Conversations With Cinthia

Cinthia opened today’s episode with a famous sonnet by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, entitled “How Do I Love Thee?”  The poem famously begins, “How do I love thee?  Let me count the ways,” and then beautifully lists a variety of ways the lover in the poem loves the beloved.  Cinthia cited this as a beautiful exploration of the reality that love is acted upon, carried out, expressed in actions and gestures that mean something to the lover and to the beloved. Have you ever done something meaningful for someone you loved, only to observe that the individual didn’t seem to find it meaningful?  It is very important to know how people want to be loved.  It can be exhausting to give and give but find that the person to whom we are giving is not emotionally nurtured by the things we are giving.  In The Five Love Languages, Gary Chapman listed five “languages” through which people give and receive love; these were words of affirmation, quality time, physical touch, acts of service, receiving gifts.   Chapman asserted th