I’ll Never Regret Moving Somewhere New, No Matter How Hard It Can Get

A friend asked me the other day if I’m glad I moved to a new country. She asked me if it was worth it and if I’d suggest she should do it.

I thought about my answer as I thought about my experience.

Part of me wanted to tell her not to do it. Part of me wanted to tell her to stay home, to live in the comfort of her life because it’s safer that way, but I couldn’t because that goes against everything I believe in.

I’ve always believed you should challenge yourself.

I believe that you should take your relationship with yourself to a whole new level. I believe you should feel the pain and the loneliness and the sadness that comes with moving to a new place. I believe you should understand what it really feels like to miss someone or something. I believe you should understand just how fortunate you are for the things in your life.

I believe you should challenge yourself, learn new things about yourself, try new foods and learn new activities.

I believe you should learn new slang and experience the difference in cultures. I believe you should always, always challenge yourself.

There are days I sit in my new house, in a new city and I wish more than anything I could just go home. There are days I wish I never moved, days I wish I never came to this place and left the friends I had at home. There are days I feel so alone I feel depressed, I convince myself no one misses me and that I’ll never have friends like I did back home.

There are days that all I want is the familiarity of food from home, how I would just love to get a bagel or go to Chipotle. There are days I hate that I have to type addresses into my GPS because I’m still unsure of how to get somewhere. There are days I just want to pack up and leave.

But after a while those voices fade, you learn how to live in a new place. You learn how to navigate your way around without a GPS. You find a job, a hobby, you start making new friends and restart building your life somewhere new. Then the somewhere new just turns into home.

You feel comfortable in the four walls you’re in. You don’t mind the silence so much anymore because eventually the silence turns to other’s voices. You start to not feel so empty and you start being reminded of what it feels like to find happiness and build relationships again.

You don’t lose sleep over what your friends back home are doing because you’re doing your own thing, new things, different things.

Moving to a new place can be hard, especially when you don’t know anyone. It can be difficult and scary and lonely, but it can only make you grow and it can only make you stronger.

It’s safer to stay at home, it’s safer to stay around people you know and people who have been in your life. It’s more comfortable to work a job you’ve been in, but with comfort there is no change. You can’t change unless you push yourself.

You can’t change unless you break yourself because once you are broken the only option you have is to heal and get stronger.

Moving to a new place alone is hard, but it’s worth it because if worse comes to worse, home will always be there for you to return.