7 Tactics to Make Your Long Distance Relationship Work

Good morning. Today I want to talk to you about what it takes to keep a long-distance relationship running. A few years ago, I found myself in that situation, and there were 7 strategies that my boyfriend and I used to really help our relationship thrive even though we weren't going to be near each other for extended periods of time. Hi, my name is Alexandra Niel. I'm a certified high performance coach. And I work with women to rewire their beliefs so that they can rewrite their life story and become better parents, better partners, better friends. They can have a long-lasting impact in their community. They can be a change agent in their workplace and live that joyful and extraordinary life that they deserve. So back in 2009, I had already had a stint in Singapore, and I loved it. I loved living there. I loved experiencing the culture. I loved experiencing the foods, meeting new people, being in a different environment. And when the opportunity presented itself for me to move to Shanghai in 2016, I jumped at the chance. I thought, what a great thing to be able to go back to the region because I had fallen in love with it. The only caveat is this time, um, I was in a loving, caring relationship. We had been together 5 years, and it really scared the bejesus out of me because I didn't know what was, what was going to happen. So we talked it through and we decided that it was a dream that I'd always had, and he was 100% behind supporting it, and we knew we'd find a way to make it work. So unknowingly, I think we developed maybe 5, 7 strategies that worked for us. Which I hope by sharing today will help you if you find yourself or if you know somebody who is in a similar situation. And the first thing was really about defining a goal together. So having an endpoint, a place that you're growing towards, is incredibly important because it's a touchpoint. It allows you to still connect and work together towards your future. And being able to do that instead of— you have a choice, right? When you're in a relationship, you can either grow side by side or you can grow apart. And distance really fosters that growing apart piece. So having that common goal that you can both work towards is incredibly important. However, and that's point number 2, that doesn't mean you don't have your own individual goals, because you should have your own goals. You should have your own, um, things that you want to do, your own hobbies that you want to, that you want to pursue. And being able to have your own thing brings variety to the relationship as well. So, you know, you go off and you do something with your girlfriends, or you go do your guy thing, and you have you— when you come back, you feel energized and you feel enriched, and you share what's happened, and you discover new things about each other. So being able to have that common goal, but at the same time having your own goals, is incredibly important for you to kind of keep moving forward together but also not lose your individuality. The third thing is really helping you through the tough times and helping you grow in, in the tough times. So being able to share ideas, being able to pose challenges to one another from the perspective of, hey, this is kind of what I'm facing, what do you think, is a great way to keep yourself on your toes, but at the same time to keep your partner growing. Because you give them new ideas, you give them new perspectives. Your history is different than theirs. Therefore, it provides them with a new perspective and it helps them grow in their thinking and in their actions. The fourth piece was really completely and utterly believing in each other and really what we had. We knew we had something special and we had spent 5 years developing this trust and you know, part of helping each other grow is providing sometimes constructive criticism. But how you approach that, and approaching it from the point of view of, you know, I'm not here to hurt you, I'm really here to help you grow, and you know that because you've been living with this person for however long, you know, you guys have been together. And for us, it was incredibly important to have those— that open communication, to have that those honest discussions about, hey, you're kind of being a, uh-uh, not so much over here. So what can we do to, can we do to fix it? And it's, it's about being genuine and knowing that you are providing that feedback and receiving it from a place of, from a place of trust. The fifth thing is be present together. When you're together, just Be together even when you're on the phone. Be together when you're on the phone. If even if you're on the phone, and I'm not even talking Zoom, I'm just talking phone, if you're distracted, if you're not fully in the moment, the person feels it on the other end of the line. It's through the way you talk, through the hesitations, through the delays in responding to, you know, whatever's going on in, in the call. So be 100% there. And when you're physically there, forget the phone, put it on airplane mode. Um, and if you're in the— if you're like a gamer, um, you know, find those moments where you can connect and you can play together. So if you're, you know— and when I say gamer, old school here, I'm talking Scrabble and Monopoly and things like that. So bring out those board games, and even though you are however far apart you are have that night where you guys are, you know, playing each other's game. The sixth piece was connect, connect, connect. And for us, that meant every day, if not twice a day, because we needed and we wanted to have that time together, especially because we were 12 hours apart. So we were upside down from each other. So we had— when it was his morning, was my nighttime, so I could share with him what happened during the day. And his nighttime was my morning, so he could share with me what happened during his day. So for us, that's what worked. But you have to find your rhythm, and it doesn't have to necessarily mean hours and hours on the phone because we all have, you know, our bandwidth and our energy for the day. And so we also have to know to manage that. So it can be something just as silly as you know, hey hun, how are you? Look, I'm really tired tonight, but I just wanted to tell you I love you. And then, you know, pick it up in the morning. So really finding what's going to work for you and for your dynamic so that you can show up in the best way possible for, for each other. And the last thing was surprise each other. I can't tell you how many times I woke up to a text in the morning or a Facebook memory or or how many times he's woken up to, um, you know, a card in, you know, snail mail card, you know, those just little things that make the other one feel special and make them realize how top of mind they are in your life even though you're not together is incredibly important. So doing those things really kept us going for the time that we were apart, but but it's a lot of the same things actually that are keeping us together now. So it's just about being more mindful and being more intentional in doing those things because the distance makes it so much diff— you know, so much more difficult. So we still have our common goals, we still have our individual goals, we still do our thing, we still do our thing together. So all of those things haven't changed. It's, um, just like I said, when you're away in that long, that distance piece, being intentional about how you show up is, is what's going to make a difference. So what about you? I'd love to hear if you've been in a similar situation, or if you know somebody who's, who's struggling and, and some of the tactics that they've used. Let me know, I'd love to hear it. And if you'd like to read more about it, maybe get a little bit additional information, click on the link below in the description and you'll find a link to my blog for, for this topic as well. So that's what I wanted to share with you today. I hope that it served you and I look forward to hearing from you and we'll talk soon. Thanks, bye!