Taking care of relationships & keeping in touch

During Xmas holidays I watched a TED talk, that had a huge impact on me. Robert Waldinger shared a summary of a 75-year-long study on happiness.

So, what really makes us happy? It's pretty simple and far from becoming rich or famous. Good relationships make us happier and healthier, being socially connected to family, friends, community, also the quality of close relationships. Good life is built through good relationships.

It’s not like this was sth totally new for me. I just think that the weight of the data - 75 years - is what impacted me so much. I thought about it for few days. So, what were some concrete actions I took?
I didn’t make a plan how to get new friends, since I barely find time to keep in touch with my existing relationships. I was thinking about the quality of my relationships and how I can deepen them.  

1. I made xmas gifts for all my friends. The gift was printed Year compass, small booklet that makes you reflect on 2015 and plan 2016. I love it, since it shows my values and what I find important and it also encourages my friends to relfect & plan. Reactions to the gift were really positive and it's great, since I was able to give a small gift to all of my friends (baking cookies is getting a bit old, right?).

2. I organized a home party. Sometimes I didn’t feel like hosting one – you have to invest some money, tidy up, wake up in the morning to a mess, tidy up again. But ... the shitty part of a home party lasts around 2 hours (shopping + cleaning), but a good party usually lasts much longer. I will organize a lot of parties in 2016, I love it! :)

3. I messaged my foreign friends that I have on Facebook and haven’t talk to in a while with a summary of my 2015. I sent around 35 messages, all the same, starting with

“Hi _____, I’m sending this to everyone I wish to keep in touch with. /Summary of 2015 - personal, honest, including professional and personal aspects/. I ended with “How was your 2015? It would be great to hear back from you.”

The response I got was amazing - people I haven’t spoken to in 3 years responded in a few minutes. I will do this every year. I also learned sth even more amazing. When you are honest and personal and you share the good and the bad, people become honest and personal too. I'm sure I learned much more about my foreign friends life, then I would, if I'd contact them on Facebook with "Happy 2016, how are you?"

Sending quite personal summary of my 2015 was defenitely out of my comfort zone. But I totally recommend it to everyone, it's also a great way to keep in touch with people, that you meet on international events, where you become friends in few days and then loose touch. Dan, thank you for inspiring me with your yearly letter to your friends thingy. :)

4. I made a list of people that live in Slovenia, that I haven’t seen in a while, and that I wish to keep in touch with. I invited them for a coffee. Every one said yes. I can't wait to see them and catch up.

5. I started sharing more personal things with my family, telling them about good and bad things, that are happening in my life. I think I haven’t had that good of a relationship with my parents since I was a little kid. It’s far from perfect, but it has improved a lot. Moving out helped a lot too. :)

6. Doing cute small things for my boyfriend. For example, when we went travelling, I prepared an envelope with challenges we can take during the trip and that can bring us even closer together. One of the challenges was to write how we feel about our relationship. Another one was staring in each other’s eyes for half an hour. Both left me crying. :)

7. When someone suggested to meet up, I said yes. Always being too busy for people around you does not bring anything good.

Do you have any great ways to keep your relationships healthy and happy? I’d be thrilled to get some more ideas.  

Looking back at 2012 - thank you!

I want to thank all the people who made my 2012 really awesome. I will remeber this year by people, events and places, that impacted me the most. It was a challenging year, but I was doing exactly what I enjoy the most - being busy and under pressure. Any regrets? Sure. Not attending TEDxSummit in Doha. You can't have it all. :)

January

In the end of December I became a president at ŠS PRSS (Student PR section) and it was one of the best decisions I've made so far. I enjoyed every minute of it, my board was great and we developed our NGO  a lot, so I am really proud of these intense 9 months. Even though I was really really afraid (of failing, I guess) how everything will be, it turned out that responsibility made me even more motivated to work hard. Now we already have a new board with even more motivated girls and it's a pleasure to observe what is happening this year. Thank you, Ana, Maša, Barbara, Nina, Eva, Milena for reading all emails I wrote and for supporting my crazy ideas!

4 generations of presidents of ŠS PRSS

February

It's not a real year, if I don't travel. But there is one thing I like more then travelling - combination of travelling and education. So Mind the box project on Malta was really perfect - trainings on creativity + hanging out with my Komsip friends + discovering Malta. I will always remember last night. We were sitting in the circle and each person could ask 1 question to the whole group. We wrote a Q on a piece of paper, so nobody knew, who asked what. Group on this event wasn't really connected and we are also not really keeping in touch after the event, but in this evening people really got open and shared their experiences. I can't wait to repeat session like this some day and I still think about the things we talked about sometimes. Thank you, Hanna, for this awesome session, thank you, Mamo, for sending email about the project to LSS group, thank you Demjan, Luka, Urška and Maja for fun times on Malta.

 Our home on Malta

March

March was time for TEDxBled. Biggest TEDx enthusiasts from TEDxLJ team also joined this project, this time in a different role - judges for speakers, that applied online.  We each watched like 50 videos and chose the best candidates. Talks from Hayley Lapalme and Maris Slezins are still in my head. I will also not forget rehearsal in late hours, switching car and amazing Nate Ware, who was the best feedback giver I ever heard. Thank you Dan, for making TEDxBled happen and big thanks to all the attendees of Challenge Future summit, that really inspired me. For sure I'd love to attend next CF Summit!

April

April was TEDxChange@Ljubljana time! While the streaming from Berlin really really sucked, second part with 8 inspiring speakers was really awesome and Smelt location was just perfect. I will never forget rehearsals with speakers and afterparty for the team, where we were reading all the comments from Twitter - great feeling of satisfaction. Big thanks to all TEDxLjubljana team members and speakers who inspired us. Watch Mitja Mavsar (in Slovene) or Jugoslav Petković (in english). 

Speakers and organizers

May

May was one busy month. First TEDxFDV happened and attracted 400 people and I had to stand on the stage in front of them! I'm not doing that again, since I was too stressed, but I am glad to say TEDxFDV is happening again this year! Big thanks to my amazing team (girl power!), help of TEDxLJ and speakers - thank you Sašo and Luka, for getting involved in TEDx world so much! I will never forget cozy rehearsal place at Dlabs, afterparty in Netcafe and all the people who I saw at the event and are now regularly attending TEDx events.

Girl power - top shit organizers from ŠS PRSS

July

I love Indonesia. Travelling there for the third time with Jošt = the best holidays I could imagine. I recommend it to anyone that loves friendly people, green nature, waves on the sea and good food. Summer is my holy time, when I give my hands some rest from all the typing emails, my brain some rest from all the projects and my mind some time to think about nothing. In summer, my project is me. I need to thank my awesome boyfriend to support my travelling ideas.

 What could be more relaxing then

 watching surfers on Uluwatu?

August and September

I moved to Hanoi for 2 months. New culture, new friends, new daily routine. Basically I just needed to take a longer break from exhausting half a year that I had - it was a damn good break, full of extraordinary good food, international friendships and humid weather. Afraid of the upcoming year, where for the first time in my life I could really choose, how I spend my time (no school after 16 years) I cleared my head and came back, with my batteries full. Big thanks to all the other interns, Aiesec FTU Hanoi organizers, but mostly I need to thank my host family for taking care of me!

"Tomorrow, mango juice place?"

November 

My first long-term training event; European school 1 with Aegee Aachen. Another awesome experience, which made my autumn really exciting. Working in a team of 7 trainers on weekly skype meetings and taking care of development of 20 participants of the one week long event. I will never forget reflection groups, feedback groups, trainers meetings, training delivery and all the awesome people I had the chance to work with! Big thanks to Katja, for giving me the opportunity and my best roommates, Anja and Caro. 

My reflection group: Šarka, Bogdan and Farid

December

Gluhwien and parties. Hmhm. Not really. Working hard for TEDxLjubljana: Turning a new page. Really nice ending of this year - limitless energy on the event and even more positive feedback after the event. I will always remember ... speakers rehearsals on IBM, running up and down the stairs in Opera and folding Pocketmod booklets. Honestly, big thanks to all the speakers, that affected my way of thinking and brought me to some important realizations about attitude. Big thanks to the team, for surviving this crazy year with 4 events!

Proud speakers and organizers

On the end I need to thank my friends and family supporting me while rather investing my time in work then in relationships. I guess I need to take another look at this TED talk. Let the 2013 be at least 67 % as awesome as 2012! :)