The best feeling in the world is connecting with another human being.
We all know we love our children, but do they know? We all want to feel loved. It gives us a sense of acceptance, belonging, and security. How do we show love, how do we know when we are feeling loved and why is it so important to feel loved?
One of the most obvious ways we show love is through verbal and physical affection. Showing love in this way is so easy when our children are little and portable. They are so small, cute, vulnerable and mainly compliant. We pick them up, hug them, kiss them and verbally praise them regularly and consistently throughout the day. However, as our children grow the way, we show our love becomes less often, less overt and more conditional. I think it is mainly because fear begins to override love. Fear of whom our children might become, fear of how they might act, and fear of not being good enough parents. However, we must fight the fear and remember to show our love. In addition to words of affirmation and physical touch, we can show our love through acts of service or freely doing something for another person. In other words, actions speaking louder than words. We can also show our love through spending quality time with our child. It does not have to be anything fancy, just 5-10 minutes where we are fully present with our child. The final love language is gift giving. This love language is not to be mistaken for materialism; if this is a person’s love language gifts are visual representations of love and significantly treasured.
It is essential to think about how we show love to know when we feel loved. We show love in different ways. I may feel loved when someone spends quality time with me, but my partner may feel loved more through physical affection or touch. Though how we show love may be different for each person, the sense or feeling of being loved is universal. We know we are really loved when the person really sees us and appreciates us for exactly who we are with all of our imperfections. We feel loved when we are not being judged; but rather when a sense of feeling good overcomes us, and we feel lovable. We feel loved when we think we have the time and space to be who we are. We feel loved when we feel safe to explore.
So, why is it so important to feel loved? When we feel that we are loved, we become aware of our value, and we become more secure. When we feel safe, we behave better, make better choices and feel more connected to others. Our brains like it when we connect with others. We feel social pain precisely like we feel physical pain. When we do not connect with others, we literally suffer.
In the mental health field, what I see most is hurt people who do not feel loved or lovable. We learn about love first from our families; what it feels like to be loved and how to show love. We all love our kids, so let’s show them.
What makes you feel loved?
