Quality Time

If your highest number was B then your love language is Quality Time.
What is Quality Time? A simple definition would be focusing attention on each other and talking. Giving each other undivided attention.

Taking a walk
Lunch and talking
Getting a babysitter and dinner
Talking after work or kids without the TV or phone or texting or computer
Picnic and talking
Doing something with your spouse that they enjoy and doing it wholeheartedly

Focused Attention
It is not just about being in the room with each other. An example is a wife that is texting while sitting next to her husband--listening to the events of the day--is not giving the husband any quality time. Same house, same room, same time but they are not together.
The activity is incidental………it is about the engagement of interaction.
The author writes “What happens on the emotional level is what matters. Our spending time together in a common pursuit communicates that we care about each other, that we enjoy being with each other, that we like to do things together.”

Quality Conversation
Two individuals sharing their thoughts, feelings and desires in a friendly uninterrupted context is quality conversation.
Words of Affirmation are based on what we are saying. Quality conversation is based on what we are hearing. Quality conversation is about someone listening. It is not about wanting advice; it is wanting to be heard……to feel as though someone understands the hurt, the stress, and the pressures.
It is important for those who do not have the same language—those who tend to analyze problems and create solutions—to remember a marriage is not a project or a problem needing to be solved. Giving advice should only be given when it is requested.

Learn not to interrupt. The author indicated the average individual listens for only 17 seconds before interrupting with their own ideas or thoughts.

“Learning To Talk” really talk is very important for quality conversation. In order to be understood, a person must learn to reveal themselves. The author suggested a way of becoming more aware of ones emotional conversation might be to note you’re your own feelings (to a notepad) about 3 times a day and learn to communicate those worded feelings to your spouse in your daily conversation.

Exercise: 20 minutes of undivided attention to each other………. That is 20 minutes of life…………. You will never get those 20 minutes again. Enjoy them.