Today’s guest post is all about maintaining a strong relationship with your significant other even though you are very busy with no spare time!. Mariana Ashley is a freelance writer who particularly enjoys writing about online colleges. She loves receiving reader feedback, which can be directed to mariana.ashley031 @gmail.com or by leaving a comment on this post.
As many of us know, maintaining a strong and happy relationship with a significant other when one or both members of the relationship are busy with a separate career life can be an extremely difficult endeavor. With busy schedules, giant career goals, endless side projects, and so much more, a boyfriend or husband can become more of a stress factor than a source of relief for the classy career girl. While preserving a healthy relationship when you are married to your career and aspirations can be difficult, it does not have to be impossible. Follow these four tips to help manage your relationship alongside your career without letting either suffer.
- Be Flexible – One of the most important aspects of a relationship is being able to relax with your significant other after a long day at work. However, as we all know, relationships don’t always encourage relaxation. Be sure to be flexible and easy going with your relationship on days where work is especially stressful. As difficult as it can be, be sure to leave your work stresses at work. Come home to your significant other and relax. Don’t stress when plans fall through or don’t go as planned. Your dates are not a work assignment, so you do not have to be a perfectionist about them. Keeping your work stresses separate from your personal life will benefit not only your relationship, but also your work life. Try hard to also keep relationship stresses out of your work life. While compartmentalizing these two endlessly important aspects of your life can be challenging, it is essential to leading a healthy and happy professional and personal life.
- Do the Little Things Together – Not every minute that you spend with your significant other has to be a four course meal and a movie. You have to tone down your expectations. Just because you can’t spend all of your time with him, doesn’t mean that the time you do spend with him has to live up to fairytale status always. Do the little things together, so that you can be together more often. Plan to go to the grocery store together, make dinner together, have a spring cleaning day together, and get lunch together during the work day. These little events may seem small or insignificant, but they can be key to staying connected to your boyfriend or husband when you have limited spare time.
- Plan Bigger Outings- While doing the small things together is important and key for the busy career oriented couple, planning big outings and events with one another occasionally is important. Find a weekend or holiday that you will have some time away from work and take a small (or not so small) vacation with your beau. Plan a weekend full of big meals and fancy dates. Go dancing. Spice things up and keep things interesting. As a busy working lady, it can be easy to forget to stop and take some time off for yourself and your loved one. Take a break to really pamper each other away from your professional lives.
- Learn To Spend Time Alone- While this may sound counterproductive for an article about maintaining a healthy relationship with a significant other, spending some time with yourself is really important for a busy career woman. You need to be able to spend time by alone away from your profession and away from your relationship every now and again. Take this time to think about things. Reflect on your career goals, think about your significant other, and take time for yourself. Learning to be able to spend time apart from one each other even when you could be together is important. You can’t expect to spend all of your spare time away from your job with your significant other. That is too much pressure for him and too stressful for you. Relax on your own.
(Photo by Unlisting Sightings)
About Anna Runyan
What a great post! I often feel like I never seen my hubby – only made worse by the fact that he is a night shift worker. No one warned me that opposite shifts are so hard to deal with. I have being alone down to a science, it's actually being around him that I struggle with, simply because we are not used to it. Little things are a huge part of our marriage, because we don't often have the time to go and do large vacations or dinner and a movie. Thanks for the tips!
We live together! We are polar opposites, and are both busy career-building bees, so sharing a space and the small stuff is great. We have the other there for the good times and the bad, but still get our own space and alone time as we have quite different roles in the house – he cooks, for example. Xxxc
I love seeing this article here. Balance is so important. Great post.
Bella Vida by Letty
Have a great day.
The first one is so important! It's hard when you are used to being independent and now you have to coordinate schedules with someone else. You have to be willing to change plans or cancel plans if that will make your significant other less stressed out.
Still working on this. Great tips though
Marinda-Wow, that must be difficult to have different shifts! I wish you the best balancing your relationship and career and hope you get to enjoy some little things soon! Thanks for the comment!
Cassie-Space and alone time are really important. I am glad you have figured that out!
Bella Vida-It is! Balance is so important and there are so many different ways we can be balanced. Glad you enjoyed!
Grace-Yes, I agree. You definitely have to be very flexible and open to change. I am a planner so this is very hard for me!
Jill- I know me too!
Hope you had a great 4th!
Great topic! I would mention one little thing that really just weaves into all the above: Be present when you're together. I put my phone away and on silent when I'm trying to spend quality time with my husband. The rest of the time I'm not with him, I can be drawn away to work or check emails or whatever. But being present helps make the most of a little time together.
Also something fun I wish I could do more often–lunch dates (if you work close together). It's a great break from the workday, and I always go back to work afterward feeling more motivated and happy.
This post makes so much sense! Now that more and more women are going to college and having careers, we need simple guidelines on how to make it all work and balance out. Thanks! I'm lucky enough to attend an online school so my husband gets his share of our time and my school work is flexible enough for me to work on when I get the chance.