Birthday Reminders & Keeping in Touch

I used to find it uncomfortable reaching out to people I hadn’t texted or interacted with in person for a while. For some reason, I felt like there had to be a reason behind the interaction, and that simply “reaching out” was odd behavior.

It was during this epoch in my thinking that I realized that there was, in fact, a reason to reach out to many of these people. Everyone, actually. And it was a recursive reason that occurred every year:

…their birthday.

First, you need to make a mental (or physical) note of all the people you care about and want to stay in contact with. For each person, add their birthday to your phone’s calendar. If you can’t remember a person’s birthday — you’re fucked and can never talk to them again.

On iOS, I found it easiest to add the birthday to each person’s contact and then enable birthday reminders in Calendar settings. I’m sure Android has a similar process.

You’ve now unlocked the perfect annual catch-up text. When the time comes, throw them a “happy birthday”. They’ll expectedly thank you and now you have the perfect segue into whatever conversation or catching up you want to have with that person.

On the contrary, I’ve found in my experience that the person(s) you’ve been thinking about texting are usually elated to hear from you anyway.

So birthday or not, text that person to let them know you care and shit.

~ C !