With my 5-year reunion almost 2 months behind me, I’m reminded of how happy I was to see some of my closest friends. Some friends, I text, Snapchat, Instagram message, or call regularly, while others I hadn’t seen or interacted with since college. Despite the fact that I had been relatively close with some of these classmates in college, the physical separation kept us out of touch. Keeping in touch with friends can be .tough And for some of us, keeping in touch with family isn’t easier.
What’s interesting to me is how easy it is to passively know what’s going on in the lives of our friends and families. Social media allows us to keep tabs on folks’ whereabouts. On Instagram, we post about the cool things we’ve done and places we’ve visited. On LinkedIn, we share job promotions and startup ventures. On Twitter, we express our inner thoughts to all who will listen. On Facebook, we do a mix of all the above. With all of these social media platforms, we can know what our friends and family are doing without truly knowing how they are doing.
Because we often know what’s going on in our friends’ and families’ lives, there’s less of a pull toward checking in to see how folks are doing. In the midst of our highly digitized world, keeping in touch with friends and family is still incredibility difficult for many.
OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND
A friend of mine mentioned that he inadvertently takes on an “out of sight, out of mind” approach when it comes to keeping in touch with friends. The college friends I hadn’t spoken to in years were the folks who I simply hadn’t interacted with in my day-to-day life. Our paths either completely diverged, or their limited use of social media made them less top of mind than the friends who post more regularly. So over time, interactions never occurred. On the other hand, the friends I’ve stayed in touch with for as long as ~15 years are people with whom I share daily experiences. The friends that I keep in touch with most are friends who are either 1) in the same city as I am, 2) experiencing parallel lives (i.e. in medical school or business school), or 3) super active on social media. Friends who do not fit into these categories are “out of sight” and soon after become “out of mind.”
The ability to easily fall out of touch with friends makes me think of 2 questions:
1) Is it all that bad to infrequently communicate with the people we care most about?
2) How do we improve our ability to communicate regularly with the people we care about?
Regarding the first question, I’ve come to terms with the fact that some of my BEST friends are people I talk to at most 1-2x a year. Because we have so much in common and care so deeply for each other, the time between our communication does not reduce the strength of the relationship. For question #2, I’ve included some quick tips below to help with keeping in touch with friends!
QUICK TIPS FOR KEEPING IN TOUCH WITH FRIENDS
1) SET ASIDE TIME
I know some folks who set aside certain days of the week or times of the day to Facetime or call friends and family. If you build communication with friends into your schedule, you’re more likely to do it regularly!
2) USE DOWNTIME WISELY
Life has a way of getting busy. Days and weeks go by in the blink of an eye. Next thing you know it’s been a few months since you checked in on a good friend. This has definitely happened to me. It wasn’t until recently that I truly began to maximize my downtime to catch up with friends and family. My most regular downtime takes place when I’m walking or driving to a destination. So I use that time to get quick phone calls in with my friends and family.
3) PUSH YOURSELF
Common excuses that I hear about not keeping in touch with friends are “I don’t like to talk on the phone” or “I hate texting!”
I heard a great quote once: “Excuses will always be there for you. Opportunity won’t.” Life is short, and you never know when you or someone you love will no longer be here. Push yourself past the excuses that keep you from contacting friends. Keep in touch while it’s still an option.
CONCLUSION
In the end, when you think about keeping in touch with friends, it’s important to figure out what matters to you in terms of connecting with people. Do you want to be involved in their lives for birthday trips, weddings, and anniversaries? Do you want keep in touch with friends to maintain potential professional connections? Do you want to have people who are there to support you when life isn’t all roses?
Once you know what matters to you, make a plan so that you can achieve that goal and make sure that your friends know of your plan to keep in touch with them more regularly. Yes, you can hold yourself accountable, but communication is a two-way street. Stating your intentions for more frequent communication can spark your friends to reach out to you too. I’ve mentioned external accountability in my posts a lot. It’s because I REALLY believe in having others to help support you and keep you on track toward the goals you set for yourself.
In the meanwhile, feel free to reach out to me if you’re a friend reading this post 😊
Peace and blessings,
Atasha Jordan, MD (to be)
