COMMUNICATION GAP IN RELATIONSHIPS/MARRIAGES

"Do you think we should have relationship/marriage phone curfew?" This was a question that I asked someone recently and it is something I have been seriously thinking about. Now I am sure a lot of things are running through your mind but is it possible to give a sincere answer to the above question? In order to give an adequate answer, you will be required to think deeply about how one partner constantly being on his/her phone may have affected your relationship or maybe the relationships of people around you.

So what do you think? Do you want to be with your boyfriend and all through a date he is chatting away? Should we have these curfews or restrictions? For the boyfriends and girlfriends, should we be able to say "Babe when we are together, please let us do away with our phones, enjoy the moment and have physical conversations." For the married, should we say "Baby, please whenever we are together, can we do away with our phones so that we can bond and focus on ourselves instead of the world?

Examining the relationship of different parents and much older friends, I have realised that they have a stronger relationship or marriage than many of us in the 'technology century'. Although many of them have phones and the social media apps that we (the younger generation) have, they seem to have far more control than we do. Of course, this is not to say that technology is bad. It definitely isn't! It only becomes bad when it is mismanaged.  In fact, technology and the existence of social media have helped us in so many ways but that is not the concentration for today.

Now a days, it is highly possible (in fact it happens a lot) for a couple to be in the same space for over 2 hours without having any real conversation with each other. But guess what? They are actively engaging in conversations on their phones (i.e. responding to chats and watching videos on Instagram etc.). Many of us including myself are guilty of this act but I feel we need to do something about it before it gets out of hand. 

This really bothers me and I think we should be able to curb the communication  gap that arises from addiction to social media. If you're physically present, let those around you know that you're actually present and if you're absent let them know that you're physically absent. It's not good to be physically present but not present (i.e. you're in a gathering but you're just occupying space because you are on your phone all most all through). We need to be able to have real conversations and that's why there is a need for a social media check or restriction especially when we are with loved ones.

I remember having a conversation with one of my uncles two or three years ago and he said "This social media thing is good in a way but it is also not good. It makes it difficult for people to have genuine conversations because they want to keep up with what is going on in other people's lives and they forget that the lives of those around them are even more important than the lives of those who do not even have a clue of who they are".

As said earlier, technology/phones/social media is good but we all need to endeavour that we use them for the right reasons. We need to be careful so that our addiction to social media does not lead to us losing great relationships. We need to be able to focus on ourselves rather than others (especially people that don't even know or care about us). A minister was said and I really like what she said "why are you keeping up with the Kardashians when the Kardashians should be the ones keeping up with you". In all sincerity, the people you might be keeping up with don't even have your time, they don't have a clue that you exist so why are you wasting your energy?

I have written on this topic to enable us all sit down and examine this situation. Are we guilty of this or not? Yes we might say that our parents or older friends did not have this opportunity early enough and so they are better for it but that doesn't really matter. Technology could be a distraction as well as a communication tool for spouses. However, we have a choice to make on whether we would make it advantageous to communicating with our spouses or disadvantageous. Let me also point out that addiction to social media/technology is just one of the reasons for communication gap in relationships and marriages, there are many others not covered in this write-up.

Thank you so much for stopping by, we appreciate you and we hope to see you next week. 

OneLove,

SomzyBrown