By Shahna L. Duerksen, MA, AMFT
In the midst of the busyness of life friendships can easily get neglected. Each person in the friendship has different expectations and capacity for giving and taking that changes in different seasons of life. Here are a few suggestions of how to get the most out of your friendships while busy.
1. Defining your Circle of Friends:
You can’t be all things to all people. Defining who is in your circle of friends helps set boundaries and expectations for yourself and others. There are many types of friendships; acquaintances, casual friends, close friends and intimate friends. Recognizing and determining who falls into the different categories of friendships and what expectations go with that is helpful in then knowing how you want to prioritize that friendship and what your capacity is for it. Ask yourself is this a close friendship that you really want to invest effort in or is this an acquaintance or a social media "like" friend who you don’t really know and is not in your close/intimate circle of friends? This may help alleviate internal and external people-pleasing tendencies you may have by setting a healthy circle of friends boundary.
2. Set Realistic Expectations:
Setting realistic expectations for yourself and your friendship is important for your emotional and mental well-being. Ask yourself what your capacity is right now emotionally, mentally and physically in regard to your friendship. Be upfront about your busyness and communicate this to your friends. Some friends may assume unavailability is rejection. As close as some friends are, ultimately they can’t read your mind, and so it is up to you to communicate to them about your season of busyness and your intent. To make sure they know this is a particularly busy season for you try communicating, “I’m going to be especially busy the next 3 months at work and with my new class I”m taking so I might not be able to get together as much as normal. I wanted you to know ahead of time so you wouldn’t think I’m ghosting you. I value our friendship and time together. Do you think we could look at our calendars for the next 3 months and go ahead and plan for some time together?
3. No Guilting:
No guilting yourself if you are the busy one or guilting your friend who may be busy themselves. Real friends will not intentionally make you feel guilty that you are busy. Have you ever had a "bosom friend” or "kindred spirit" friend, as Anne with an ‘e’ of Green Gables would say? These are the intimate friends you've had for years and the kind where you can go months even years without actually seeing one another but when you get on the phone or in person with them it feels like you pick right up where you left off together. These are the intimate friends who also have busy lives and "get it" too. They understand and don't make you feel guilty for the busyness of life. These are the friends that you are there for in the middle of the night for a frantic support phone call and are your emotional support when life is rough.
4. Respecting Boundaries:
Marie Forleo, motivational speaker and author, recommends training your friends to respect your boundaries just as they would want you to respect theirs. One person’s boundaries will not be the same as the other in the friendship. Forleo suggests asking your friend when you call them, “is this a good time to talk?” and not expecting that they set aside what they are doing to make time for you. If you don’t have time for the full group text messages between several friends that set your phone dinging at all hours of the day and night try saying or texting, “Hey all. I’m slow to respond to texts these days due to a busy season at work and home. I’m taking myself out of group texting for the time being”. Remember you get to set the patterns and ground rules on your side of the friendship for what you need. Setting these healthy boundaries help set a sustainable pattern towards a healthy life-giving friendship.
5. Be creative:
Technology is available and amazing for connecting with friends via text, email, FaceTime, and audio. There seems to be an Ap for everything and make use of them. Invite friends to a group text and maybe add in some guidelines so your phone is not dinging 55 times during the day. FaceTime your friend in a pre-planned scheduled time or use an Ap to leave your friend a voice recording of your voice using an audio record feature as there is immediate connection with hearing that person’s voice.
Call friends while you are doing your work commute or running errands to the grocery store or gym.
When you think of them let them know. Send a card or use a photo card Ap that sends and mails a card for you at the click of a button or two. You can schedule milestone moments or just thinking of you cards ahead of time. Or if you read an article and know they’d appreciate it, take a photo of it and text it to them, “Hey, I just read this. Thought of you. Have a good day”. Putting in effort in creative ways goes a long way in a friendship.
Use a scheduling Ap to pre-program friends birthday’s, anniversaries and things you want to remember. Make yourself reminder alerts to remember important friendship facts.
Schedule regular times to connect with friends by phone or in person. Remember that low key get together’s sometimes is less pressure in a busy schedule. Invite your friend over for a Uber food night or potluck-free-for-all in your pj’s watching your favorite show.
6. Know your friends friendship love language.
Especially in a busy season of life it is important that you make meaningful connections with your friends in ways that mean the most to them. Learning how to love your friends through understanding what their friendship love language is strengthens the friendship. Knowing our own love language helps us to communicate with our friend how we need to be connected with, and will help them understand how to do so. The five love languages are: words of affirmation, quality time, acts of service, physical touch, and gifts. Ask your friend, what is your love language? You can also pay attention to how your friend show’s love because many times the way a person shows love is how they’d like to receive it. If your love language is through words of affirmation, you probably show love by expressing it verbally. The goal of using the five love languages for friendships is to help each person in the friendship learn to become a better friend.
Shahna Duerksen is an Associate Marriage and Family Therapist at Roubicek and Thacker Counseling in Fresno, CA. She loves writing, pumpkin spice lattes and encouraging others in their mental and emotional well-being. You can contact her office at: 559-323-8484 or find her on Facebook and Instagram @shahnaduerksen