The Five Elements & The Five Love Languages
I love love. I love thinking about love, and I love talking about love. So when the casual question, “What is your love language?” pops up, I immediately have an answer: “Food! Food is my love language.” “Food is not a love language,” my friends point out to me. “Oh, yes it is! What is more romantic than two pieces of nigiri sushi? See? They even come in pairs!”
What my friends are actually asking is, which of the five love languages – as defined by Dr. Gary Chapman in his book, “The Five Love Languages” – has the greatest impact on my happiness and relationship satisfaction: gifts, words of affirmation, quality time, acts of service, or physical touch? I give an equally obtuse answer: “Whichever one I’m getting the least of at that moment.” (It’s a good thing I have friends who are patient with me.)
One day while I was talking to Erna about romantic relationships, she said something that made me wonder, “Is it possible that there is a love language that lines up with each of the Five Elements?” We did a quick rundown of both lists and, miraculously, yes! As we suspected, each element has a love language that naturally corresponds to it.
There are differences between the Five Love Languages framework and Traditional Chinese Medicine’s (TCM) elemental framework:
According to the Five Love Languages, love languages are acquired much like languages are acquired: primarily learned from our parents and family, and secondarily learned from our friends and environment. Love languages are “spoken” between romantic partners, and unless you speak your partner’s love language, your efforts will do little to meet their emotional need to be loved.
TCM views a person’s primary element as inherent to them, and includes parents and family with our friends and external environment as influences that help us to develop all of the elements. Also, there is no particular view that love languages are only spoken between romantic partners. Love can be expressed between any two people regardless of their relationship; family and friends will also benefit from us understanding what will resonate most with them.
Regardless of who we are trying to connect with, how do you discover a person’s love language? Dr. Chapman recommends to start by asking them (one ingenious way he suggests for figuring out your own love language is to think about what would happen if you didn’t receive a specific type of attention; you’d experience “traumatic feelings of betrayal” if you are cut off from your love language of choice). After that, he suggests taking notes based on your observations and analyzing them for patterns of efficacy, etc., etc.… which sounds like so much work.
With TCM, you should have plenty of other clues about a person’s primary element besides how they react to being shown romantic love. A person’s primary element is evident in myriad ways, including how they interact with friends and family, how they approach their job, and even sometimes by how they drive (!). Once you figure out someone’s element, you can then map it to a love language. And again, this can be applied to so many other relationships besides just romantic ones.
In both paradigms, we recognize that love is essential to our emotional health and stability. Speaking someone’s language is the key for making sure that message lands with the greatest impact. Here is how we’ve mapped each element to a love language and why we think this works:
Earth & Gifts
Gifts are tangible, physical items a person gives to their loved one. Gifts don’t have to be expensive or even purchased because their worth has nothing to do with their monetary value; some of the best gifts are absolutely free, like a sweet-smelling flower picked from the garden.
Gifts are a visible symbol that someone was thinking of you even when you were apart. When someone gives you something you mentioned you wanted, that shows that they were paying attention to you and wanted to make you happy (remember Ross and Rachel and the crystal duck on Friends?).
Gifts are central to the Earth person because Earth is all about expressing care in very material and tangible ways; Earth is the element of nourishment and giving sustenance, after all. When an Earth person gives a gift, they are often useful things, like a chef’s knife you never realized you needed but now can’t live without. Sometimes Earth people pay closer attention to your needs than you do yourself!
In romantic love, as when someone is given an engagement ring, the message an Earth person receives is, “I love you. I can and will take care of you, and this ring is the tangible proof of that promise.” This tradition should not be dismissed as frivolous or materialistic; for millennia, people in cultures across the world have bestowed gifts as a promise to take care of their mate (even birds do it!).
Metal & Words of Affirmation
Words of affirmation build you up and make you feel appreciated. They can come in the form of verbal compliments (“You look great!” “I love how good you are with my father.”) and they can come in the form of encouraging words (“I’m so proud of you for sticking to your health and fitness routine.” “I know you’re going to knock your work presentation out of the park.”).
According to the Five Love Languages, these loving words, “affirm a partner’s worth [and tell them] they do something meaningful and worthwhile for you.” When you give kind and encouraging words, you’re not focused on someone’s shortcomings; you’re recognizing their value and encouraging the latent potential within your partner to come out.
In Traditional Chinese Medicine, words of affirmation reflect exactly what a Metal person values: harmony. Words of affirmation are an external expression that your loved one fits harmoniously into your world, and that you value and appreciate what they bring to your life. As romantic partners, being in harmony means being on the same team, playing by the same rules, working toward the same goals. Expressing words of affirmation is the natural way for a Metal person to convey, “I value you so much,” and, “Look how great we are together.”
Water & Quality Time
Quality time means giving your loved one undivided attention and actively engaging with them. This includes doing fun things together and spending time on common pursuits. Even (and maybe especially!) when partners have different interests, when they do something together wholeheartedly, without reservations or complaints, the message is clear: I want you to have a good time because I love you.
Quality time can also come in the form of quality conversation, described by the Five Love Languages as, “sympathetic dialogue where two people are sharing their experiences, thoughts, feelings, and desires in a friendly, uninterrupted [way].” This is different from words of affirmation because when you express words of affirmation, you say how you perceive the other person; quality conversation involves listening to what your partner has to say. Each partner participates in drawing the other out with a genuine desire to understand that person’s thoughts, hopes, and feelings; the flip side of that coin is self-revelation, or to share your true and authentic self with your partner.
For Water people, the quality time spent with a loved one supports Water’s emphasis on purpose. The goal of quality conversation is to understand who someone is and what their purpose is, and to share who you are, and what your purpose is. You can only glean such deep insights by giving someone your undivided attention and really focusing on what the other person is saying.
When a couple shares the same purpose, it becomes easy to spend time together. But there is no better way for a Water person to express love than to say, “I support your purpose by spending time on what’s important to you, even if it is not important to me.” Water is the element that relates to time, so for a Water person to give someone time signifies that this person is valuable, because their time is valuable.
Wood & Acts of Service
Acts of service involve doing things you know your partner would like you to do. This can be anything from vacuuming the living room, to filing your pesky taxes, to taking the kids to the park so your partner can sleep in on a Saturday morning. While these may seem like menial tasks on a honey-do list, they can mean a lot to your partner.
Showing love through acts of service requires thought, planning, time, effort, and energy, all done without complaint, because is it really an act of love when your partner has to hear you complain about what you’ve just done for them? When acts of service is your love language and you are asking your partner to show you love, it is a request, not a demand; requests direct the flow of love, whereas demands create a dam and love cannot flow. You cannot guilt your partner into doing something for you and call this an act of service; coercion is antithesis to love. With all love, both sides must be gentle and willing participants.
In TCM, Wood people are all about power, particularly its external manifestations. Nothing would give the Wood partner more gratification than to be your knight in shining armor by removing all the obstacles in your way, even if your obstacle is the massive pile of laundry that needs to be folded. For the Wood person, the more these acts of service look like acts of heroism, the better! “I love you so much that I will slay a dragon for you!” (If that dragon is the IRS and all their forms, then yes, please.)
When showing love to a Wood person, the easiest thing for you to do is listen to what they want and to do it with a smile. Wood people are happy to tell you what they need done, and if you help them to achieve their goals, they will feel the full force of your love.
Fire & Physical Touch
It seems obvious that physical touch – especially intimate touch – is an expression of love, but for people whose love language is touch, even small affectionate touches do a lot to fill their love tanks. These are the people who will give their partner a sweet kiss on the cheek as they pass through the kitchen, or rub their feet after a long day at work.
One big sign that a person’s love language is physical touch is how they act when they are deprived of that physical contact. To them, physical distancing is emotional distancing, so it’s critical to maintain this connection. And in times of crisis, the thing they need the most is to be hugged, or they will become completely depleted.
Of course, physical touch is the love language of Fire people. Fire is the element of sensuality and feelings, and that absolutely includes feeling someone physically. In non-romantic relationships, Fire people are the ones who greet their friends with a big hug, or who link arms as they walk down the street. Fire people want to merge with the ones they love, and touching – both physically and emotionally – is the inroad to merging.
Conclusion
Just as we exhibit each of the Five Elements in our lives, we also have the capacity to show love and receive it with each of the five love languages. Some ways come more naturally to us than others, but understanding how your loved ones best receive love will allow you to connect with them that much more fully.