Reaching out to people and keeping in touch, even after a long period of silence, shows that you still care about them and are interested in their wellbeing.<\/p>\n
Some people will understand, while others may feel uncomfortable receiving a happy new year text from someone they haven’t spoken to in a year.<\/p>\n
Recently I have noticed people post memes and jokes about new year greetings from estranged family and friends.<\/p>\n
I was struck by how vocal we have become in saying how much we dislike receiving new year greetings from people we don’t normally interact.<\/p>\n
People have realized that receiving messages from people they don’t usually speak with is emotionally draining, especially when they wish them a happy new year.<\/p>\n
For some, reaching out to someone they haven’t spoken to in a while can be overwhelming.<\/p>\n
After all, there is no etiquette to responding to someone who has not contacted you in over a year.<\/p>\n
But if we turn the table and ask, have you reached out? Or are you the one who only wants to talk once a year?<\/p>\n
Ask yourself, “Am I shy, or am I protecting my mental health by texting that one person in my life once a year.”<\/p>\n
It’s important to take the time to think about why you want to reach out to someone and wish them a happy new year but neglect contacting them any other time in the year.<\/p>\n
If you are shy or awkward about it, it could be that maybe this person is a much older family member or a friend living abroad. These can be restored through communication from both parties.<\/p>\n
Another possibility is that your relationship with the recipient lacks boundaries or love, so you don’t reach out to them more than once.<\/p>\n
If you text someone and they immediately have a snorty comment about you, your lifestyle, or your family, then it is comprehensible why you would limit your communication.<\/p>\n
But now as we enter the new year, we can make it a year we work on our communication and relationship skills.<\/p>\n
Ultimately you need to ask yourself, is it okay to reach out to someone and wish them a happy new year after a year of silence?<\/p>\n
And before answering, be mindful of your mental health and the other person’s feelings. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{When the clock strikes midnight on new year’s eve, we hurry to send each other happy new year texts. Most of these messages consist of a generic “Happy New Year!” followed by occasional emojis and maybe a few words of encouragement.}<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[75],"byline":[3072],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-47310","opinion","type-opinion","status-publish","hentry","category-opinions","tag-homenews","byline-zaninka-umutesi"],"bylines":[{"id":3072,"name":"Zaninka Umutesi","slug":"zaninka-umutesi","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":3072,"name":"Zaninka Umutesi","slug":"zaninka-umutesi","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/opinion\/47310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/opinion"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/opinion"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/62"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/opinion\/47310\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47310"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=47310"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=47310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}