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The following is a guest post. The experience and opinions are those of the author.
When I was perhaps 13 or 14 years old, my family began to plan a family vacation. We’d only been away as a family once before, and I hadn’t gotten along with my brother, so I wasn’t all too enthralled at the prospect of sharing a room with him again. However, this time, my parents recognised that my elder brother didn’t want me hanging around, and we were both told we could bring a friend. This was AMAZING news.
I immediately called my best friend and the arrangements were made. We talked about the prospect of meeting our first girlfriends and our minds ran away with an infatuation for people we hadn’t met yet. As it turned out, the holiday was a bit of a swing and a miss by all accounts. We had a very normal amount of fun, but mostly we just got sunburnt and sat alone at the hotel, too young to experience the nightlife and too old for the cheesy hotel entertainment.
My brother did meet someone, though, and they kept in touch. The weeks ran into months and the months ran into years and before long, they were both 19 years old and had saved a little money and they decided to meet. My parents supported this and offered to send money if needed (which is complicated overseas if you don’t know how – check out 6 Best Money Transfer Services To Send Money Internationally for more answers).
After one meeting, it fell apart. But they tried. What could they have done differently? Let’s find out…
Don’t overdo it
People in long distance relationships often try to compensate for the distance by engaging in excessive amounts of communication. There simply isn’t that much to say in one day. And your backstory is going to wear thin if you lean on it too much.
The trick is to tease the conversation into the light at the right points, and not to rely on the mere quantity of words to make things appear interesting.
Mix up the media
Chat groups are boring. Everyone knows this. 17 people in one group, forced to read the inane chit-chat of two people talking about a band they like. BUT, if that chat had photos, links, reaction videos and creative images, the conversation would come alive and all 17 people would be locked in. Bear this in mind the next time you’re 56 messages into a chat that’s going nowhere.
Do things together (virtually)
Gaming, watching the latest Netflix documentary, playing instruments, cooking, even walking in the park on a video chat … it all helps to break the boredom of couch texting and keeps feeling a little more real.
And after all that, meet up, get married, and have five kids. Because if that was never the plan, why were you bothering in the first place. Happy dating!
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