How To Keep Your Long-Distance Friendship Thriving
One of the many chapters casually missing from the Adulthood Manual is the section on how to keep and maintain friendships.
The concentrated environment of colleges and universities truly did a number on how we perceived the frequency we’d be able to meet up with our friends beyond graduation. There was just something comforting about knowing that if we ever needed a venting session or to meet up for lunch, our friends were just a dorm room away. But as years passed, jobs changed, pandemics hit, and marriages happened, our friendships had a way of moving further away.
Thus, long-distance friendships were born.
Take me, for instance. In the (many) years since I made my first big-girl move away from my small town to New York City, I have since lived in Los Angeles, back home to the South, and now Chicago — which means I have a lot of friends and associates, spread across the country. And while that may seem like an appealing status, knowing a lot of people doesn’t away correlate to having deep connections with them.
As humans, we tend to like people we see often. It’s the Mere Exposure Effect. This psychological phenomenon refers to having the tendency to develop a “preference for things or people that are more familiar” to us than others.
Can a Long-Distance Friendship Work?
So when our friends are out of sight or not in close distance to meet up regularly, celebrate life’s milestones, or just shoot the breeze in pleasant yet mundane activities, they tend to become out of mind. That’s why, in the case of long-distance friendships, creating opportunities for connection is essential for their longevity.
Sometimes quick check-ins via Instagram DMs and comments just aren’t enough to keep the gel between two friends bonded. A text here and there, mixed with a couple of “I was thinking about you’s,” don’t always hit the same as setting up a FaceTime call, a prescheduled coffee chat over Zoom, or pulling up to their city. Real life happens between social media updates and tweets, and in order to be a part of these moments, even from miles away, you’ll have to put in a little more effort.
How to Maintain a Long-Distance Friendship
While it may feel like a chore to keep your friendships thriving with miles between you, distance doesn’t have to be a barrier to keeping the dynamic alive. And here’s how:
How To Maintain A Long-Distance Friendship: Know How Much Communication You Really Need
When it comes to our friends, sometimes we can expect a certain level of communication — whether a lot or a little — that we may have never expressed. But communication, especially from a distance, can’t be a guessing game.
When connecting with your long-distance friends, be open to sharing your communication needs and how much you’d like to see the two of you contribute to the relationship. Do you consider yourself a “bad texter”? Are bi-weekly check-ins more your speed? Or would you like to have a touchpoint every other day? And does this work for both of you? Being clear and transparent from the start will help limit moments of miscommunication and hurt feelings and allow more grace to be given.
Reconnecting Isn’t Awkward
Say life gets busy, and you fall off from communicating with your friend on a regular basis. These moments can make us go back to our old ways, where a minor pause in communication can lead to more time passing before we pick up the phone again.
In long-distance friendships, awkwardness is not your friend, and in most cases, the passing of time doesn’t constitute the end of a friendship. So reach out. Don’t let your brain convenience you that you won’t be welcomed back or that your friend has completely moved on from you. It’s okay to send a “Hey girl, life has been life-ing, my bad” text and pick things up where they left off. There’s nothing awkward about reconnecting. After all, you are friends.
How To Maintain A Long-Distance Friendship: Don’t Run From Healthy Conflict
If there’s one thing that long-distance friendships can guarantee you, it’s that challenges will happen and conflict will occur, but it’s how you handle the conflict that matters.
Misunderstandings are going to happen, a tone will be misread, and you or your friend might say something in jest that’s taken personally. In each case, don’t run from correcting these moments. Sometimes, it is necessary to take a step back and give each other some space to reflect and reach an understanding. But when you communicate to be understood and not to “win,” you allow healthy conflict to be an opportunity for personal growth and a chance to grow together.
How To Maintain A Long-Distance Friendship: Develop A Friendship Anchor
When you think about your long-distance friend, what’s an interest or hobby that you all share in common? Is there a TV show you can binge-watch together? Or are there some gym goals you both can keep each other accountable for? Establishing these casual touchpoints can help keep your friends top of your mind and create inside jokes and shared memories you can look back on.
How To Maintain A Long-Distance Friendship: Make Room For Growth
The truth about adult friendships is that the woman you grew to learn and love when the friendships first started will bloom into a new version of herself that you’ll have to learn all over again. And that’s the beauty of friendship.
She’ll become a wife or mother, brokenhearted, or pivot into a new passion. Still, you can grow separately and support each other along the way. While it may feel foreign to get reacquainted with the new version of your friend, remember it’s probably just as much, if not more, strange and different for her too. But it’s the support that matters because that’s how sisterhood lasts.
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Featured image by Luis Alvarez/Getty Images
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Aley Arion is a writer and digital storyteller from the South, currently living in sunny Los Angeles. Her site, yagirlaley.com, serves as a digital diary to document personal essays, cultural commentary, and her insights into the Black Millennial experience. Follow her at @yagirlaley on all platforms!
ItGirl 100 Honors Black Women Who Create Culture & Put On For Their Cities
As they say, create the change you want to see in this world, besties. That’s why xoNecole linked up with Hyundai for the inaugural ItGirl 100 List, a celebration of 100 Genzennial women who aren’t afraid to pull up their own seats to the table. Across regions and industries, these women embody the essence of discovering self-value through purpose, honey! They're fierce, they’re ultra-creative, and we know they make their cities proud.
VIEW THE FULL ITGIRL 100 LIST HERE.
Don’t forget to also check out the ItGirl Directory, featuring 50 Black-woman-owned marketing and branding agencies, photographers and videographers, publicists, and more.
THE ITGIRL MEMO
I. An ItGirl puts on for her city and masters her self-worth through purpose.
II. An ItGirl celebrates all the things that make her unique.
III. An ItGirl empowers others to become the best versions of themselves.
IV. An ItGirl leads by example, inspiring others through her actions and integrity.
V. An ItGirl paves the way for authenticity and diversity in all aspects of life.
VI. An ItGirl uses the power of her voice to advocate for positive change in the world.
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You've Never Seen Luke James In A Role Quite Like This
Over the years, we've watched Luke James play countless characters we'd deem sex symbols, movie stars, and even his complicated character in Lena Waithe's The Chi. For the first time in his career, the New Orleans-born actor has taken on a role where his signature good looks take a backseat as he transforms into Edmund in Them: The Scare—a mentally deranged character in the second installment of the horror anthology series that you won't be able to take your eyes off.
Trust us, Edmund will literally make you do a double take.
xoNecole sat down with Luke James to talk about his latest series and all the complexity surrounding it—from the challenges taking on this out-of-the-box role to the show's depiction of the perplexing history of the relationship between Black Americans and police. When describing the opportunity to bring Edmund's character to life, Luke was overjoyed to show the audience yet another level of his masterful acting talents.
"It was like bathing in the sun," he said. "I was like, thank you! Another opportunity for me to be great—for me to expand my territory. I'm just elated to be a part of it and to see myself in a different light, something I didn't think I could do." He continued, "There are parts of you that says, 'Go for it because this is what you do.' But then also that's why it's a challenge because you're like, 'um, I don't know if I'm as free as I need to be to be able to do this.' Little Marvin just created such a safe space for me to be able to do this, and I'm grateful for everything I've been able to do to lead to this."
Courtesy
Them: The Scare, like the first season, shines a light on the plight of Black Americans in the United States. This time, the story is taking place in the 1990s, at the height of the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles. While the series presents many underlying themes, one that stands out is Black people and the complicated relationship with the police. "For the audience, I think it sets the tone for the era that we're in and the amount of chaos that's in the air in Los Angeles and around the country from this heinous incident. And I say it just sets the tone of the anxiety and anxiousness that everybody is feeling in their own households."
James has been a longtime advocate against police brutality himself. He has even featured Elijah McClain, the 23-year-old Colorado man who died after being forcibly detained by officers, as his Instagram avatar for the past five years. So, as you can imagine, this script was close to his heart. "Elijah was a soft-loving oddball. Different than anyone but loving and a musical genius. He was just open and wanted to be loved and seen."
Getty Images
Luke continued, "His life was taken from him. I resonate with his spirit and his words...through all the struggle and the pain he still found it in him to say, 'I love you and I forgive you.' And that's who we are as people—to our own detriment sometimes. He's someone I don't want people to forget. I have yet to remove his face from my world because I have yet to let go of his voice, let go of that being [because] there's so many people we have lost in our history that so often get forgotten."
He concluded, "I think that's the importance of such artwork that moves us to think and talk about it. Yes, it's entertaining. We get to come together and be spooked together. But then we come together and we think, 'Damn, Edmund needed someone to talk to. Edmund needed help... a lot [of] things could have been different. Edmund could have been saved.'
Check out the full interview below.
Luke James Talks Ditching Sex Symbol Status For "Them: The Scare", Elijah McClain, & Morewww.youtube.com
Featured image by Getty Images