When was the last time you were genuinely engaged in what someone was saying to you? Do you make time for your loved ones? Do you make time for your friends? How do you keep your relationship alive? We live in an always-switched-on world, I struggle to sleep because I’ll be so busy on my phone or laptop, I’m busy on my phone so forget to be present in the moment sometimes. Today, I want to give my top tips for balance in relationships. This is in partnership with Yushoi.
This year I’ve been working with Yushoi, the delicious baked pea snacks which taste like crisps, a total dream because I’ve been buying their snacks for a long time. I’ve been working on a few blog posts all about balance this year. If you’ve followed me for a while, you’ll know that balance is so important to me and is a topic I talk about quite a lot, often I feel like I discuss it way too much but it’s too important not to.
Today I thought it would be nice to talk about balance in relationships. We live in a world where I often feel like we’re so busy making a living that we forget to make a life, or forget to make time for those around us so let’s discuss that today with some of my top tips for making sure you have balance in friendships and relationships.
Making a living is all well and good, but as dull as it sounds, we do all eventually end up in the ground and you’ve gotta have made time to live life and enjoy life too. There’s so much more to life than a career and trust me, this is coming from a workaholic.
By all means, I’m definitely not the queen of having balance in my friendships and relationships, I really struggled with an ex of mine as I just didn’t know how to manage my time well, with a part time job, blogging, social life, gym and having a boyfriend, it left me with absolutely no time to give him my time. It was either him or my friends and I sacrificed both at times. When it comes to family, I am a strong believer in dropping everything and putting them first because you never know what’s around the corner. I think I’m getting better at doing this. This year has been incredibly cruel with so many things happening to members of my family and it’s really put life into perspective and made me realise just how important it is so spend as much time with them as I possibly can. I’ve seen young people be taken from us in a flash, I’ve seen my Grandad fighting for his life, I’m watching my once fighting fit brother struggling with normal tasks on a day to day basis because of a cruel chronic illness and it’s just made me realise how important it is to spread kindness and love always and to let someone know how much you love them. Kindness is free, sprinkle it everywhere. I think it’s really good to be able to put things into perspective.
If you read my blog post about getting over broken friendships, I said that sometimes we just don’t have the time to see and do everything we are invited to do. I love my friends and whilst I don’t have a specific group of friends, I have a number of different friends scattered all over the world. It’s tough because I don’t often see them. I have in the past had issues with friends who have said I don’t make time for them which makes me feel like even more of a failure as it’s something I beat myself up for anyway but sometimes, we honestly just don’t have the time in our schedules. I have a few tips for trying to let people know you’re around and still there and still love them even if not physically there. For me, this was a period of my life where I couldn’t even make time for myself because I was running myself into the ground like never before and wasn’t even in the country to see my family let alone my friends.
- A text doesn’t take long - If someone is on your mind or if you haven’t heard from them in a while, a text doesn’t take too long. Drop a message and just let your friend/family member know you’re thinking of them.
- Facetime is key - When I lived in Canada for a year I didn’t miss my family as much as I thought I would but it’s mainly because I FaceTimed them every single day so it felt as if I was in the room with them. I didn’t have a data plan on my phone so could only use wifi. I did struggle when walking around by myself because I always call my mum when I’m walking somewhere.
- Put your phone down - It is important to know when to put your phone down. Again, something I really struggle with as it’s kind of my job to be switched on 24/7. If you’re out for dinner with your grandparents for example, just put your phone down in your bag, one hour without it isn’t the be all and end all and I find grandparents really notice when we are constantly on our phone.
- Listen - I’m trying to listen to the people around me more. I feel like my brain is in a constant over-drive/over-think/work bubble which can be quite dangerous so I’m trying to really take notice of people like my Grandad. He’s king rambler but it means so much to him when I’m genuinely engaged in what he’s saying. Don’t forget, they spend all week alone and ever since I was born I’ve seen them every Sunday, for me, Sunday is dedicated family day and I struggle when I don’t get to see my grandparents once a week. It’s just so important to me.
- Regular date nights - With my boyfriend, we are with each other 24/7 but we aren’t actually together because we are both so busy working away. I think it’s so important to do regular date nights to keep the spark alive and to ensure we are having ‘us’ time. If date night isn’t your thing and you want to keep costs down, give yourself a cut off point for work at say 8pm every night and spend a few hours watching TV together. Quality time with someone is so important.
- Get people together - I’ve found that some months I just don’t really have time to see people so when I do get time, if there are a few people I need to see, I’ll make a thing of it and invite a few different friends round. They always get on and it’s great plus it means you can really fit everyone in.
- You’re not a bad person - There’s this little part of my brain that constantly makes me feel guilty or like I’m a bad person or a failure if I can’t see everyone - there are loads of friends I’d love to see more of or talk to more but I just don’t always have the time and the right friends will know that. The best friends are the friends you don’t see in a year but nothing has changed. I’m so fortunate to have friends like this in life. They’re busy too, we haven’t neglected each other we just know we can start off where we left off anytime we see each other.
So there we have it, how do you feel about this topic? How do you balance your relationships and friendships? Do you have any issues with this?
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***This blog post was sponsored by Yushoi but as always is my honest opinion.
Lots of love, Em x
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