7 Tips to Minimize Family Tensions & Maximize Potentials During Covid-19 Isolation
Seven recommendations to ensure a healthy home, lessen family tensions and reach your potential while riding out a dark Winter of Covid-19 isolation.
Guest Writer: Emma Grace Brown
Creator of EmmaGraceBrown.com
Is the pandemic bringing your family closer together, or tearing you all apart? The Spring initial shock has long worn off. A Summer spent testing the boundaries of what is safe and what feels comfortable is behind us. With positive Covid-19 cases again rising, hospitalizations increasing and the colder months of Autumn and Winter quickly closing in, it’s time to plan for another season self or family-isolation. If you’re smiling at the thought of a Winter spent isolated with the family, navigating the challenges of the times must be going well. If instead there’s a grimace of frustration, despair or impatience, you’re not alone. Tired of self-isolating? Feeling as if being cooped up with the kids is trying your last nerve? Run With Ryan is pleased to offer a few tips on how to turn your situation around.
1. Enjoy Each Other
When your family is used to spending time apart at work or at school, socializing, playing sports or engaging in individual hobbies, being thrust together doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll change your ways naturally. If everyone is spread to the corners of the house, essentially doing their own thing, maybe it’s time to mix things up a bit! Make a plan that encourages time spent together, rather than separating to respective bedrooms or favorite safe spaces. Sit down for meals together throughout the day, gather for scheduled movie nights or make game evenings a routine event to look forward to.
If things are too tense to happily bring everyone to the table, first try building some bridges. A few kind words can grease the wheels toward improving the atmosphere in your home. Acknowledge Joey’s skillful progress on his favorite video game, and note Janey’s attentiveness to her bedroom aquarium. Not only does everyone enjoy a heartfelt compliment, learning to give and receive them graciously is an important life skill as well. They’ll feel better hearing the kind words and you’ll feel good for making family progress.
Establishing a healthier, positive environment will encourage everyone to enjoy their time at home together more. Instead of feeling cooped up and simply tolerant of each other, actively celebrate the best of those you’re spending the time with. Be patient and learn to enjoy each other’s company. Plan fun events together both indoors and, when the weather is agreeable, outdoors…
2. Nature and Screen Time
If you’re feeling stuck in a rut, getting out of the house is bound to do your family some good. For one thing, you’ll appreciate your house more if you don’t feel like you’re staring at the same four walls 24/7. What’s more, being outside in nature can be therapeutic. It’s calming, can alleviate depression, and can improve sleep quality. Nature encourages us to unplug—and if your family is like so many these days, everyone is otherwise glued to their screens.
While that might not seem like such a big deal, staring at a screen too much can be damaging to relationships, creating a sense of isolation and loneliness. Psychology Today reviews recent studies on the effects of staring at our screen devices. “Screen time use leads to the release of dopamine similar to the way drugs like cocaine impact the brain… These changes in the brain can result in reduced attention, memory difficulties and changes in our ability to think, read, and write at a deep level.” Heavy screen usage, it continues, not only effects our bodily functions, but is linked to changes in the brain resulting in depression, anxiety, and memory difficulties.
It can be all too tempting to turn to the tv, scroll another social media site on your phone or aimlessly browse online on the nearest tablet when feeling bored or when lacking patience for your loved ones. But because of the known side effects and in the spirit of coming together, consider creating a screen usage plan for your family. Some boundaries regarding time limitations and subject matter can go a long way toward protecting your family members and guiding each other toward greater well-being.
3. Values and Boundaries
How do you establish appropriate guidelines for your family’s screen usage? Start by cutting screen time for activities that aren’t truly necessary. While that might seem vague, try thinking about things in terms of value. Is the content on the screen valuable? Does what you or your family member do with the device add to your sense of mission or purpose? Is it needed or is it a mental distraction keeping us from forming stronger bonds?
Be prepared. Cutting screen time is bound to draw resistance. While you might meet some heavy friction at first, offering incentives can further your cause. One important thing to keep in mind- interactive screen time is considered healthier than passive entertainment.
You may decide to allow family-friendly, multiplayer game nights. Maybe invest in a high-powered internet service to ensure play flows seamlessly. Or surprise the family with the latest and greatest gaming controller to the arsenal of fun. Engaging in screen time doesn’t have to be unhealthy; monitored, limited and in moderation, it too can help bring the family together.
4. Get Outside and Play
Once you establish your new usage plan, what will you do with your screen-free time? Why not go outdoors and smile together? Go for a walk in the neighborhood. Take a brisk bike ride. Simply hang out on the deck while star dazing. Some s’mores over a fire pit in the backyard can be a wonderful way to enjoy the great outdoors! Your family, while still isolating, will be making memories to boot.
Of course, it doesn’t need to end there. There are lots of activities you may want to try. Maybe use the time to pick up a new family-friendly hobby that keeps you active in the outdoors. Consider engaging in a yoga practice together, hit some bike trails as a family unit, or go hiking and camping at nearby parks. Once it snows, unleash your inner child and make snow angels together. Find ways to move the body and stay active. Exercise is a terrific stress buster and health booster! Side note and friendly reminder, to make sure you stay safe and have the right equipment for whatever you pursue. We want the family outings you’re dreaming of to add to your health and bring a shared happiness.
Whatever activity you select, think through the issues that might arise while you’re out enjoying yourselves so you can take appropriate precautions. This might include things like sunscreen, helmets, and a first aid kit. Map out routes ahead of time, charge your phones and stay close if venturing into someplace new for an adventure. A few minutes spent on safety prepares the family for unexpected accidents while letting us focus on the present and enjoy the moments you’re creating.
5. Get Your Alone Time
It’s important that your family isn’t going in separate directions all day long, and that the overriding atmosphere at home isn’t one of tension and stress. That being said, while happy, healthy, bonding time together is a must, Talkspace Online Therapy notes that everyone should be permitted alone time. Some solitary pursuit of hobbies, self-reflection, or simple peace and quiet can go a long way toward de-stressing you as an individual, improving your productivity, and reinforcing your mental fortitude.
What are you doing with your me-time? Is it productive and feeding your body and soul? Or are you spending it in passive and unproductive ways? Will you look back on this year and be disappointed in what you did or in what you didn’t do with it on a personal level?
Consider setting some goals. You’ll find it encourages inner discipline and can be highly motivating. Goal setting not only helps with time management, it’s energizing, and is a sure-fire way to improve efficiency. Maybe you’d like to take your at-home yoga practice to the next level, or you’re ready to tackle a personal reading challenge in your library. Select an overriding goal, and think through the steps that will be milestones on your journey.
This can be another place where incentives can be a boon. For example, adding a new smartwatch to your athletic gear can motivate you toward keeping up your regimen. The Garmin Venu, for instance, can coach you through a morning run, monitoring your cadence, stride length, heart rate, and more. It will even track your sleep patterns, which is ultra important for mental and physical well-being, yet is often overlooked.
Solo time is just that. But it’s also something you can use to bring the family together. During dinner, before a movie or while on a bike ride, check in with your family and ask about progress in whatever goals each of your loved one has set. Gently hold each other accountable and continue to work, making the home a safe and healthy space for the entire family.
6. Healthy Solo Space
As we’ve learned over the past year, our homes are not just our places to eat, sleep and begin the routine all over again in. They’re where we spend the most of our days. It’s important we break what can easily become a monotonous sludge of uneventful, seemingly repeating days and make the home a laboratory of wellness, fun and enjoyment. This extents to your significant other, to your newborn. Everyone needs to feel welcome, loved and heard more than ever.
When developing a family-focused health plan, it’s sometimes easy to plan for what you’d like and in terms of only what you think is best. You’ve planned for your alone time, but understand alone time is just as important for kids. Sulking off to a corner to avoid the rest of the family can be seen as unhealthy, but Inspire explains that children greatly benefit from time to themselves. It’s in these moments they develop creativity and independence.
Encourage some solo play time while making sure whatever the kids might be doing and wherever they are doing is appropriate for their age. If your kids need incentives, think in terms of healthy additions to their personal pursuits and pastimes. Purchase some interactive ebooks, reward them with new athletic gear, or revamp their spaces in their favorite theme; these actions could be just the ticket toward inspiring and motivating them play, learn and grow.
7. Focus On Haves
One of the toughest things about self-isolation is giving up some of the things we love and rely on: trips to the gym, outings with friends, movies and restaurants. But if you only focus on the negatives, you’re bound to remain unhappy. Instead of mulling over what you don’t have, Sharon Lechter recommends shifting your perspective. Turn your attention to what you do have, and pay sharp attention to your internal self-talk.
Cultivate positive energy through positive input. What you watch on TV and what you follow on social media matters. Choose movies, shows, and games. Follow positive people on social media. Delete friends on Facebook who post for shocking reactions. Nurture the content you allow in your home and think in terms of similar boundaries to what you provide your children with. As we discussed above, what is valuable and what is noise? Celebrate what truly matters and find things to be grateful for each and every day.
Think of your activities, actions, and words in terms of the old science expression “GIGO.” Garbage in, garbage out. Just like it’s important to focus on the positives in your family at large, focus on what you put into your own mind and body. Feed the relationship who have with yourself and those between you and your family members with only the best of energies. Listen. Thoughtfully engage. And pull the weeds of toxic energies taking up space for budding, healthier relationships to grow.
All Things Come & Go
Remember, the Covid-19 pandemic is temporary. It’s gone on longer than most ever would have thought, but there will still be an end. We have the opportunity to come out on the other side stronger, more reflective, and changed for the better if we take it seriously and not let the moment pass unused. Look to the things you’re gaining while in self-isolation. Time with your family is just a starting point; there are other wonderful things you can do to ensure this is a period of positivity and growth for every member of your family, both together and apart. Keep everyone safe, healthy and happy as much as possible. Breathe. And this too shall pass…
About the Writer:
Guest writer Emma Grace Brown moves to the beat of her own rules! She’s a strong, smart woman on a mission to share her “My Life. My Rules.” philosophy with others who are facing the day-to-day doubt she once did. On EmmaGraceBrown.com you can find her exploring self-care, self-love, and self-expression, while examining the difference between the three.
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