ROOTLESSNESS.
It’s the plague of the “TCK” isn’t it. Kids growing up cross-culturally have been branded with a scarlet letter R.
I get it. It’s an understandable, tangible way to illustrate some of the challenges that come with this life and on one level it makes tremendous sense. It goes hand in hand with all of the other bullet points in the “downsides” column.
- I can’t answer the question “where are you from?”
- I don’t know where “home” is.
- I move a lot.
- Even when I stay everyone else moves a lot.
- I say goodbye way too much.
- I see my grandparents like once every two years.
I MUST BE ROOTLESS.
I get it . . . but I hate it and I actually couldn’t disagree more. Maybe it’s a matter of semantics but if that is the case could we please reconsider the wording?
Let’s deconstruct it a bit.
ROOTLESS means “without roots.” Agreed?
So the metaphor presumes that we are talking about something that NEEDS roots and DOES NOT have them. We’re comparing TCK’s to a tree not a car . . . or a cow . . . or a crescent wrench.
That’s how metaphors work.
SO . . . if we are calling my kid rootless we are insinuating that they NEED some roots (I have no argument with that part of the point). But IF we are metaphoring about a tree which is rootless we have to stay true to the metaphor all the way through.
A tree without roots . . . dies. Period.
It shrivels up.
Dries out.
Withers away.
Falls down when the wind blows.
That, my friends, is where the metaphor breaks down. Why you ask? Take a look around. There are TCK’s all over the globe who are the polar opposite of shriveled. Not all of them thrive but MANY do. There are also LOADS of monocultural kids whose homebase has never once changed and are about as dried out and shriveled up as you can get.
There is so much more to having roots than staying in one place.
To be rootless means you have been cut off from what gives you nourishment, connection and strength. That’s the function of a root (you can look it up).
I would agree that my kids have been cut off from SOME of the things that CAN bring them nourishment, connection and strength . . . but not ALL. Not by a long shot. Not even close.
In fact I think they are tapped into sources that I never dreamed about in my monocultural childhood. Beyond that they are FAR MORE transplantable than I ever was. You could pick them up and drop them anywhere and they will thrive.
THAT IS NOT ROOTLESS.
My kids (and TCK’s everywhere) are ROOTFUL. Filled with roots. Lot’s of them. Fast growing, healthy roots. So much so that they will never dry out moving from one spot to another. There will be challenges to be sure, but that’s the thing about roots . . . challenges make them stronger.
They still need to be tapped into the things that feed them . . . AND THEY ARE.
- A family that looks and acts the same in any living space, airport, hotel or hemisphere.
- Routines and traditions that don’t change and can travel anywhere.
- Solid friends that they have met along the way and stay connected to.
- Core values that drive every decision.
- A deeper grasp of fluid community than they ever would have picked up elsewhere.
I love geographical stability (being planted in one spot and never moving). It can and does produce some really solid lives. In fact some of my greatest nourishment, connection and strength has come as a direct result of being tapped into people who have barely moved in their lifetime.
It’s a good way to do things well . . . BUT IT’S NOT THE ONLY WAY.
Living cross-culturally CAN be every bit as rootful.
Good stuff and now some pushback, yes? The good point that you stress is that trees must have roots to live. Great analogy, and TCKs must have ? to live. Well, they need food and water and shelter and some clothes, air to breathe…check. That is the direct analogy to the trees. But there is more, isn’t there? The ‘rootlessness’ that we TCKs feel is a real feeling, and it can arise from being ‘cut off’ or separated, from the people and places that have nourished us; the sources that other people continue to lean on for ‘nourishment’. This is best expressed in the ‘Belonging’ aspect of TCKness. Even with great families and routines and values, we can feel ‘homeless’ and disconnected, like people in a crowd who feel lonely. This is the reality and it is real even when all the other aspects of TCK life are good, very good! It doesn’t help to say, “People in crowds can’t feel lonely or isolated because they have all these great people around them!” It can invalidate the experience of many. At the same time, it would be incorrect to say, “All TCKs feel cut off and isolated.” –Please don’t shy away from the “Yes, And” aspect of TCK rootedness (often experienced with folks of similar backgrounds) and uprootedness. There are TCKs thriving everywhere. I think this is true. And there are TCKs everywhere that experience alienation, depression, anxiety and loneliness. Both are true. Like many things, there is likely a gradation, not a dichotomy. In between ‘Doing GREAT!” and “Falling over to shrivel up” are lots of places like ‘Starting to thrive’ – ‘Struggling to connect’ – ‘Feeling a bit lost’. The point is to affirm all that is good and to continue to work towards inclusion and connection for those facing challenges- like helping develop relational anchors and relational bridges. ~ Your friend in TCKness, Michael
Michael! Why do we not hang out more? We could have these conversations all the time. First things first — I love what you do. No one I know is more committed to the nourishment, connection and strength of TCK’s than you. So — I not only appreciate your pushback, I’m honored by it. Makes me think this is a dialogue worth engaging in. Second things — At any level that this reads like a dismissal or devaluation of the sincere challenges and negative emotions that come with the TCK experience, I am off. I can own that. Those struggles are real and my heart is not to put a happy stamp on it and pretend otherwise. However (and this is the point I was trying to get to) I struggle with the totality of the word rootless. Rootless means (by definition) completely cut off. No roots. Everything on the spectrum between “doing GREAT! and Falling over to shrivel up” suggests that SOME roots are still present EXCEPT FOR falling over — That is the final inevitability of rootlessness. “Starting to thrive” and “Feeling a bit lost” both suggest that there is still SOME connections versus absolutely none. That said, I will totally agree there is an inevitable disconnection that TCK’s experience from things that others take for granted. Another angle has to do with perspective. TCK’s feeling rootless makes sense . . . however when that is filtered down into training for parents (of the non-TCK flavor) it almost always comes out in a two column list of upsides and downsides. The BIG problem with that is that fear is so much more powerful than encouragement. Parents hearing this (especially for the first time) will never walk away saying “Hmm, that’s a pretty balanced list of good vs bad.” Words like “rootless” jump off the page and hit them between the eyes. If the list is 50% positive and 50% negative most parents will hear it as 90/10. 80/20 at best. So I certainly don’t want to ignore the dichotomy. I love the dichotomy but the narrative leans unintentionally to a pretty depressing place — I think parents need to hear that there is hope . . . not false hope apart from the hard stuff but real hope even through it. You are a shining example of that. Thanks brother.
Yes. And, our greatest rootedness must be in SomeOne who is everywhere. He is our Peace. He is our Strength. He is our Hope. He is the happiness we thought we were going to find in other people. My sense is (as a multi-decade, multi-continent, TC human) is that as TC humans we think our happiness is back somewhere else. It isn’t. It is right here, right now, in Jesus… And yes, this requires that we both confess and release some of our pain and longing. Many of us will “nurse” the TC thing, and use it as an excuse to refuse joy when it is right there in front of us. I am not always very good at this. But, still, I know it is true.
Thanks Mak. Well said.
Jerry – thanks for including me as a FIGT conference participant. I love the rootfullness analogy and I get your points and Michaels as well. To your point about the balance between good and bad on the list – I initially read your comment as 90/10 or 80/20 favoring the “bad” side, but now I am not sure. Which is it?
I also greatly value your perspective point. I believe that everything we do or learn has positive and negative consequences. Labeling anything good or bad tends to push our interpretation in that direction, and consequently, we tend to overvalue the good, and undervalue the bad. As a parent, I always advised my TCK daughter to look for the beneficial aspects of any experience that she interpreted as bad. Her feeling of “rootlessness” has now enabled her to move with her boyfriend to London, and then to Dublin to experience new cultures and make new friends. Might she have done this with a more “rooted” monoculture life? Sure, but I don’t see a huge number of mono-culture kids from the US making that leap to live and work overseas. I think that monocultural lives leads us down the political path that we are experience today. So I say “Hooray for the TCK rootlessness! It promotes thoughtful and healthy cross-cultural adults.”
Hey John — Thanks for reading and for engaging in the conversation. I love this stuff don’t you? As clarification, yes I think that parents process a 50-50 negative/positive lists as 90% negative. This always comes up as an issue in the training that I have been a part of. So, for example, if you say TCK’s are globally minded, diplomatic and sensitive to diversity but they also struggle with their identity, feel disconnected and rootless you may have painted an accurate picture of the pros and cons BUT when a parent processes that they will feel like they are completely screwing up their kids. Pros and cons don’t carry the same weight and unfortunately for parents (who deeply love their kids) fear is much heavier than encouragement (not always but usually). Part of my hope is to turn up the emphasis on the encouragement so that we actually experience a more balanced understanding. Sometimes that feels like ignoring the negatives or pretending like they don’t exist. I think that is every bit as dangerous. There are some genuine challenges that come with life abroad — lots of them — I just think a narrative that is focused on them breeds more. And unfortunately a 50/50 approach usually leads to an imbalanced understanding.
And as a side — I don’t think your daughter is rootless. I think she is deeply rooted, just not in a geography (semantics maybe?). I think that is incredible and speaks volumes to her upbringing. I also would never question her if she said she feels rootless . . . fair enough. She is absolutely entitled to that.
Jerry, thank you so much for your wonderful post! It’s so important to bring more positivity into the TCK world!
A few weeks ago I was wondering what kind of roots I have. I saw this exercise in Lois Bushong’s book “Belonging everywhere & nowhere” and sketched my life on a timeline. I was supposed to draw roots into the places where I had lived but I could not come up with anything that felt like a root connected to a place. Instead, all roots of my personalty and culture came from people! My parents, my friends, my husband and my kids! My own drawing made it so very clear to me and I’m really happy with what I found! My core values are deeply rooted in what these people have tought me and I feel an enormous freedom that I am not tied down to a place to feel rootful!
Do keep encouraging and pointing out the positive sides! We all need to hear more of that!
Thanks Wiebke — Yes. Yes. Yes. Roots don’t have to be geographical do they? Love this.
It also occurred to me that as a TCK I don’t really understand the concept of being rooted in a place. And to be honest, I don’t miss it, because I’ve never known what it feels like. So it’s not something I once had and then lost. As a grown up, I have travelled to most of the places that I grew up in. It was nice but so very different than the places that existed in my memory. New people moved in, my family and friends are no longer living there, my school doesn’t even exist anymore. It didn’t feel one bit like coming home. But when I come back from a trip and see my family again – that’s home! When I visit my parents I can see where my roots are.
I’m a monocultural parent (my parents still live in the same house that I grew up in!) of five TCKs, and this post and comments are really helpful. I fully agree with your assessment of how parents process the pros/cons lists and how the “cons” seem more powerful and dire as we think about how our choices are affecting our kids. My kids are deeply affected by my husband’s and my choice to live overseas, and I want to both be aware of and address the negatives and also celebrate the positives. It is just often hard to celebrate the positives in light of the hard things, so thanks for this encouragement.
Thank you! It seems like I mostly read negatives about TCK experiences, so this was a refreshing look at the positive side.
Well said, friend. I’ll have to email you a picture of my notebook from a conference a few years ago, as people were discussing their roots (all in one county/country/space) and I was pondering mine. The beautiful thing about the TCK condition is that these roots do span continents and timezones. The not so beautiful thing about the TCK condition is that these roots span continents and timezones. My heart will always be a bit splintered (like how I did that, going with the whole tree metaphor) as I try to make wherever I am as fully home as it can be. But alas, I love this life that I’ve been given, so rootfulness, in all it’s stretched out and chaotic glory, it is.