COVID-19 Made This The Most Important Love Language For Work & Home
So much about this Corona-era is ineffable.
The daily morning torpor of waking to this reality - a mix of weariness, uncertainty and maybe that extra glass of wine you knew you shouldn't have had but drank anyway because #quaratinelife.
The quickening of being too close to another body. Holding your breath, your temperature rising when you or someone you love makes a "risky" move like standing within 6 feet of someone or buying eggs.
The ball in our throats when it's quiet and dark and we let ourselves take in what it is like to be alone right now in the ICU, in a prison, entrapped in a violent home, or one with empty cupboards.
Because ours is an existence of imposed isolation, we long more than ever to have our experiences reflected and validated. But we cannot confess them to a good friend in person. They cannot give us a knowing hug. Our boss can't give a pat on the back for a job well done. When we meet someone we admire, we can't set a tone of equity and progress with a firm handshake.
In 1992, Gary Chapman published The 5 Love Languages: How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate, a pop psyche book helping couples understand each others' ways of communicating love. Ever since, these 5 habits became a shorthand for how you express affection:
Words of Affirmation
Acts of Service
Receiving Gifts
Quality Time
Physical Touch
(I'm a words of affirmation & quality time gal).
In this COVID era, we are short of human contact and proximity are no longer viable ways of relating.
When we are starved of physical touch and quality time,
words mean more.
So we pour over each others words: on the news, YouTubes, Zooms, podcasts and on...
Because we're all muddling through this together. Newscasters are drinking wine in their living rooms while they throw to commercial. Your kid is running into your home off ice as you deliver your keynote at a remote networking event. Because we are desperate to figure our way out of some of our greatest challenges as human race, we are improvising like hell.
Life - imperfect and terrifying - has torn down the fourth wall and we are all witnessing it over our screens. Because no one has a magic wand, can kiss it away, or gift enough PPE to fix this, words are what we have.
People are ready for a bold statement. For an honest solution and now, more than ever, willing to take a chance.
So if your talents can help get a business you're interested or a person you care about back on its feet, reach out, tell them you want to offer your services.
If you're curious to meet someone and hear their professional story and how they're doing this week with homeschooling, write them that email.
Hell, if you just like the cut of someone's jib - give them a compliment.
In this deeply uncomfortable time, we seek help and affirmation, in the forms its available. Mind your words. They are a powerful way to bridge far more than the 6 feet that separate us.
I don't have a solve for how to tell your 5 year old why they can't celebrate their birthday with friends, or how to tell your parents how afraid you are for their survival. I just know that it's a good time to figure out what you're able to contribute, what you really think and feel and to say it to the people who matter.
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