Love Languages: Quality Time and Conversation

The second specifically constructive gesture or language of love is Quality Time.  The majority of people cannot just live next each other without quality personal contact.  There are hermits of course, but as Aristotle reminds us in his book on the City (The Politics, book I, part II), a man who lives apart from the community is either a god or a beast.  The consequences of being away from the community are either divinizing or de-humanizing - we either become contemplatives or monsters.  It is important to note Aristotle's other surprise at his discovery of man's contemplative vocation, and that is about how few of us actually live the lives we were made to live (Nicomachean Ethics, Book I, Ch. 5).  Aristotle discovered that the greatest happiness man can attain - the activity which he alone of all the animals is able to perform - is the contemplation of his Creator.  And of course, he remarks just how rarely people discover their capacity for contemplation, and how rarely even those who discover their capacity actually contemplate (Nicomachean Ethics, Book X, Ch. 8, Metaphysics Book XII, Part 7).  With those remarks, it becomes fairly easy to discern - almost conclusively - that when someone separates themselves from the community, even for apparently valid reasons, they place their lives and their happiness in danger.  Even hermits live in community - though their community activities are reduced to a strict minimum.

Man's happiness is not only found in contemplation however, it is also in the exercise of friendship and in a  bond of friendship-love.  This is a second important point for community life.  Living "separated" from the community is possible even when one lives in physical proximity of other persons.  Pope John Paul II wrote about this phenomenon in the encyclical Evangelium Vitae referring specifically to the modern conception of individual freedom:

"This view of freedom leads to a serious distortion of life in society. If the promotion of the self is understood in terms of absolute autonomy, people inevitably reach the point of rejecting one another. Everyone else is considered an enemy from whom one has to defend oneself. Thus soci- ety becomes a mass of individuals placed side by side, but without any mutual bonds. Each one wishes to assert himself independently of the other and in fact intends to make his own interests prevail." (EV, §20)

We commonly refer to this phenomenon as individualism.  A human community is not just the juxtaposition of individuals - people living in physical or even emotional proximity - with no deeply spiritual bonds.  A human community is founded on personal friendships - personal bonds which are more than just circumstantial.  In order for these personal friendships to come about, to thrive, and to become a solid foundation, there must be a concrete exchange of persons.  This is where the love language of quality time comes in to play.  Quality time is sharing something personally, it is what permits a personal exchange.  Quality time is a moment where what is truly personal is made manifest, where what was hidden about the other person is shared.  While the gestures of quality time are diverse, I think the essential gesture of quality time is conversation.

Artistic expression must have some role as a gesture of quality time, but it is more connected with the gesture of gift giving in my opinion.  Art does not have a principally ethical intention at its origin - so the effects of art or of artistic inspiration on the communication of personal love are secondary.  Beauty does not increase love as such, but does awaken the mind and heart to a certain extent.  Quality time could involve singing a love song to someone you love.  What is essential is the veracity of the words.  If the music itself isn't beautiful, but the words are honest, personal, and true, the intention is still transmitted.  On the other hand, if the music is beautiful but the words are banal, impersonal, or quite simply lies, it could be artistically appreciated but lacking ethical intention, or worse, amoral.

What we do see then, are degrees of personal significance in the time we can spend with each other.  And the degree of personal significance is the quality of the time we spend with each other. In order to understand what it is that makes some moments or activities more meaningful than others, we should try to understand or discover what we could call the "principle of meaning."  What is it that determines whether or not the time we spend with someone will be meaningful?  Can we always make the time we spend with someone meaningful, or do we have to accept that sometimes it will be superficial?  Does the meaning of a moment spent with someone depend on both persons?  Is it possible for one person to find time spent with someone meaningful while the other person does not?

I think that true quality time takes two, it cannot be a completely one-sided affair.  A personal exchange requires both exposing one's true self and receiving the other's true self.  This implies trust and allowing oneself to be vulnerable.  Quality time is not dramatic, but rather the experience of another as a person and not just an individual.

One may be led to believe that quality time is always something deep, intimate, and perhaps secret, but quality time can also be simple, light and joyful.  There is no reason to oppose superficial and profound.  The problem comes in when we limit our relationships with others to either the superficial or the profound.  The problem comes in when we refuse to be vulnerable or when we oblige someone to become vulnerable.  The word "superficial" has negative connotations when used to describe relationships, which may sometimes be the case.  However, I do not think it is right to accuse others of being superficial.  We can accuse ourselves of being superficial, but not other people.  If someone does not choose to reveal themselves to us, perhaps it is because we have not yet sufficiently earned their trust, perhaps it is because they are more receptive than revealing in their personality.  Perhaps it is just because they lack experience or reflection, so they are innocent or childlike, but not superficial.  So if we look at quality time, there are both a variety of forms and degrees.  Quality time is sharing human experience in a personal way.  Sharing human experience could be either sharing the experience itself - having the same experience at the same time - or sharing experience by communicating/transmitting it.  Culture has this very end in view.

Once again, we are looking at gestures of quality time -and quality time is one of the two constructive gestures of love.  By gestures of service we demonstrate that we depend upon one another materially, that we need each other in very concrete and basic ways, and that we serve one another - we do things for one another - not just because we have to, but because others need our help or our services, and we want to do what we can to help.  In a small community or family, the services are undertaken for the good (well-being) of those who live together, it incarnates in a fundamental, material way our choice to live together.  They are not undertaken for money, and this brings up an interesting reflection on the education of children.  In today's materialistic, individualistic society, how do we educate children to have a balanced perspective on the material common good?  Some have suggested giving children an allowance based on their participation in household chores.  Though the motivation involved is extremely effective in getting children to do stuff, it also reinforces the modern materialistic, individualistic mentality - which is undesirable.  Building a strong and balanced family or community life requires true cooperation and profound personal bonds.  True cooperation requires having the same end in view.  And the end of family life is the good of all the members of the household.  So if household chores become paid jobs, the goal is no longer to live with each other, and it does not create an atmosphere of trust and mutual dependence.  Money becomes the perceived fruit of our labors, and we depend less upon each other than upon the power of money.  We rely less upon others for our happiness, and more upon money.

Perhaps that is why materialism and individualism go hand in hand, and we are seduced by individualism because it resembles autonomy - which is a personal good.  But while persons are stable, strong, and reliable to the extent that they discover and develop according to their substantial autonomy, they are good to the extent that they are able to enter into profound personal communion with others.  In fact, the human person is revealed through communion with other persons, not through the manifestation of autonomy.  So the confusion between substantial autonomy and an individualistic materialism has encouraged the separation of persons at the heart of the family and community.  Substantial autonomy gives us our depth as human persons, and this depth is revealed in the communion we have with other persons.  An individual material autonomy is important, but is not the essence of autonomy.  And someone who is materially independent does not necessarily know the source of their true autonomy - or worse they equate their autonomy with their independence.  A family or community is not build of independent members, but of autonomous persons who have chosen to depend upon one another, who have chosen to be responsible for one another.

Now, the quality time spent with members of the community or family strengthen the personal bonds which are what enable us, principally, to choose one another.  What are some specific ways we exercise quality time?  Quality time is what disposes to communion, and what realizes deep personal communion.  Conversation seems to me to be the most obvious and fundamental means of communion and ipso facto exercise of quality time.  I am sure there are other ways to spend quality time with others, but to skip conversation would be an error.  We don't speak merely to affirm one another, merely to say the good - we also speak to teach, to share our experiences, to try to understand our lives, and to expose our inner-self.  So conversation takes place at many levels, and can realize various degrees of communion.  In this way, we can look at making conversation as a gesture of love, a gesture of quality time.  There are different kinds of conversation (social, polite, planning, deep, superficial, awkward, interesting, boring, etc.) and there are different subjects.  Do the different levels of conversation correspond to the different levels of ethical acts?

Are we ever under an obligation to enter into dialog with someone?  Is there a fundamentally ethical motivation for conversation?  Can the language of quality time be spoken at the most basic ethical level? Does respect require us to spend quality time with people we don't even know?  Basic respect, as we have already seen, requires us to avoid harming others.  Therefore basic respect in the domain of quality time requires conversation to the extent that it would prevent pain or harm.  When someone initiates conversation with us, it is against basic respect to ignore them in most circumstances.  And in most circumstances, basic respect would require us to avoid imposing conversation on others.  Beyond the level of basic respect is that of politeness, and therefore polite conversation.  Polite conversation is a non-imposing invitation to conversation.  Polite conversation gives the other person permission to speak without forcing them to or obliging them to.  When we know that a human community is built on personal relationships, which requires the exchange of persons, politeness obliges engaging others - even strangers - in conversation.  Beyond polite conversation is socializing - conversation open to friendship.  In order for socializing to remain ethical however, it must remain finalized by friendship.  Friendly conversation that does not really change us, or bring us closer, remains superficial.  In friendly conversation, or socializing, a discovery of the other person allows trust to grow.  With growing trust comes the ability to expose one's person in a deeper way.  Therefore social conversation can be a disposition to deeper more personal conversation, which is one of the most important gestures of quality time.

My mother sent me an article about the relationship between people's happiness and the kinds of conversation they have.  Without getting into what it means to be happy, the article does offer an interesting perspective into the effects of conversation habits on our lives.  My cousin - I think she must be in middle school - likes to start conversations with me online.  She lacks a little follow-through though.  She say, "Hi," and I reply by returning the greeting and asking a question.  But since the first question isn't very interesting I usually only get a one word answer.  So then I ask a more interesting question - to which I get a brief reply.  Obviously, socializing requires certain skills that need time and a sense of responsibility to acquire.  These gestures of quality time and conversation contribute to the ambiance and culture of a family or community - quality time is what allows us to demonstrate concretely to one another that we are welcomed and received for who we are, as persons.