This is a thought or a message written up as a list of some sorts, it goes hand in hand with what I wrote just before.
How to build a stable relationship abroad
1. Be SECURE IN YOURSELF, wherever you are.
This is the number one thing before putting any pillars in to a relationship that you want to last, near to home or far away.
You need to be able to find a secure center within yourself- for when times are good and when they are hard. Whether it is for a general anxiety turmoil in your head or for surrounding reasons. Neither can support the other if as soon as you hit a wall you as a partner are breaking apart. Trust in one-self is an important start. Trust towards each-other comes (for example) from following this list while near or far.
2. Have OTHER PILLARS for an additional sense of security.
Realize that you can not control your partners family life, pattern or problems. You have to trust them and give them time to deal with their own personal milestones in their own way and pace. Yes, these "own pillars" are hard to find and build, especially if you are newly arrived in the country you are in, But that is where that sense of inner "oak" security is a very important thing.
3. FIND things in the new country that you can relate to and love, does not have to, and perhaps shouldn't always be what your partner loves (you are not the same person). If you intend to live a cross-cultural life find something that sustains your love for this foreign second home of yours.
4. ACCEPT the Online life with family and friends for those everyday chats.
For living on another continent/or in another country (even if just temporarily) this is now your reality. Make the best of it.
5. KNOW that Nothing is set in stone- You are in charge of your own reality.
Make your cross-cultural/continent life an ever changing adventure. Take turns, spend holidays in your home country. Take 1-2 years at a time. Have a house in one and an apartment in the other, or do a house-swap whenever the opportunity (mainly work-wise) occurs, Hypothetical kids can fly over whenever they have time, they can stay all summers with their grandparents if they´d like. Get comfortable with the idea of a flexible lifestyle (as far as you can bend), but accept that for that to be possible some sacrifice will be taken in the end. Embrace all the cross-cultural memories you get instead.
6. Do NOT PAINT YOUR PARTNER INTO YOUR OWN PERSONAL CULTURAL IDENTITY.
This goes for those with a strong national pride and roots. Cultural identity can be very personal and impossible to relate to if you do not speak the same language, born and raised in the same city or took part in those same gigs and heard those songs and built the same emotional attachment each time that song is played.
Your culture, nationality and memories are not your partners, and you fell in love with them for who they where- do not paint over them as you try to help them immerse. Goes for both if they are in your country or you are in theirs. Instead create new memories of you as a couple (do not disregard them for "all that which they are not"). Do not make them feel like an option that you already regret and will regret for a lifetime as you worry about "how they will never be able to give you that". Find your roots once again in yourself, if they are strong an in-rooted enough they can not simply fall because of someone else. Give them time (lots of it) to immerse themselves in a way that works for them and gives them joy- to paint their own cross-cultural painting.
And lastly, accept that they or your hypothetical children may never be 100 % "on board" with your heritage, language or cultural identity. accept and learn to love them for their "mixed cultural abilities".
7. SUPPORT AND HELP YOUR PARTNER TO FIND THEIR OWN CULTURAL IDENTITY IN THE NEW HOME COUNTRY
A relationship is a team, and you support one one-another. Do as much as you can (without allowing yourself to be painted over) to help your partner feel at home, have memorabilia around, try to learn their language or just start with some phrases, once in a while take part in a hobby they like even if it is not your "thing", learn about their national holidays, find a food-truck, cook a national meal.
You can also see if you can find a hobby that you both did in your previous lives and immerse yourselves in that together.
However. as cultural identity can be so personal (and hard for the other to relate to) it is important to accept that you might not be able to give their elements of national passion the same emotional validity as "their own people"can, same goes for any attachment they have to hobbies they used to do back home and you might not actually enjoy as much as they wish you did. Help them find groups to join or places where they can practice their recreational activities.
8. ACCEPT THAT YOUR CULTURAL IDENTITY IN THE NEW HOME COUNTRY CAN NOT BE THE SAME AS BACK HOME.
- but acknowledge when your partner tries too, and accept that they can not always be part of your national identity/reminiscing adventures.You might need to find new ways to do things, you cannot paint over them in order to feel at home. The two of you together make up your shared home.
9. DO NOT HOLD GRUDGES
- remember why you chose this life
10. BUILD AN EVEN STRONGER SECOND SHARED IDENTITY
- this will be your intercontinental family
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