Holiday Gift Giving Mistakes to Avoid
I’m a big fan of The 5 Love Languages and the idea of giving gifts according to someone’s love language. When we fail to recognize another person’s love language in our gift-giving, we can miss the mark, despite making a genuine effort to show thoughtfulness and care. When we fail to give a gift according to someone’s love language, the gift recipient can be left feeling overlooked and unappreciated. In this blog, I’ll be sharing some gift giving mistakes from my own life (or others I know), so you can avoid making them this holiday season!
In case you need a quick review, the 5 Love Languages are:
gift giving
quality time
physical touch
words of affirmation
acts of service
The idea is that we want to have an understanding of others’ love languages, so we can show love and care according to THEIR love language (not our own). Our tendency is to show love according to OUR love language. Even animals do this!! For example, has your cat ever brought a dead mouse to your door? It’s as though your cat is bringing you a really special gift. Only….you don’t actually like dead mice. They’re just not your thing, after all! This is what can happen when we give gifts according to OUR love language rather than the love language of the person we’re giving the gift to.
Here are some examples of gift giving gone wrong!
Scenario 1: When you know the person’s love language, and you still fail to apply your knowledge!
I’ll start with a personal scenario first. I know about the love languages, and I know my family members’ love languages as well. Despite this, I still messed up! Here’s how it went!
My sister and her 2 kiddos came to visit me over Easter weekend. As a quality time person, I planned all sorts of Easter activities for us to do together. At the end of the night, my sister, a gift-giver, wanted to stop at the store to pick out a few items to give her children the next morning for Easter. While at the store, I debated whether or not I should buy something for the kids, knowing that my sister is a gift giver. I decided not to buy anything, because the kids didn’t really need any more toys or candy. What happened?
The very next morning, I heard my sister tell my niece and nephew to “bring Auntie Lissa her Easter gift!!” In came her two little chickies with a water bottle and chapstick, both things that I love and frequently use. In that moment, I realized that I failed to apply my knowledge of the 5 love languages. My sister gifted me according to her love language and mine by spending time with me! And, as a gift giver, she of course, picked a gift that I would truly appreciate. While she didn’t necessarily care or notice my slip up, I always remember this experience!
Scenario 2: When you know the person’s love language, try REALLY, REALLY hard, and still fail!
I learned about the 5 Love Languages at a pretty young age, and I knew my family members’ love languages as well. We had determined that my dad was an acts of service guy and that it would be really great if my sisters and I gave him a birthday gift that was an act of service. We knew that he had been talking about painting the front porch for a long time and that it just never got done. So, we decided to do it for him.
We didn’t tell my mom or dad that we were going to paint the front porch because we wanted it to be a surprise. My sisters and I decided to come home early from the beach one weekend, so we could get started on painting. None of us had jobs which meant that we had no money, and buying paint requires money. We determined that this was not an issue, however, because we knew that my parents had lots of paint cans in the basement.
We pulled out the paint cans from the basement, checked out the available paint colors and quantities, and chose a color. We didn’t know how old the paint was, but it seemed good enough, and since our porch had leafy designs on it, we decided to use 3 different colors: white, black, and purple. (In case you were wondering, we did not grow up in Charles Village, Baltimore where colorful porches are the norm.)
We painted away while our neighbor watched with a smile, and when my parents drove by the house, we saw our mother rubbernecking to see what was going on! I don’t quite remember what happened after that, but what I can tell you is that the porch eventually did get painted….It just didn’t get painted to completion by us!
So…the moral of this story is to ask for help if you need it! Knowing someone’s love language alone isn’t always enough! Even when you try to gift according to their love language, you can still miss the mark!
Scenario 3: You don’t know the person’s love language at all, but you try really hard, and then both of you end up feeling bad!
Here’s a slightly modified scenario of someone I know (name changed). On mother’s day, Ms. Bmore’s partner pulled out all the shots. They and their children created a thoughtful, hand-made card (words of affirmation). They made dinner (act of service) and then had a special meal together (quality time).
The problem? Ms. Bmore’s partner wasn’t familiar with the 5 Love Languages, and thus, they were not aware of their partner’s love language. While their mother’s day plans involved 3 of the 5 love languages, can you guess what Ms. Bmore’s love language was? Unfortunately for this partner, it wasn’t 1 of the 3 love languages displayed, and this resulted in Ms. Bmore feeling really sad, unloved, and overlooked!! When we don’t know about the love languages, we can go to great lengths to show thoughtfulness and care, only to have our efforts overlooked and leaving our loved ones feeling unseen. In cases like this, both parties lose.
Scenario 4: When Bob knows but is unwilling to try!!
This scenario is based on ones that I’ve heard multiple times in my therapy office. The scenario is this: The wife’s love language is words of affirmation. She, being the good communicator that she is, has told this to her husband (let’s call him Bob) multiple times. A text, a card, or a note with a thoughtful, heart-felt message would simply mean the world to her. She cannot understand why it is so hard for Bob to give her this one simple thing that she is asking for.
Bob’s response: “I just feel weird saying that kind of stuff. I didn’t grow up with that kind of stuff in my family of origin, so it feels weird. We didn’t talk like that in my family.” For Bob, saying or writing thoughtful words is like pulling teeth, despite the fact that it costs no money and would make someone he loves oh, so happy!
The moral of this story? Sometimes we know someone’s love language, and we are simply unwilling to try. The reality is that speaking someone else’s love language may be outside of our comfort zone, especially if you’re like the Bobs of the world who did not grow up hearing kind and loving words being spoken regularly. It’s important to keep in mind, though, that being uncomfortable showing love based on our own background does not give us an “out” from trying. If our partner is clearly communicating that they are craving words of affirmation (and if we truly do love them), then it’s worth making the effort to try. Don’t be like Bob!
Sometimes we learn from our mistakes, but if you can learn from someone else’s mistakes, that’s even better! I hope that learning from others’ mistakes is what you’ll take away from this article! These are real stories with real people and real impacts! Here’s hoping it provides inspiration for an amazing, heartful gift that hits the spot for your friend, colleague, or family member!
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Written by: Melissa Wesner, LCPC
Melissa is the Founder of LifeSpring Counseling Services in Maryland, and she is a Certified Brainspotter and Brainspotting Consultant who specializes in treating depression, anxiety, trauma, and sex therapy.
