Navigating Long-Distance Relationships While in College

In the hustle and bustle of college life, there is much to be excited about: new people, new things, new challenges, and the opportunity for growth. For many Jewish students, however, college is also a time of disconnection from their family, friends, and home community. It can be hard to maintain these relationships while juggling the demands of college, but it’s not impossible. When college assignments and relationship commitments become overwhelming, it’s okay to seek support from services like LastMinuteWriting.com – best urgent essay service. This writing help platform can assist with pressing academic tasks, allowing students to focus on nurturing their relationships without compromising their studies.

In this article, we will discuss how to manage long-distance relationships while in college, including relationships with family, friends, and your Jewish community back home.

The Importance of Staying Connected

You’re leaving for college with excitement and a bit of apprehension about your new home away from home. Separation from family, you fear, will lower social status and lead to insecurity and loss of identity. First, avoid self-imposed isolation. Maintain personal relationships and your Jewish community. These ties have helped form who you are and can be a valuable part of your ongoing personal and spiritual development.

Challenges of Long-Distance Relationships in College

Furthermore, if you’re in college, there are time differences and schedules, and you want to do the things that your new life offers, and also there’s a feeling that you’re missing out on a lot of things. Maybe there’s a wedding in the family. Maybe grandma and grandpa are visiting the town. Maybe the house that you grew up in is no longer yours.

Some of these fears might be specifically Jewish, such as whether you’ll be able to be Jewish away from home. Maybe you’re worried about getting kosher food, celebrating the Jewish holidays with your family, or doing Jewish studies.

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Strategies for Staying Connected with Family

Keeping the channels of communication with your family open by scheduling set times for phone calls or Skype sessions can help to keep your mother, father and siblings aware of your continuing presence in their lives. If you are heading off to school in the fall, schedule your parents, siblings and other relatives into your weekly or bi-monthly calendar before you leave.

Share with them your good experiences and difficult ones, classes you enjoy and new friends and new activities on campus, and ask them about home as well. Tell them you’re thinking of them and they will tell you they’re thinking of you. 

Create a family group chat and a shared calendar with your partner, so you know what is happening (birthdays or anniversaries, for example) and can feel more centered.

Keeping in Touch with Friends from Home

While it’s natural to make new friends at college, remember the friends who know you from home. You have a past with them and important memories. When you stay in touch, it can help provide continuity while you learn new things in college. 

Keep up with friends using social media and messaging apps, but don’t let this be your main form of contact; make the effort to speak with friends on the phone or via video chat, and see who you can visit in person when the time is right. 

Plan to be there – when you have a break from work, or when a holiday comes around. Set up dates with your friends, before time runs out.

Staying Connected to Your Jewish Community

Not being home for the High Holy Days or simchas (celebrations) or being on campus for a Shiva (a seven-day period of mourning) can be tough. Finding ways to remain connected to both your home and to Jewish life on campus is not an easy task. 

Seek out Jewish organizations on your campus, whether it be the Hillel or the Chabad, and get involved, rather than losing yourself in a sea of new friends and notions. They can help you feel part of a community as you continue to do Jewish things away from home.

Maintain contact with your rabbi or other spiritual counsellors from home, who can support you in your Jewish life on campus. See if you can set up regular times via telephone or videoconference to check in with him or her, or even to study Jewish texts.

If possible, use technology to engage in services or programming at your home congregation: increasing numbers of congregations make Shabbat services and other programmes available via livestream.

Balancing College Life and Long-Distance Relationships

It’s important to maintain regular contact with parents and siblings, to keep in touch with old friends and to nurture continued relationships with your Jewish community at home. But it’s equally important that you plunge yourself into the college experience. Sometimes it can be difficult to know where to draw that line.

Here’s a table that outlines some strategies for balancing college life with long-distance relationships:

But here’s the thing: it’s truly fine if your immediate priority is having a good time in college, if your family and your friends want you to succeed and to grow (and that’s the love and approval you should be looking to get from people, not from credits or social status). Be upfront with them about the amount of time you have and homework, and about the social scene on campus on your studies or your of both, and be fine with that.

Dealing with Homesickness and Loneliness

Of course, you’ll experience occasional homesickness and loneliness, perhaps more acutely than usual when you’re far from family and friends, or when a Jewish holiday or other time of usual family and community taking place.

Refocus your homesickness. We’ve learned that students deal with homesickness best when they reorient themselves to the best aspects of college life, why they came to your school in the first place, and what it does and can offer them. At the same time, don’t be afraid to tap someone back home for support if needed – even a 10-second phone call might be enough to ground your student back in reality.

Or if you are homesick, try to do something to get more involved and engaged around campus. Attend clubs or join organizations. Support groups on campus are helpful but don’t forget to check out other organizations that are Jewish as well. If you meet people through fraternities, sororities or in class, that’s also great. You are building a new support system, not replacing the one you have at home.

Nurturing Long-Distance Relationships Through Shared Experiences

You can also recapture the special feeling of shared experiences with people from home. Watch the same TV show or movie (if you can coordinate), and chat about it later; read the same book, and do a virtual book club; cook the same recipe and video chat about the results.

For the Jewish student, maybe this means finding a way to keep holidays or celebrate traditions together – from a distance. Light the Shabbat candles at the same time as your family, and do video chat while you do it. Read the weekly Torah portion via Skype with a home-friend. These little, shared experiences keep us connected.

Preparing for Visits Home

When you do get a chance to visit home – for breaks, holidays and the like – prepare yourself, practically as well as emotionally for your time there, and let your loved ones know your plans well in advance so you can make the most of your visit. 

Accept that things might be different for you when you return home. You are the same person, but you’ve also changed. You’ve grown, and your relationships might require more adapting than before. Allow yourself and others to do this.

The Growth Opportunity in Long-Distance Relationships

Of course, being in a long-distance relationship is mentally and emotionally challenging but you’ll also learn how to become a better communicator, a stronger individual, and more thankful for the important relationships in your life. 

Keep in mind that your Jewish heritage and values can be a source of support and guidance with respect to these relationships. Family and community are important cornerstones of the Jewish experience and are valuable influences as you develop and hopefully foster a support system while away at college. 

You can engage with your family, friends and Jewish community back home, even if you’re in college far away. Long-distance relationships require effort, creativity and constant communication. You may need to prioritize your college experience and developments over your loved ones, especially as the years progress. That’s OK.