Balancing Careers and Relationships

     Building a life when you're young and navigating life can be difficult. Most of us have no idea what life has in store for us, and it's usually not what we expect. It's hard trying to figure out how to be an adult while building a career, but when you add on a serious relationship, everything changes. Let's talk about how Aary and I balance our careers, relationship, and individualities.

    Aary and I have had very different lives which has had an impact on how we transition into adulthood. His parents made it their priority to give him the opportunities they didn't have. They were able to give him the best education possible, send him to college, and then make sure his transition into having a career was seamless. I applaud them because he didn't have a difficult time becoming an independent adult. He's been able to make a good name for himself by the age of 25 and hasn't had to doubt things. The one thing that was difficult for him was finding the balance between his work life and individual life. He always prioritized work, so when we started dating there was a lot of confusion about how to divide up his time. The struggle of how to prioritize work, his girlfriend, and hobbies was a battle but he learned. 

    The biggest thing was building self-boundaries. He had to learn to put down the laptop despite wanting to work another 3-4 hours because he wanted to do other things as well. Dedicating a few hours to me once he got home and playing games once I was asleep was perfect. It took weeks, and even months to fully implement the division of time, but once he did he was so much happier. This way he could navigate the building of his career and relationship without making one feel better than the other. 

    My life has been harder when it comes to transitioning into adulthood. I started working full-time at 17, but it was always odd jobs. Quickly I gained financial independence but mentally I was still young and confused.  I didn't have the chance to go to college, so a lot of doors started to shut because of that. When I decide to start modeling, it was a blessing and a curse. It's unstable in almost every way. Loving my job is easy, but what isn't easy is never having a stable income or hours. My career could be swept out from under my feet in a matter of seconds and there's no plan B. I struggled to be an adult at a young age when I didn't have the stability of a college degree and a normal career. Everyone around me had such a different life than I did so feeling isolated was a constant.

    When Aary and I started dating, I finally started to feel stable. Within that feeling, I started to feel more lost as an adult. I barely know who I am and how to handle my life, how can I manage all of that plus a serious relationship? Slowly I learned that we had to come together as a team to build our lives both together and individually. Giving each other support in our careers helped us thrive in our relationship. I was starting to grow as a person in every aspect, but having Aary next to me made me feel more secure as an adult. The realization that life is always going to be weird and confusing was prevalent, but knowing that we were in this strange life together was comforting.