Valentine's Day has a remarkable and changing history. From it's origins in the ancient Roman fertility festival called Lupercalia to the modern customs of exchanging cards, candies and flowers, Valentine's Day has become a major consumer holiday where Americans spend over $20 billion a year to share expressions and tokens of love.

That's a big deal...economically and emotionally.

While this love day is a big money maker, it can also be a stress inducer. There's a lot of expectation and disappointment in getting the expression of love just right.

After all, how do you express something as big as love in just one day?

A better approach is to express love daily in small gestures. The key to doing that most effectively is to know your partner's love language.

In Gary Chapman's wonderful book "The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love That Lasts", he shares the importance of understanding that we have preferences in how we experience love.

Knowing your partner's preferred love language is the secret to making him or her feel loved...on Valentine's Day and any day of the year.

One activity I love to do when coaching couples is to have them look at the 5 love languages and list them in their preferred order of importance.

That's the easy part.

The second step is to have them guess their partner's preferred order. The results can often be surprising since most people wrongly people assume that their partner prioritizes the same love language as they do.

Now it's time for you to discover how you best experience love. Whether you are in a relationship or not, this exercise will help you know what you need to experience love from others, and how to give love to yourself.

If you are in a relationship, use this exercise create the best Valentine's Day ever by deepening your understanding of your partner. That's a Valentine's gift, that keeps on giving!
 

Step One: Look at the list of love languages and write them down in the order of how you prefer to receive love.
 

Words of Affirmation
Acts of Service
Receiving Gifts
Quality Time
Physical Touch

Step Two: Now do the same thing as you guess your partner's preferred order.

Step Three: Have your partner do steps 1 and 2 above and then compare.

Step Four: Make this Valentine's Day extra special by expressing your love for your partner using their #1 love language. Continue sharing your love by doing small gestures daily and make this Valentine's Day be the start of a lifetime of loving behaviors.

Were you surprised by your responses? By your partners? Feel free to share your insights or great ideas to express love by commenting below..