind to people.” I love that.
LF:
Yeah, that’s great. I love… I’m that probably that goofy person that smiles that people and they don’t, they’re like, what’s wrong with her? Like, what is she doing? And I think it goes back to that point, absolutely. When you talk about unity, you know, acts of service leads to conversation and just getting to talk to people and find out their perspective and perspective leads to conversations about differences of opinion and different is different. Different is not necessarily good. Different is not necessarily bad. It’s just different. And that’s okay. It’s okay. We’ve seem to forgotten that it’s acceptable.
JW:
I don’t know where we did it, but we’ve forgotten how to disagree agreeably.
LF:
Yes. That exactly. Again, another coffee mug statement. Yes.
JW:
You know what? You should have like a whole set of these. Are you writing these down. We can get these custom made.
LF:
Well, yeah, you could keep a list!
JW:
You know, one of the things too, I will tell you though, when someone’s looking at you and laughing, that’s a friend of yours, or not laughing, but I should say smiling, just looking at you and smiling, and they’re darting their eyes from your eyes down your body. Don’t be the kind of person that goes, “Hey, I’m not getting what he’s saying.” When you look down and your fly’s open in the restaurant, it’s time to pay attention when the guy’s smiling at you. A friend of mine did that. I will not tell you who it was because it was so funny at the time. It wasn’t funny to me anyway, washing my hands and things and refreshing myself and I’m in the restaurant and he’s just smiling right in front of everybody’s looking down, just up and down me. And I’m going, what is his problem?
LF:
I can only imagine what that visual looked like.
JW:
I’m looking down, I’m going, “Oh my word, I can’t believe this.” You know, one of my biggest fears – I’ve had the pleasure of speaking all over this country for different groups, associations, and so forth. And I’ve got to tell you, and one of my biggest, most funny things that I pictured in my head is if you remember the show Naked Gun with Leslie Nielsen, where he had that lavalier mic on and went to the men’s restroom and it was live, the mic was hot. And I’m like… So you’re going to laugh. If I ever go speak somewhere and they already, the Ave, people already had me outfitted, I’ll take that thing off and then I’ll go take care of things. And then I’ll come back and say, “Hey, put this back on.” I don’t want that to happen.
LF:
Well, there are certain places that those microphones should probably not go and the restroom is probably one of them.
JW:
Who knows if the mute works or not really, you know what I’m saying? Because you’re not in the room right? So, so that’s an important area. Act of search. Let me tell you, one of mine though, is sharing gifts. The fifth language of love, Lori is sharing gifts between people. And so, what is the importance of sharing a gift that makes it a language of love to you? What’s so important about that.
LF:
Well, and I think this kind of goes back to the acts of service, acts of service and gifts are two kind of in the same for me. But what I love about this love language is that a gift doesn’t have to be a physical item. You know, we’ve talked about this before on the podcast about gifts that, you know, we create ourselves and I know Jimmy, your presence is a gift. Just being here today on the podcast is a gift to everyone who’s listening. We know.
JW:
Well, my ego can take that. Thank you. Yes, I’m being funny here.
LF:
But you know, gifts of your talent, of your time, of your energy, those are so important and, you know, influential on a person’s life on a person’s day, on a person’s week, on a person’s month, something that they may take with them for the rest of their lives. I mean, it’s, it’s really a great way to think of it. And I’m sure that when Mr. Chapman wrote his book here that he had the thought process of not just physical items, but things that are not tangible, if you will.
JW:
Right. This is a very important, I think, language that I learned very on in the third grade. This is how vivid this memory is. Third grade, I was only about seven or eight and I was in a little community. The town was not very big. The school’s not very big. The classroom, of course then, was not very big. I imagine it’s 25 people or so in our class. And it was Christmas time and we’d had drawn names. Everybody got to draw a name that wanted to participate and a young boy there, that’s a friend of mine that I wasn’t just real close to. I mean, you know, I’ll be honest with you. You probably have grown up only… You have a thousand friends, it seemed like on Facebook and all these things, but you probably can only count those friends that’ll come to your aid in a time of dire need of about five or six. I mean, you just got those kinds of friends, you know? Well, this young man, wasn’t that real close to me at that time that I recall. And, and I’ll never forget what happened. It was Christmas and they were exchanging the gifts. So there was a little girl there and I’m not going to put her name out here. She may listen, but she’s still a friend of my hunter and everything, but I’ll remember this to the day I die. We’re all opening gifts and she’s sitting over there and she didn’t get a gift, but the boy that had her name got me a gift because he didn’t want to buy a girl a gift. I mean, this was only in third grade. Right? So, very childish at that age, obviously. And we all are, but I’m like, “Wow, I got two gifts!” And my dad – I’ll never forget -my dad happened to be there at that party. And he said, son, he said, you know this isn’t right. That little girl didn’t get a gift. And you got two of them. Now, remind yourself, I’m in the third grade. And I knew when he said that this isn’t right. He left immediately, went town. It’s just a few miles away. And before that party was over from that third grade class, you know, the punch and the cookies and you’re having fun and all this stuff with your toys. Before it was over, he had brought back a wonderful gift for her that she just adored and hugged my dad’s neck. Her parents weren’t there. I, from that point on made it a point in my mind that I will not alienate anyone. If one’s going to share, we’re all going to share, right? And I thought to myself, if we’re going to share gifts, the best gift we can share is the one you can’t wrap. And it’s called respect.
LF:
I love it. I absolutely agree. I think that goes with respect right along with compassion and kindness and sincerity. Those are just so important. And I really feel sometimes we struggle with those ideals. We are so… At times we tend to be materialistic. And you can only have so much stuff. And the thing is, when we’re gone, you can’t take that stuff with you. You can leave it behind. And it may have sentimental or tangible value to someone else. But the thing that you want somebody to remember and speak about on your behalf or your legacy or your memory is who you were as a person and what you did for other people. So I love that story. What did he buy?
JW:
I think a doll and some other things that went with it and a little kitchen set type thing for a third grader. So I’m talking like cups and things. I mean, he spent more… So the limit we were supposed to bend way back, don’t laugh back then. It was like probably $5 or less, right?. This was in, gosh, I was in the third grade. So this would have been like 1972 or 1973. So, you know, money would buy a lot more stuff in, and I’m telling you, he went into town, which is about eight miles away from our little community to go to the store, to buy her that gift and wrap it. And I’m like, “Dad, how did you” – I’m a kid, you know – “how’d you get all that done?” That’s a long ways to town, eight miles, you know, as a kid. But anyway, the point of that was, is that young lady turned out to be a very dear friend of our family still to this day.
JW:
I haven’t communicated with her in years, but to this day she and my parents still get to talk once in a while. And just, they have a great relationship because of compassion and respect shown to her that day when it was alienating her from being in the group. And that just won’t work. You know, if we’re going to hear and share one of the most powerful gifts we have, as I said, respect, and I’m talking about even Aretha Franklin style, man, and let’s spell it out. If people don’t get it, spell that baby out, let’s get the respect our there that we need. Now I’ve got to be honest with you. There are people that are hard to love just as there are people that are very difficult to respect. However, let me make it clear to me and to you what I mean by that. First and foremost, I respect everybody I meet until they show they don’t deserve that respect. You with me? So carte blanche, I meet you. I respect you until you prove otherwise through your actions, words, or deeds, right? But there are some people that may think philosophically different than us. They may think politically different than us. They may just think communal different than us. They may just have a whole different background. My point is I try to learn something about them that makes them the way that they are conducting themselves so that I understand first, and then can still respect the person, not necessarily their words, perhaps. So a case in point. Of the greatest senators, I think, that ever come from this state was a gentleman by the name of Senator Boren. David Boren was an outstanding Senator. A Democrat from Oklahoma, was governor, became Senator. Just an outstanding person… Rhode Scholar when he was a student. I mean, this guy is smart. And he always said, when he was in the day of politics, Lori, now this is getting a little deep, but in the day he was in politics in DC, he could reach across the aisle because he respected that other party person. Even though he may disagree with their means of how to help our country grow or heal a wound or do something that they’re trying to pass a law to do. And that really rang with me because I have my picture taken with him on the steps of the Senate building when I was in the boy Scouts back in the day. And so anyway, my point I’m making is, is that rang bells to me to this day is always trying to find a way you can respect somebody. In other words, proactively seek out the way to respect someone. Don’t try to find the easy thing. And that’s the thing that we have different. The things that we disagree on, the backgrounds, we all share our different. Lori shared her background on this podcast. I shared mine. It wasn’t perfect, but boy, what a learning experience, right? It doesn’t mean perfect.
LF:
Absolutely. Well and that, and that’s part of the progression of life. You know, my husband makes this joke about, you’re never too old to learn and he’s constantly learning something. And I think that that is absolutely true. You have to be willing to learn. You have to be willing to… Communication is a two-way street. And you have to be willing to accept things even if you don’t necessarily agree with them or you like them, but you have to learn that acceptance of other people.
JW:
Communication is a one-way street if you failed to remember your wife’s birthday and she did not get a gift, that is a one-way street. So…
LF:
And that is failure in the love language of gift giving.
JW:
That never happened to me. But I’m just telling you, I got a friend of mine that called me. He just sounded so down in the dumps. And I said, “Hey, it’s so-and-so’s birthday. How’s your wife doing?” He goes, “Don’t even want to talk about that. I forgot her birthday.” And I’m like, oh man, that’s a kiss of death, right there. You know, that’s where you want to make sure Lori, that you help your wife pick out the living room furniture because you’re going to be on the sofa that night.
LF:
You are going… You have… What’s that in Big Bang Theory, when Sheldon says you’re in my spot.
JW:
Yes, that’s it.
LF:
That husband has a spot.
JW:
Yes, that’s right. That’s right. Hey, this, Lori, has been outstanding. I have learned quite a bit from you during these five languages of love. And so, let’s leave our listeners with a challenge as we always do. The only way we can get better is to proactively exercise that right, to gain a better understanding. So this week, your challenge is to focus on these five languages with love. Someone you love, someone you’ve got respect for, but you know, the world continues to give us challenges in all phases of life. Guys, I don’t think we’re out of the woods yet on some of this disruption, but we don’t have to let it rule our lives. So what I want you to do this week is control those phases in life that you can and just speak the language of love to your special person or persons. Have words of affirmation, spend quality time with them, physical touches in a kind way, acts of service and share a gift that doesn’t have to cost a lot of money, a kind word, do a deed for someone that needs help. And Lori, is there anything at all you could add to this that would make this, the closing point?
LF:
I don’t know you put me on the spot.
JW:
I think what she’s trying to say folks is, is now go out and live your life by design.
