Gary Chapman Quotes

Love is always freely given. Love cannot be demanded. We can request things of each other, but we must never demand anything. Requests give direction to love, but demands stop the flow of love.

Many couples have never learned the tremendous power of verbally affirming each other.

Every single day in a marriage, we influence each other. It is a matter of am I going to have a positive influence or a negative influence?

Lack of love from parents often motivates their children to go searching for love in other relationships. This search is often misguided and leads to further disappointment.

Love is the fundamental building block of all human relationships. It will greatly impact our values and morals. I am also convinced that love is the most important ingredient in the single 's search for meaning.

Life's deepest meaning is not found in accomplishments , but in relationships

What we do for each other before marriage is no indication of what we will do after marriage.

When I admit my own imperfections, it doesn't mean I am a bad person.

Love makes requests, not demands.

Much of the misbehavior of children is motivated by the cravings of an empty LOVE TANK.

We cannot erase the past, but we can accept it as history.

People do not get married planning to divorce. Divorce is the result of a lack of preparation for marriage and the failure to learn the skills of working together as teammates in an intimate relationship.

We all desperately need love. If a spouse in a difficult marriage will learn the love language of that spouse, and they will, with the help of God, consistently speak their love language no matter how they are treated.

Sometimes when the spouse is really the culprit, it is hard to admit what you consider your little failures, but if you are going to have a better relationship, you admitting your part in the dynamics is a step in the road to healing. Because if they see you modeling apology, for example, and they see you modeling love, they may well get the idea that maybe they need to apologize.

Love is the most powerful weapon in the world for good. I really believe that.

What we dislike in others is often a weakness in our own lives.

This book [Desperate Marriages ] is really a book on how to be a positive change agent in a very, very difficult marriage. I am not promising that all individuals will be responsive to the approach I take, but I do believe that many marriages could be saved... could be healed. That is my hope.

I think that in today's world, by nature, we are all self-centered. And that often leads to selfishness.

Physician Albert Scheweitzer said. " We are all so much together, but we are all dying of loneliness." Professor Leo Buscaglia notes, "There seems to be accumulating evidence that there is actually an inborn need for this togetherness, this human interaction, this love. It seems that without these close ties with other human beings, a new born infant, for example, can regress developmentally, lose consciousness, fall into idiocy and die.

..there is hope. That's the marvelous thing about being human. We can change our future. We need not be enslaved by the experiences of the past. We can learn to love even when we have not received love.

Love is reaching out to try to get to the other person.

Requests give direction to love, but demands stop the flow of love.

I think the tingles are important. They are real, and I am in favor of their survival. But they are not the basis for a satisfactory marriage. I am not suggesting that on should marry without the tingles. Those warm, excited feelings, the chill bumps, that sense of acceptance, the excitement of the touch that make up the tingles serve as the cherry on top of the sundae. But you cannot have a sundae with only the cherry.

The in-love experience does not focus on our own growth or on the growth and development of the other person. Rather, it gives us the sense that we have arrived and that we do not need further growth.

Forgiveness is not a feeling; it is a commitment. It is a choice to show mercy, not to hold the offense up against the offender. Forgiveness is an expression of love.

I hope the reader's sense that I am deeply empathetic with the pain of being in a desperate marriage, but I also believe that the person who is married to the abuser or the alcoholic or whomever has the greatest potential for helping them.

I am amazed by how many individuals mess up every new day with yesterday. They insist on bringing into today the failures of yesterday and in so doing, they pollute a potentially wonderful day.

Expressing love in the right language. We tend to speak our own love language, to express love to others in a language that would make us feel loved. But if it is not his/her primary love language, it will not mean to them what it would mean to us.

I think another [myth] is that some marriages are just hopeless. This is a common thing I hear from people, "Well, I just think there are some marriages that are hopeless, Dr. Chapman, don't you agree with that?" I say I understand the feeling, but the fact is that there are no marriages that are hopeless.

Respect begins with this attitude: "I acknowledge that you are a creature of extreme worth. God has endowed you with certain abilities and emotions. Therefore I respect you as a person. I will not desecrate your worth by making critical remarks about your intellect, your judgment or your logic. I will seek to understand you and grant you the freedom to think differently from the way I think and to experience emotions that I may not experience." Respect means that you give the other person the freedom to be an individual.

If we are to develop an intimate relationship, we need to know each other's desires. If we wish to love each other, we need to know what the other person wants.

Sex is the joining of two bodies; love is the joining of two souls.

Forgiveness is not a feeling; it is a commitment.

I cannot change others, but I can influence others... we can't change people, but we can and we do influence people, and we do it every single day.

On the other hand, if I walk in the house, I don't even bother to find her, I just walk in the den and flip on the TV, get myself something to drink, sit down, start unwinding, I have influenced my wife in a very negative way.

The getting out part [of advise] may well be true. Because if you have tried the tender love thing... typically the abuser is not going to change until they are pushed in a corner.

People tend to criticize their spouse most loudly in the area where they themselves have the deepest emotional need.

Don't be a victim of the urgent. In the long run, much of what seems so pressing right now won't even matter. What you do with your children will matter forever.

Most of us have more potential than we will ever develop. What holds us back is often a lack of courage.

The object of love is not getting something you want but doing something for the well-being of the one you love.

We can look at the pain in our lives. We can look at the way we have been mistreated, and we can have an attitude of, I will never amount to anything. I have been wrong about people all my life. I am going to pay somebody back for this.

I have been doing marriage counseling for about 15 years and I realized that what makes one person feel loved, doesn't make another person feel loved.

Emotions are our spontaneous response to life. We have these emotions, but if the emotion is a negative emotion, then I have a choice to say, "I am feeling sad tonight because this happened, but I am not going to let my sadness keep me from engaging my wife in conversation. "

Something in our nature cries out to be loved by another. Isolation is devastating to the human psyche. That is why solitary confinement is considered the cruelest of punishments.

My attitude affects my actions. So, if I have a negative attitude about it, then it is going to show up in the way I respond, but if I have a positive attitude, then I start looking for the things I can do that will make my life better and make the lives of people around me better.

Love is something you do for someone else, not something you do for yourself.

Another reality about relationships is that they are never static. All of us experience changes in relationships but a few stop to analyse why a relationship gets better or worse.

A soft answer turns away anger.