Estate Planning as a Love Language

It’s hard to believe that it’s been thirty years since Dr. Gary Chapman introduced the world to the concept of “love languages” and how they can be used to strengthen your relationship, not only with your spouse, but also with your children and other special people in your life. While you might not think of Estate Planning as a type of love language, it can incorporate three of the five love languages: Acts of Service, Words of Affirmation, and Receiving Gifts. (In case you didn’t already know, the other two “love languages” are Quality Time and Physical Touch.)

Have you ever wondered how you can show someone in your life that you really love them?

When I have polled groups of people on the simple question, “Who do you love most?” I get the expected answers:

1. My spouse
2. My children
3. My parents

But then I ask a follow up question (which at first seems to be unrelated to the initial question), “How many of you have prepared your estate plan?”

Consistently, less than 10% of the people in the room, have their estate plan done. 9 out of 10 people acknowledge that they have never taken the time to prepare for their death.

That brings me back to the issue of caring for those you love. Simply taking the time to get your affairs in order in an Act of Service to your family. If you truly love your spouse, your children, and your parents, then why have you not prepared for the one event in life that is most impactful, most devastating, most painful, and final?

By not planning you are leaving your spouse, children, or parents in the most vulnerable position to deal with:

• Having no authority to allow your spouse, children, or parents to act on behalf of your estate.
• Guessing the location of your investments, bank accounts, and retirement plans.
• Leaving no access to your online accounts, which hold the keys to your life these days.
• Leaving no direction as to the division or distribution of your bank accounts, retirement plans, investments, and other assets.
• Leaving the disposition of your body and the details of your funeral arrangements to be made by your loved ones under extreme stress and leaving them vulnerable to financial exploitation from the funeral industry’s best salesman.

In short, you have unintentionally created a mess for your spouse, children and/or parents to clean up. And you have done it at the most painful time in their life. As if the loss of you from their life was not grievous enough, now they need to process through your life in which you have left no direction.

If it is not plainly apparent at this point, I am suggesting that making sure you have your estate plan done and up to date is one of the most loving things you can do for the people you care for.

If you would like to share some final Words of Affirmation with your family, there are ways to customize your estate plan documents to incorporate those parting sentiments.

And when your assets are distributed, your family will not only be receiving a monetary gift, but also the gift of “peace of mind” knowing that your wishes are being fulfilled.

If you die without an estate plan in place, the choices about what happens next are made for you, possibly by people who never knew you or the by the probate court. Having an estate plan puts you in control of what happens next for the people you love most.

Showing love to those in your life on a regular basis is more challenging than it sounds. It’s not hard, but it does take conscious effort. The people we hold closest and dearest to us are often the ones we expend the least amount of effort in displays of caring and affection. Estate Planning is a type of love language and one that your family will appreciate greatly in the years to come.