Say I Love You

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Say I love You

Give the gift of Bonne Maman and show your love and appreciation for those you care about the most with the NEW Ten Ways to Say I Love You. With ten mini jars of preserves, jam, and honey, Bonne Maman is here to take care of those you cherish the most.

Family and friendships are an important part of every culture. In English, there are many different ways to express your feelings of love and appreciation to your friends and family. Here are some of them:

So, breaking the ice with a cute and funny way to say I love you in English might just be the right solution! Here are a few expressions that you might find helpful (they sound really cute in a text message, too):

The expression of love is wonderfully diverse, and whether you're a native English speaker or not, many of us have so much choice in finding the right words when we want to express our feelings beyond the classic three words.

We hope that this extensive list of different ways to say I love you in English will help you find the right words to express your feelings for the one you love and cherish.

My French husband loves me. I know he loves me because he hands me a bouquet of flowers almost every weekend. And when I tell him I was at a party full of beautiful people, he charmingly says something about "birds of a feather". I'm reminded that he loves me when we're at a cocktail party with work colleagues and he reaches out to caress my arm. He calls me ma biche (my deer) and shows his love for me every day, even after more than a decade together.

However, I can't remember the last time he said "je t'aime" (I love you). This might be disconcerting if it wasn't so normal in France, where no matter how head-over-heels a couple may be, they rarely utter those words.

Heise was inspired to write her first book, Je T'aime, Me Neither, when her French boyfriend left her saying, "Je ne t'aime plus." The proclamation was all the more startling, she said, because how could he say, "I don't love you anymore" when he had never said, "I love you"?

The French don't say, "I love you" because they don't have a verb to express heartfelt sentiments for the people they care about. There is only the verb "aimer", which means both "to like" and "to love". As a result, a French person is not exaggerating when they conjugate "aimer" to explain their relationship to rugby, a warm baguette or the smell of lilacs. Naturally, then, it feels trite and rather mundane to use the same word when describing intense feelings of love for one's newborn baby, a childhood friend or a life partner.

Looking at Larousse's online French-English dictionary helps understand how the French do talk about love. Here, the transitive verb is defined as "aimer", but the examples listed of how to express that love show how rarely it is used. According to Larousse, when talking about love for a sport or a food, the proper French term would be passion. Love at first sight is a coup de foudre (lightning strike); letters are signed affectueusement (affectionately); and the love of your life is simply the homme ou femme de ma vie (man or woman of my life).

Without being able to say "love", the French have learned to show it instead. "Flattery", "chivalry" and "romantic" are all words that found their way into the English language through Old French. Giving compliments is something of an art form here, coming just as easily from a new lover as the butcher preparing your leg of lamb. Men don't think twice about carrying a woman's suitcase down the metro stairs, and, as for being romantic, it's ingrained in a culture that perfected chocolate, invented Champagne and built the opulent Art Nouveau Pont Alexandre III bridge.

In France, pet names are specific to the individual or their role in your life. A man may refer to his female colleauges as mes chats (my cats). A close friend greeting a woman is likely to call her ma belle, or my beauty. An online search of women's magazines produces lists of hundreds of pet names for mum, dad, the kids, a friend or a lover: ma chéri; mon coeur (my heart); mon trésor (my treasure); ma perle (my pearl).

The French don't have to say it, either. They are happy to communicate their feelings with hugs, cuddles and kisses wherever and whenever they feel the need to express love. There is no debate about public displays of affection in France, where PDAs are celebrated as a fortunate consequence of love. A Paris summer is full of couples sitting hip to hip along the Seine, kissing so passionately that they don't notice the encouraging cheers of tourists on the passing Bateaux Mouches river boats.

Kisses also replace "I love you" when saying good-bye to friends and family. The French say "je t'embrasse" (I kiss you) at the end of phone calls with loved ones. My children end their text messages to me with bises (kisses), while my good friends sign off with a slightly more formal bisous, both describing a kiss that comes from the Latin word baesium, a salute that falls between a sacred rite and a romantic gesture.

For most non-German speakers, the German language sounds harsh and reminds them of everything but love. But even though German might not be the most romantic language, German people have hearts and feelings and can express their love in many ways -- and you can see that clearly in many works of German literature and art.

If you plan on visiting Germany or other German-speaking countries in the future, you should definitely learn how to express your feelings towards somebody in the German language. There are many goodhearted people in the country and there are many opportunities to fall in love.

Besides the verbal expression, there are some other ways in which Germans express their love, especially men. On the night of the 1st of May, there are many interesting traditions that happen in different regions of Germany. People show their love to each other without saying a word.

At the beginning of a romantic relationship or when you are dating somebody, you might not say that you are deeply in love with the other person. However, you might begin to feel that there is more than just friendship between you.

The German language might not sound as lovely as other languages, but there are definitely many ways to express love in it. We hope that now you feel prepared for expressing your feelings for Germans - and we hope that romantic situations work out for you.

Learning a new language inside a classroom doesn't provide the same opportunities "to feel in love," Harris says. The language spoken primarily in the home or with loved ones develops a deeper emotional resonance.

"When to say 'I love you' is a very personal decision and there is no set definitive time as to when to say it. Everyone falls in love at a different pace, based on my experience, coaching clients, and recent studies, it's men that tend to say it sooner than ladies.

"However, be careful as what you think are feelings of love could be no more than infatuation. Being attracted to someone in the early stages of a relationship makes you feel great because of all the 'feel-good' chemicals such as dopamine and oxytocin that are being released in your body."

Dr. Venetia Leonidaki, Consultant Psychologist and Founder of Spiral Psychology, appears to agree, adding you may want to "check-in with yourself" before confessing love to your partner for the first time.

"You may feel a deep connection with this person, want to know more about them, care about how they feel, and be willing to go to great length to take care of them. All the above signs suggest that your feelings run deep and as a result, saying 'I love you' may only come out naturally."

Dr. Marianne Trent, Clinical Psychologist, points out while the ablity to express "je t'aime" is "a uniquely human experience", the word "love" may mean different things to people in the same relationship.

"Some grow up in households where feelings and declarations of love are discussed daily whilst others have grown up in more of an emotional vacuum. The feeling of being in love is an intense rush of hormones which can elevate your excitement levels which as a result make it kind of hard to keep the words in!

"I would say that if you feel like you love someone and it looks likely that the feelings are reciprocal that you can dive in and say it! A safe way to dip a toe in the water is to say "I'm falling in love with you" before actually dropping the 'L Bomb!'"

Although psychologist Santini recognizes telling someone you truly love them is "one of the challenging things to say", she believes you should ignore self-doubt and express love when you notice the following signs.

My father, despite writing letters filled with life and curiosity, saw nothing wrong with consigning my mother to four decades of cooking and cleaning at home while he was enjoying his agency out in the world of men. It seems to be the rule, in both the small world of marriage and the big world of American life, that those without agency have sentimentality and vice versa. The various post-9/11 hysterias, both the plague of I love yous and the widespread fear and hatred of the ragheads, were hysterias of the powerless and overwhelmed. If my mother had had greater scope for accomplishment, she might have tailored her sentiments more realistically to their objects.

This article was co-authored by Sarah Schewitz, PsyD. Sarah Schewitz, Psy.D. is a licensed clinical psychologist by the California Board of Psychology with over 10 years of experience. She received her Psy.D. from the Florida Institute of Technology in 2011. She is the founder of Couples Learn, an online psychology practice helping couples and individuals improve and change their patterns in love and relationships.There are 7 references cited in this article, which can be found at the bottom of the page.wikiHow marks an article as reader-approved once it receives enough positive feedback. This article has 13 testimonials from our readers, earning it our reader-approved status. This article has been viewed 2,340,007 times. 041b061a72