Our blog posts often focus on relationships that fall under either a professional category, or the donor-nonprofit category. But today, the day before our nation celebrates Thanksgiving, we want to focus on personal relationships. We’ve written before on the importance of Caring for Each Other, and numerous studies have proven the link between healthy personal relationships and personal health. When it is so clear that our connections to others should be a priority, for our well being and for theirs, it can be surprising and disappointing to realize we may have been neglecting that area of our lives.
The pandemic has made it much harder to nurture our relationships, as activities we once did with friends become something we must do solo (if that’s even an option). We can’t meet up with our jogging buddies, our drinking buddies, our thrifting buddies or our quilting buddies. However we used to socialize before the pandemic, chances are good that it hasn’t been an option since mid March.
Whether you’ve experimented with virtual happy hours and virtual trivia or not, the urge to be physically with our loved ones is stronger than ever, especially with the holiday season upon us. But the need to look out for each other has never been greater, and for most of us, that means continuing to hold the line a little longer.
So to ease the burden just a little bit, we here at Bliss would like to encourage you to reach out to the folks that you miss and have a long phone chat. Write them a nice letter. Make them something and send it to them. To make up for not being able to visit from their home in Chile, I’m planning a virtual gingerbread house decorating session with my nephew and my mother. My goal is to get us all the same or similar kits so that it’s even more unifying, but deep down I know that it’s really about the time spent together. Now more than ever, we’ve got to find a way to continue to nurture our relationships throughout the year.
(Video Source: Playing For Change on YouTube)
