In the Asian culture, right from the moment that we are born and even before little black hair follicles start sprouting out of our heads, we are given the message "Work hard" "Have a plan for your life" "Strategize". I take many of these cultural values to heart especially when it comes to trying to ensure the success of cross cultural relationships. I would LOVE to tell you that for ensuring cross cultural relationships, love is in the air and all you need is love. But if I told you that, I would be breaking one of the 10 commandments, the sin of lying.
Of course love is the basis of all things but beyond that, I feel absolute conviction that for the success of cross cultural relationships to happen, you need strategy. For some of you out there, the challenge may be distances apart. For others of you, it may be a cultural or a language barrier. And there are those that may be facing all of the challenges that I just listed above. There have been situations where latinos are in a relationship with latinos from another culture and even they tell me that its not easy to be in a cross cultural relationship. And it is still challenging even though that they share the same native language of spanish.
It would be advisable to at one point have a talk with that loved one and discuss how that you can tackle each one of these areas whether it would be language, cultural, or separation. Marisa and I almost always had a plan on how we were going to tackle problematic areas. And there is a conviction in my soul that without doubt, this is one of the reasons we are still strong as ever. There hasn't been a loophole that we didn't have a plan for.
I remember sitting in the bus station in Uruguay on the phone with Marisa waiting for the bus that would take me from Montevideo to the ferry back to Buenos Aires. And I remember us talking about how neither of us have much time but if we grab moments together, this just might work. In other words, each time we talk we grab 10-15 mins or 20 mins together and we do it as frequently as we can. Mind you that things aren't always smooth 100% when we try and execute this plan. But in the history books, what battle plan ever goes 100% the way you planned it on paper?
In reality, it only takes between 15-25 mins to sit down with someone that you love and work out a strategy. Be willing to do the ground work and come up with an action plan of some sort. Even if the plan you execute doesn't turn out at all, just having the conversation alone with your loved one is worth those 15-25 mins. That one conversation can spare you from days and weeks of heartache later on because in any moment, both of you had a plan that you know you can fall back on or are at least trying to stick to.
Yes indeed, love is in the air. And with a good strategy and foundation laid out, love is something that isn't just gonna be in the air out there but will be something that flows in and out of your daily lives....