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The Best Thing I’ve Done for My Social Life Is to Schedule Regular Catch-Up Sessions With Friends
Four reasons why you should schedule regular catch-up sessions for your social life
I was once good friends with an incredibly intelligent and ambitious individual from my high school. We’re not friends anymore, a mistake I regret, but before we lost touch, my friend had a fantastic idea I have since incorporated into my life. My friend said we should schedule it into our calendars. Every month, on a specific date, and a time that worked for both of us as we were in different time zones (for example, a weekday evening time), we set up a recurring meeting to call each other and catch up.
Every month, we would call each other and catch up on all the things that happened in our lives in the past month. If either of us were busy, we could cancel or reschedule. If we had nothing to talk about, we kept the call short.
This was before all the COVID lockdowns, mind you. It’s interesting now that this strategy works whether you are always home or if you just want to keep in touch with friends, whether locally or globally.
Since knowing about the power of scheduling catch-up sessions, I have been using this to catch up with my friends to great effect. Here is why I think it is so effective:
Scheduling it makes it the norm
Before, when I didn’t schedule the catch-up sessions, it was normal for me not to catch-up with friends for months, or even years. It’s not as if I would run into some of my friends on the street or at work — most of my friends are in other cities and countries. The few people I would run into, I would catch-up with them and then forget about it months later.
Scheduling it in as a recurring meeting means you don’t have to think about finding a time that works for both of you. It means you do not have to re-arrange your schedule to find availability.
Scheduling it makes it a priority
Perhaps for the first or second month, you will rearrange your schedule to find a time that works for both of you, but after a few months, it will be in your calendar and you…
