The Honest Truth About Starting Over

The truth is, starting over in a new city, in a new country, a new job and meeting new people is fucking scary. You have to completely start from scratch not knowing where to go and what to do.

You’ll get lost countless times and you begin to wonder how life was before Google maps and Uber. You’ll make mistakes. Oh yes, lots and lots of them until you get it right. You have to pull yourself out from your comfort zone to make new friends. No one teaches you how to make friends when you’re in your 30’s. In fact, it gets harder every year as you get older.

You begin to realize that nothing compares to the quality of friendship that you have with the people you’ve known for years. It dawns on you, that you don’t
want to be everybody’s friend. And maybe that’s okay.

Now don’t get me wrong, being alone has its perks. In fact, it’s quite healthy to the mind and soul. You gain so much freedom and independence that if you’re lucky, you find yourself in the process. You learn that when you fly solo, you know you have the strongest wings. You have the strength that not everyone has. You become wiser and you filter out people who deserve to be in your life and weed out those who are quite toxic to you. Being on your own teaches you self-love. You become in sync with yourself that now more than ever, you crave for your own company.

Starting over could be the best decision you’ve ever made and it probably was, but no one tells you the damn truth behind all of it. Amidst all of the excitement of trying to immerse yourself quickly into your new home, the natural high you had when you first arrive quickly dies down and all of a sudden, that ache in your chest that you’ve been trying to push away hits you back hard.

You begin to miss your old friends. You begin to miss the old familiar feeling of
family. Reality slaps you in the face. You are alone. What everyone hates to admit is that being alone can also be so damn lonely. It’s when at the end of the day; you’re bursting with so much news and you become conscious that the important people in your life are not there to witness your success and failures.

It’s when you’re excited for the weekend and realize that your person is a thousand miles away or when you and your best friends are geographically disadvantaged. Friday nights will no longer be spent out and about in the city sharing funny stories over a few drinks. Sleepover Saturdays won’t be the same when you can just quickly call your crew if they want to hang out and chill. Pigging out on Sundays with your family is now a thing of the past.

You hate to admit that you don’t like being alone for a long time and it isn’t something you casually say out loud. You like being alone long enough but not too long for the bad thoughts to take over. The sad thing is, you like being alone but you hate being lonely.

No one will tell you how to do it. You will feel empty. You will fall. You will burst into tears and cry yourself dry. You will hide away from everyone. And that confidence you thought you had will easily slip out of the window. But I tell you this, maybe it’s true when they say the hardest part is always at the beginning and maybe just maybe, it’ll soon get better. Maybe there’s some truth to that. Maybe.