Sep 20, 2015 |
I am an expat . . . AND . . . I own a drill.
Hold your applause until the end please.
It’s funny how the value of stuff changes when you live cross culturally.
This month we crammed the full sum of our belongings into eleven 52.0 pound (23.6 kg) suitcases and plastic tubs (not counting carry ons or the cat) and threw the whole heavy bit on an airplane so we could (once again) call ourselves expatriates. Two years ago we took a strikingly similar trip in an airplane going the other direction so we could call ourselves repatriates.
We spent the last two years “restocking” our lives with American piles of stuff (mostly made in China) only to sell it or give it back to Americans on our way out. Now that we are back in China we are restocking again and I am noticing that there is a vast difference between America restocking and China restocking.
When I moved back to America I wanted tools. Lots of tools. Tools for fixing things and for breaking things. Tools for banging and smashing and tightening and straightening and loosening and scraping and sanding and cutting and fastening and climbing and nailing and setting things on fire and putting out the fires that I start. Tools for putting holes in stuff. Tools for lifting up heavy things. Tools that you could shoot electricity through and chop things in half. I wanted tools that would hold my other tools and more tools that would help me pick those other tools up off the ground without bending over. I wanted tool boxes and tool bags and tool buckets and tool cabinets and tool hooks and tool hangers and tool shelves and (just imagine it) a whole, entire tool wall . . . that would glow just from being awesome.
I wanted to be THAT guy. The one whose friends would know that no matter what job they needed to do — I would have a tool for it and they were welcome to use it.
I gave it my best shot.
I spent every Saturday morning driving to the yard sales of other men who were upgrading to better tools and selling their old ones. I would come home like a cave man dragging a wooly mammoth for the entire village to feast on. Spreading my bounty across the living room floor I would beat my chest and grunt . . .
“THESE!!!”
“ARE MY TOOLS!!”
My wife tried to reason at first:
“Jerry, when are you ever going to use this?”
“Could.”
“How much did this cost?”
“Cheap.”
“You don’t even know what this tool does.”
“Do too.”
“What does it do?
“Doesn’t matter.”
She eventually recognized the futility of rational thought and just started patting me on the head.
Why fight it? There was clearly a hardware store shaped hole in me that needed to be filled and I was determined. Each time I got to add to my collection was a victory and victories are for celebration . . . not common sense.
Then we moved back to China . . . and I bought a drill.
That’s it. One drill. The cheapest one they had.
And I gotta’ tell ya’ — I’m walking high this week. Victorious all over again.
It’s the strangest thing. Just weeks ago I gave away three drills exactly like my new one as well as two other drills that were much nicer. I sold saws and hammers and bags full of screwdrivers and wrenches and I wept quietly as other men walked away with my two years worth of plunder.
Then I replaced it all with a drill.
Life is different in the expatosphere. I rarely have an occasion which demands tools beyond those you can find in the Fisher Price starter set and I’m not sure where I would put them if I had them. Most of the people around here have a screwdriver or two. Maybe a tape measure and possibly the half sized hammer that comes in the same plastic box. There are zero glowing tool walls around us and quite honestly I would feel ridiculous even pursuing one.
I do have my drill though which is pretty much all it takes to be THAT guy.
Tools are just one example of things that would be considered gratuitous luxuries in my new world and base essentials in my old.
I have three friends here who own a car. Three. That’s it.
Where I come from it’s nothing for ONE person to own three cars but unthinkable to have none.
Here — there is a sense of, “waah — you got a car?”
There — the sense would be, “Waah — you don’t have a car?!”
Don’t get me wrong. We don’t get all judgy here. It’s not like “well WOOTEEE DOO DOO. Look at Mister Flashy Cash driving his fancy new car all around the town. Must be nice! Dirty joker.” It’s more like, “Wow. You passed the driver’s license test AND you don’t mind driving in Chinese traffic? Cool.”
It’s a bonus — BUT there is nothing pitiable about NOT having a car.
Or a dishwasher.
Or a garbage disposal.
Or a television.
Or a dryer.
Or a vacuum.
Or a full sized refrigerator.
Or an oven.
Or a bathtub
Or a lawn mower.
Or an Xbox.
Or gluten free pizza dough.
Or a drill.
Here’s the kicker.
Many (if not most) of our friends have a paid house helper. Usually a middle aged woman who comes to their home during the day to clean the apartment and do the dishes. Some of them cook meals and watch the children. They might even do the shopping AND when the expats aren’t careful . . . they become a part of their family.
It’s how people live here. It’s common and there is no stigma around it.
However, it’s almost embarrassing to share with our three car, glowing tool wall having friends back home.
“Well WOOOTEEE DOO DOO — Must be nice to have a maid! You got a butler too? Tough life over there huh?!!”
It’s funny how we set our parameters around what’s essential and what’s extravagant based on the people around us. It’s even funnier to see it from two sides.
Now you’ll excuse me . . . I have holes to drill.
Jul 16, 2015 |
I was teenager once. It was awkward.
I was pretty run of the mill. Unfortunately the mill that year was cranking out knobby kneed, gangly armed, pimply faced manboys who, despite devoting every waking moment to the art of faking cool, squawked like a chicken every time we laughed. I was (like all of my counterparts of the same patent) a strange and confusing chemical mix of misguided uber confidence and confusingly low self esteem. In my head I was some combination of Michael Jordan* (athletically speaking) and Arthur Fonzarelli* (with the ladies). In Actual World I regularly tripped over the free throw line and let’s just say that went much better than it ever did with the ladies.
*links to MJ and the Fonz included for younger readers.
They called me Jerry Jones chicken bones and my strongest comeback was . . . “I know you are but what am I?!” I remember holding my breath with high hopes of squeezing out a chest hair. I got three new pimples that night.
It was a strange and surreal time. Confusing. Painful. Weird.
You couldn’t pay me a bajillion dollars to go back and do it all again . . . and yet . . . here I am — weeks away from yet another international move and I’m flashing back.
Transition is like puberty . . . in so many ways. If you’re in the middle of it maybe you can relate.
Here are my symptoms:
1. Mood Swings
I’m sprinting the gamut between high highs and low lows. I’m finding that as we move closer to yet another massive life transition I can (multiple times in one day) make the jump between feeling like Tigger with a cup half full and Eeeyore who doesn’t even see the point of cups . . . or water . . . or being awake.
Between the visa applications, the doctor visits, the downsizing, the packing, the intentional eye contact goodbyes and the fact that time itself is moving much too fast and much too slow simultaneously . . . yeah . . . transition makes me irritable.
Is there a problem with that or could we please just move on to number 2 like a normal blog?!
Sheesh.
2. Funky Brain
I am scattered to say the least. My brain is all over the place and no matter what I’m thinking about I have a secondary nagging thought that there is probably something else that I’m forgetting to think about.
This nonsense ironically made perfect sense when I was 12 and could blame it all on hormones and girls.
I have no good excuses now. My brain is just full . . . and consequently funky.
3. Snarfing
In the context of our chaos, when meal time comes, I am pathetically unmotivated to make wise decisions about food . . . so I make stupid ones. I also have little ambition towards cleaning up afterwards considering the fact that clutter is the bain of our transition right now.
The simpler the better.
Somehow eating uber-hydrogenated cheesy puff munches out of a plastic bag or feeding my family with a sack of double cheeseburgers feels less daunting and just easier. I’m even inclined to try convincing my wife that $5 pizzas are a better choice than a home cooked meal . . . every day.
I’m flashing back to age 14 when my stomach was a bottomless pit and my metabolism burned calories before they even went in my mouth.
This is no longer the case.
Stop judging me.
4. Fighting with people I don’t disagree with
One thing I remember, very distinctly, from my adolescent years is that everyone who lived in my house was wrong . . . about everything . . . always.
It didn’t much matter what the topic was or where they landed on it. If they said it, I disagreed . . . wholeheartedly . . . and even if they changed their position to agree with me one hundred percent . . . I still disagreed.
Recently I’m finding myself (once again) prone to taking the alternative stance even when there is no good reason to do so. When everything around is a chaotic whirlwind it’s easy to forget that the people in my boat are not actually trying to sink me.
I talk to a lot of people in transition so at least I know that high tension and pointless arguments are par for the course. Unfortunately knowing it hasn’t given us immunity.
It helps to call it out though . . . we’re on the same team.
5. Digital paralysis
I was a part of the generation who discovered that there is no limit to the hours a teenager will spend playing video games or watching TV. We were hard core. Kids these days have no idea.
We numbed our brains into the wee hours of the morning long before PS4 and Netflix. We were trailblazers. Ground breakers. When we ran out of lives we started all over from the beginning of the game. When we rented a movie we had to leave the house. Our playlists were called mix tapes and they took days to get just right. When we sent a text message there was paper involved. And stamps. The licky kind.
It was a tougher time.
Times of transition (much like the formative years) present an often overwhelming temptation to disconnect from a stressful reality. Now more than ever, the digital options that enable unhooking from real life are without boundaries.
Let’s just say it takes longer to write a blog post while you’re binge watching 90’s sitcoms.
I get it now — why my parents feared for my generation.
6. My ears are broke
My wife tells me this is true and I really have no strong argument to prove otherwise. I can look straight at you. Make eye contact. Nod like I am absorbing every word. Even respond with noises that make total sense in conjunction with what you have just said . . . and immediately have ZERO recollection that the conversation ever happened.
I can ask you a question and you can give me a clear, concise, perfectly constructed answer. I will make a purposeful, cognizant effort to register that data and store it in my brain . . . and three minutes later I will ask you the exact same question again.
I am either regressing to my teens or fast forwarding to my 90’s.
Either way . . . what were we talking about?
7. Exhaustion
I am so, so tired . . . and yet never so much that I can sleep well. It’s a vicious cycle.
8. Weird things are happening to me
I’ve been having regular headaches and tiny little anxiety attacks. That’s not like me. I wake up in the middle of the night and can’t go back to sleep. I’ve learned that I can increase my heart rate at will just by thinking about the next few weeks and I have regular dejavu.
I’ve also learned that I can increase my heart rate at will just by thinking about the next few weeks and I have regular dejavu.
It’s weird.
Seriously. Is there not a pamphlet for this? With charts and graphs and awkward diagrams. At least when I was sixteen my mother gave me a book called, “So You’re Turning Twelve.”
(pausing to let that sink in)
There is hope
Whiny as I may be, the silver linings are not absent here — in fact they are multiple. The change of life (I mean the big one years ago) was not entirely horrible. It was certainly filled with paradox and there were challenges that I would never want to relive however, between the knobby kneed bumbling and the hormone driven awkardness . . . it was a rich, wonderful time.
I was surrounded by great people who poured into my shaky life. I probably laughed harder and more often than I have since. I was impressionable (although I tried my hardest not to be). I was formed during that time and my life (the grown up one) has been better because of it.
And the best part . . . it didn’t last forever.
The awkward development years served as a beautiful gateway between two wonderful stages of my life.
I expect that this transition will be the same.
How about you? Anyone else out there in transition and feeling 13 again? Or is it just me?
Jun 1, 2015 |
Two years ago exactly we were in the process of repatriating (moving “home” to the U.S. after 7 years in China). Our lives became consumed with the quest to reduce all of our belongings into 8 suit cases. We failed but just barely.
Part of my transition back to the States was discovering something that I really hated about myself. I have never been a stuff guy. I have plenty of issues but materialism has just never been one of them. All of the sudden, though, I was feeling overwhelmingly greedy and sorry for myself. Walking through the homes of our old friends I could feel my internal organs ranting.
“They have furniture!” my gut would say “IN TWO DIFFERENT ROOMS!!”
To which my heart would respond, “and look! Cutco knives! The whole set! We don’t even have spoons!”
My lungs would gasp and mock, “oooooh . . . an air purifier . . . must be nice.”
It was the most pathetic midlife crisis I have ever heard of. I couldn’t even fathom daydreaming of a red convertible. I just wanted a bicycle . . . and maybe a TV.
Our friends, whom we were once on a level with stuffwise, had continued to move forward on the timeline of accumulation, uninterrupted. We, on the other hand, had downsized the entirety of our possessions to what would fit on the plane . . . twice.
There was considerable jealousy and subsequent guilt.
That was two years and several dozen yard sales ago. Now my organs are freaking out once again because . . . frankly . . . we have too much stuff.
And we’re leaving again.
Oi.
This is what I (along with my organs) am learning about transition and stuff:
1. Yard sale equity is not a sustainable, long term, financial model
We spent two summers restocking our lives with other people’s stuff. Then we tried to sell it all to different people in one day. While I did make a hefty 200% profit ($2.25) on one of our lamps I spent way more than that on donuts for our employees (pictured here). On everything else we either broke even or sold at a loss and at the end of the day we still had 85% of the stuff we had at the beginning of the day.
As the most ironic financial consultant in the world I feel you should know that if you’re looking for a reliable investment strategy to provide peace of mind and security in your retirement . . . buying new stuff and selling it all every two years is not it.
That will be $200. We accept housewares and kitchen utensils.
2. Stuff generally demands more emotion than it is worth
Playing lifeboat with all of your possessions (especially when there is more than one of you) can be painful. Deciding which things make the suitcase and which things don’t is an organ wrenching exercise. Dollar values. Sentimental values. Can I get this there? Will I use this? Will I wear this? Will this fit? If I keep this what do I need to leave behind?
Everything is connected to story or a memory and there is only so much space to go around. There is much growling and showing of teeth.
Now plug that into a yard sale and watch the tension consume you. “NO – I will not take 50 cents for my drill bits! I love those drill bits!! Now GET OFF of my property!”
It’s a sensitive time.
3. It’s ok to let go of stuff
The sweetest moment of our yard sale came as we were cleaning up. My wife and I both shared a sense of sarcastic irritation — “Great. Now what?”
Another yard sale? Please no.
Sell it online? 12 emails to set up a time for someone to come give us two dollars for our spatulas? . . . uh . . . no thank you.
Give it all away? Argh. We can’t keep doing this.
Frustration mounted and we were both at a loss. Finally I made a suggestion. Let’s wrap our heads around giving $100 worth of stuff to the Thrift Store. That won’t kill us and we could thin out this pile of mess.
Moments later we realized that there were very few things that didn’t fit into our $100 category. We took it all to the garage and put it in two piles . . .
- Thrift Store stuff (most everything)
- Stuff worth selling online
We felt much better.
4. It’s ok to NOT let go of stuff
We still have a looming layer of things that didn’t go in the yard sale. Bigger items that we are still using, have invested more in and would definitely feel the pain of zero cost recovery. I am a terrible (albeit self-aware) businessman. I love to make a profit but I would prefer for you to just have it.
“Yeah we’d love to get $10,000 but . . . aw heck, just take it.”
I’ve had to wrestle with my own lack of materialism. The whole notion sounds ridiculous to the cut throat entrepreneur but I don’t think I’m alone in feeling (misplaced) guilt for putting price tags on stuff that I could give away.
Recovering what we have paid does not (necessarily) equal greed.
5. Stuff is not people
When I think about how I want to spend these last few weeks, running a flea market doesn’t even make the top ten.
People. That’s how I want to spend my time.
I want to make new memories with people that I’m going to miss. I want to take pictures with people I love at places I love. I want to sit around a fire and stay up late. I want to get up early for coffee and donuts. I want to have cookouts and eat stupid amounts of meat. I want awkward eye contact and healthy goodbyes. I want to go kayaking with my best bud. I want to eat family dinner on paper plates while sitting on a blanket in the middle of an empty living room floor and watching a movie on the iPad because . . . once again . . . we don’t own a TV.
I love my stuff . . . but I love my people more.
So these are my guidelines:
- I will get stuff out of my way so I can spend time with people.
- I won’t stress about losing money on my stuff.
- I won’t stress about making money on my stuff.
- When I can I will bless people with my stuff.
- When stuff creates an awkward situation I will call it awkward and move on.
- If my family owns stuff that gives them security or builds their confidence then I absolutely want them to keep it.
- I will not lose time with people for the sake of stuff.
That’s my plan . . . I’ll let you know how it goes.
For those of you whom transition is just a part of life — What’s your story? What’s your secret when it comes time to buy, sell, give, keep, pack, repack and unpack stuff?
Apr 21, 2015 |
Repatriating is weird.
It shouldn’t be but it is.
It should be awesome — and easy — and the complete redemption of every challenge, every irritation and every bumbling misadventure you have trudged through in your life as a foreigner. You are being unshackled from the chains of expat awkwardness and outsider fatigue.
Language barriers — gone. Cultural head scratching — no more. Mystery dishes — not on your plate. Awkward laughter to cover your embarrassment even though you have NO idea why you should be embarrassed (or laughing) — done with it.
You’re going back to normal. Your normal. Normal normal.
And there it is. The reason that repatriating is weird. Because it was supposed to be normal. Turns out . . . it’s not.
Your normal shifted while you were away. Theres a good chance (although the variables are different for every person) that your new normal IS communicating through a language barrier, scratching your head, eating the mystery dish (or finding a culturally acceptable reason not to) and awkward laughter.
Repats face a multi-layered challenge when they come “home”. One of those layers is tainted with the guilt of feeling like they should not be feeling like they are. There is a sense of isolation when we re-engage our communities.
Generally speaking, people don’t repatriate in herds. Maybe we should. Then we might know that we are actually quite normal.
For those without that luxury — here are some some things that DON’T make you weird.
1. Sensory Overload
Feeling overwhelmed by things that have never overwhelmed you before is not weird. This would make sense if you were only overwhelmed by bad things. You can brace for that impact, but it’s confusing to find yourself drowning in the things that you were most excited about coming back to.
Remember this — your senses (all of them) have grown accustomed to something different. You’ve adjusted the settings to respond to the realities of your foreign life. As an expat you have been hyper-tuned in, because if you’re not you’ll miss something important. In other ways you’ve completely checked out because you don’t understand and frankly you don’t need to.
It’s like when you’re watching TV and the sound is bad so you turn it up to 65.
Then you forget and change the channel. You just woke up the whole neighborhood.
It takes some time to readjust.
2. The Little Brother Syndrome
If you’ve got a little brother I don’t even need to explain this to you. They can annoy the pot out of you and, as the elder sibling, you reserve the right to pummel them. Wedgies, noogies, wet willies and forehead flicks are all perfectly acceptable means of retaliation (assuming parents are absent). HOWEVER — When Lester McNeederbottom down the street takes his lunch money . . . it’s on.
NOBODY messes with your kid brother but you.
Even if your expat experience was hard. Even if you slipped into a bad habit of whining and griping about every part of it. Even if you couldn’t wait to get home . . . you’ve connected.
So when somebody talks trash about your host country . . . it’s not weird to feel defensive.
3. Total Incompetence
I forgot how to use my bank card at the supermarket. I spent 10 minutes looking for the veggie “weigh station” before I remembered they don’t do that here. I couldn’t remember if U-turns were legal. I had no idea how to order at Chipotle.
This list goes on.
Trust me. Whatever is on your list. You are not alone.
4. Weird Withdrawals
Being the outsider has it’s challenges. As an expat you go through various stages of frustration with being the odd man out.
We got stared at. Pretty common for foreigners in China and to be fair . . . we’re kind of a walking freak storm. My wife and I are the garden variety, fair-skinned foreigners but our kids look NOTHING like us. Our daughter would blend in perfectly if she weren’t standing with us and our son (who has by far the darkest skin in the family and an awesome head of curly hair) doesn’t blend at all (with us or without us). We are totally worth staring at.
We grew pretty comfortable with the ogling but at times it was the most irritating part of our lives there.
So why in the world would I feel offended when people in my home country DON’T stare at my family?
I don’t know. But I did.
It’s pretty common to have withdrawals that make no sense at all.
5. Judgyness
When you see the place you have always called home through a different set of lenses you return to it with a different perspective.
“These people just don’t get it.”
“Everybody here thinks they’re the center of the universe.”
“If they could see what I’ve seen.”
“I used to think like that before I moved abroad.”
Faith, politics, education, business, office protocol, you name it. It’s all subject to a deeper scrutiny from those who have seen it from a different angle.
Here’s the catch. It is highly unlikely that you will notice yourself being more judgmental. You may, however, notice that everyone around you is wrong.
Side note — if everyone around you is wrong, you’re probably being more judgmental.
You are not the first.
6. Zero Self Discipline
It’s pretty exciting to come home to all of the guilty pleasures that you have missed so much. Consequently it’s not uncommon to find yourself substantially fatter and broker six months later.
It happens.
7. Missing your other language
Personally, I find this to be the most dysfunctional quirk in my own transition process. The only time I have ever had a deep yearning to really commit to learning a new language is when I have needed it the least. When I was in China I fluctuated between being a terrible student and a mediocre student.
Then I came home and found myself listening to Chinese podcasts and checking out new Chinese character memorization software.
Doesn’t make even a tiny bit of sense but I would bet that I’m not alone.
Anyone?
8. Feeling homesick at home
If “home” was clearly defined before you lived abroad you may be painfully confused on your return. Even if your host country is radically different from anything you ever experienced growing up, you may be shocked to discover you miss it like you’ve lived there forever.
The whole “home” conversation gets more complex if you grew up cross culturally but you knew that already. If that’s you, you’re well acquainted with being homesick even if you can’t identify where home is.
Whoever you are — there are many more like you.
9. Mourning
I tread lightly here. Clearly repatriation and death are not the same. That said, mourning is an absolutely legitimate part of this transition. It is healthy and natural.
The defining characteristic of grief is that it is a process. Mourning is not the same as venting. You don’t just get it out of your system one day and then “poof” it’s gone.
By acknowledging that this could be grief you’ll connect yourself to the many other repats who feel the same. Beyond that you might just get your eyes opened to people all around (even the “normal” ones) who are grieving many different flavors of loss.
They are all around.
10. Becoming self-centric
Repatriation is weird. We’ve covered that.
It’s a shock. It’s a process. It takes time and we feel alone while we are doing it.
We’ve had an adventure and we want to share it.
We’ve struggled and we want someone to feel bad for us.
We’ve been gone and we want to feel missed.
We’re behind and we want some help catching up.
We’ve changed and we want someone to notice.
We’ve got lots to say and we want someone . . . anyone . . . to listen.
And since we are the ONE in the crowd who has done something different, it’s easy to forget that we are not the only ONE — period.
The crowd matters.
“Home” changed too. They had an adventure while you were gone. Bad things happened. Good things happened. They missed you but they didn’t sit on the porch waiting for you to come home. They’ve changed. They’ve grown. They’ve got stories to tell and they might like you to show some interest as well. There’s even a strong chance they would love to hear about how much YOU missed THEM.
Don’t kick yourself.
If coming home has become all about you . . . you are definitely not alone.
What’s your story? Share it below and prove to the others that there are more like them out there.
Know a repat? Past, present or future? Pass this on. They may think they’re the only one.
Want to feel normal? Go here and read this legendary piece about repatriating by Naomi Hattaway: I am a Triangle
Want to meet more people like you? Go here and join the “I am a Triangle” Facebook Group which is FULL of people just like you. Told you that you’re not alone.
Nov 8, 2014 |
There have always been nomads but there are more now than ever.
Maybe you are one — those people who are going to live their entire lives 3-5 years at a time (give or take). By choice, calling or mandate you will encounter multiple, major transitions in your life. Military families, missionaries, international business people, career students, traveling teachers, medical professionals, jet setters, globe trotters and restless wanderers are all on the move and likely to stay that way until they can’t any longer.
It’s the opposite of the “where I come from” scenario. Where I come from deep roots are a core value. You don’t move unless your job says you have to. You plant yourself in the community and become a pillar of it. You stay at the same church for life (unless the Pastor makes you mad), your kids graduate high school with their Kindergarten class and you live in the same house until you can’t take care of it anymore.
It’s stability at it’s finest.
I love it. I’m thankful for the rock solid experiences of my childhood.
However.
I don’t think it is the ONLY way to live well. I have also been privileged to meet some wonderful people (I call them “The Movers”) who have lived the nomad life into their twilight — never planting themselves for more than a few years — and it has been rich and good.
It is different to be sure.
- They are not pillars of any one community but they have deeply impacted several.
- They don’t have a core group of long term local friends but they have a network that is global.
- The people around them are always changing but they understand community in a very real way.
- They will never get a town hall named after them but they have a huge impact on people who leave and have a profound impact somewhere else.
- They’ve never owned a house but they always know when they are home.
I have learned some priceless life lessons both from people who have never moved and some who have never stayed.
If you are a mover (of any flavor) – here are a few thoughts gleaned from those who have done it well.
1. Every brick counts
You’re never going to be the pillar and that’s ok. Your life is going to look more like a brick wall. Lot’s of smaller, individual blocks laid out one by one and all stuck together. What you want in the end is a solid wall.
Here’s the kicker – One mushy brick compromises the strength of the wall. Two or three even more so. Every brick counts.
So . . . even if you’re only in a location for 2 years you should work hard to make it solid. Build strong relationships. When they break do everything you can to make sure they get fixed. Add value to the people around you.
The two biggest lies that transient people believe are, “I don’t have time to make friends” and “this will all be better when I leave.” You do and it won’t.
Believing these makes for a really mushy brick . . . and every brick counts.
2. Think Trajectory
Steven Covey said it well. “Begin with the end in mind.”
If you’re 30 think about life when you’re 75. What do you want 75 year old you to be proud of? Where will they have gone? What will they have done? What will they be telling their grandkids about?
Now pull that back into modern day you’s decision making process. Just thinking about the end isn’t going to make it happen. You’ve got to make decisions all along the way that lead to that place. If 75 year old you speaks fluent Swahili then guess what. You need to buckle down and get to work.
3. Invest aggressively
Conservative investors keep the risk low because their timeline is long. They invest when it’s a sure thing with a pretty solid hope for something good in the distant future. Aggressive investors can’t wait that long. They identify something that seems like a good opportunity and they go for it. They risk loss. They risk a set back. They risk embarrassment but they do it all with the keen understanding that if they don’t move now, they’ll miss it.
You are investing in relationships – if you’re a mover you don’t have the luxury of 30 years before you have a meaningful conversation. Don’t be afraid to dig into relationships and get below the surface early on. Go deep quicker. Invest in people. Note: this is not romantic advice – that may be completely different.
Healthy movers understand the significance of NOW.
Important side note – Aggressive ≠ stupid.
4. Emulate the Greats
When you think about people who are on a similar life path (expat, missionary, military etc.) who do you see that is doing this well? Pick three to five people that come to your mind when you answer that question.
- Why did they come to your mind?
- How do they interact with people?
- How do they take care of themselves?
- What do other people say about them?
- What are their habits? Their routines? Their disciplines?
Deconstructing their lives a bit will give you a great short list of characteristics for you to transfer onto your trajectory.
Be yourself but emulate the greats.
5. Give more than you take
There are two kinds of movers — the givers and the takers.
Takers bounce from place to place to suck the life out of the culture and the community. They are selfish adventurers who are looking to get what they can get and care little about the people around them. They are rude to their hosts. They are parasitic and abusive but sometimes no one notices because they can also be a lot of fun.
In the end their brick wall is a pile of sand.
Don’t be those people. Be the givers.
6. Always be changing
The richest part of transience is diversity. Every place you go, every community you live in, every group of people that you do life with is a new and unique opportunity. You get to see the world from their perspective and you quickly learn that every perspective is different.
Become a lifelong student of the places you live and the people who live there with you. That should be changing you.
7. Never change
Even though you change with every stop, who you are at the core should be rock solid. Be careful not to let different places and different people cause you to forget your deepest values.
8. Bust the Bubble
The bubble is the place you can go and not need anything else. It’s safe and comfortable. The people inside are just like you. They speak your language, they share your frustrations, they eat your food, they drink your drinks. It’s enjoyable and rarely awkward. Outside of the bubble there is a lot more risk. You have to work harder to communicate. The people there are weird.
Bust the bubble. Movers miss so much because they never branch out.
Whether your bubble is corporate or expat or something else . . . set yourself free. There’s some really cool stuff on the other side.
9. Redefine Home
Home is where the heart is right? Yeah, you can bet that a mover said that.
Home for you is people (specifically the ones who stay with you no matter where you go) but it’s way more than just that. It is principles and protocol and other things that also probably start with a “p”. It’s just NOT a place — at least not just one.
Don’t settle for a half empty glass. “Well, we move around a lot so I’m just not sure where home is.”
Bunk.
Just change “where” to “what” and answer the question. It is everything (seen and unseen) that you will take with you the next time you move.
Have those conversations with your family.
10. Wherever you are . . . be there
It’s easy to checkout early especially when you know you’ll be leaving soon. That can be dangerous for movers who are never NOT leaving. When your time is short, every moment counts . . . especially the last ones. It’s a different way of thinking but work towards leaving a piece of yourself after you’re gone instead of not being present while your are still there.
Read these if you’re in the process of leaving
Leaving Well
Landing Well
Staying Well
For some it’s a calling, for others it’s a job. Regardless, I am convinced that the end result of a life spent moving can be a beautiful string of amazing experiences, a stockpile of incredible stories and a huge network of quality relationships.
Have something to add to the list? Comment below.
Know a mover who might need this? Please pass it on.
Nov 5, 2014 |
The original title of this post was “Ten Reasons I Love the Fact that My Kids are TCK’s.”
I couldn’t stop.
My kids are TCK’s and I love it.
I was re-reminded of this simple fact as we traveled back to China together last month. By definition they qualify for full membership as Third Culture Kids even though we now live in our passport country.
As parents we have done our fair share of second guessing and worrying about this. Is this too much transition? Too many goodbyes? Too many hellos? Will they ever have roots? Will they even know what roots are? Are we messing them up for life?
Despite the doubts and challenges I can say wholeheartedly that I love that my kids are TCK’s.
This is what I love
1. I love that they look at a map and see friends instead of stereotypes
You’ve seen them right? World maps that show us the “people of the world.” There is inevitably a soccer player in Brazil, a matador in Spain, a Crocodile Dundee knockoff in Australia and some guy with a pointy hat in China. I love that my daughter sees Brazil and thinks of Pedro who was in her 2nd grade class.
2. I love that they see people and not Disney Characters
Nothing against Disney but cultural cliche’s are fairly standard for animated features. I love that my kids are learning that cliche’s are not the full picture. There are people behind the stereotypes.
3. I love that they hear the world in rich languages and not funny accents
My kids are no strangers to hearing other languages or hearing English with thick, sometimes difficult to understand accents. Mocking those people doesn’t make sense to them though. Why would you make fun someone who speaks a second language poorly when you can’t speak any of theirs?
4. I love that they can empathize with language learners
We’ve lived on the flip side of speaking a second language poorly. My kids know how it feels to want (or even need) to say more than your vocabulary allows. This makes them uber slow to cast judgment on the bumbling foreigner in front of us at the American grocery store. We’ve been that bumbling foreigner. No one ever told us to speak Chinese or get out though.
5. I love that they are learning to communicate more content in fewer words
They have been trained the hard way to use fewer words, use more hand gestures and explain challenging concepts in simple terms. The ability to be concise is such a valuable skill. I would say more but that would ruin my point.
6. I love that they don’t make fun of people because they are different
Different is more normal than being normal. It’s not that my kids are above thinking that something (or even someone) is weird. They’re kids. However I am seeing in them that even weird is understood as a place where there is something to learn, not a place to mock because they don’t understand.
7. I love that they have been the weird ones
Being stared at has been an average day for us. Being questioned about our ethnicity and the mixed up color palate of our family has been our standard. Sometimes that was really hard. Irritating. Down right frustrating but I love that my kids have felt the sting of standing out in a crowd. I’m pretty sure it has something to do with #6.
8. I love that they are not intimidated by far off places
China may as well have been Mars when I was 11 years old. I tried digging a hole once. There is no place on earth that my kids would not be excited to go. There is also no place that they don’t think they could ever get to. They are explorers in a very literal and realistically expectant sense.
9. I love that they are not intimidated by new
New people. New places. New foods. New adventures. Always exciting. Always scary. Never not worth it.
10. I love that they love airports
Boarding passes. Security. Gate. They know the drill and they love the adventure of gift shops, snack stores, play places and luggage carts in-between each step. Every airport is both exactly the same and yet beautifully different.
11. I love that they can look forward to a 14 hour plane ride
Ok this one is much better now that most planes have video-on-demand but still . . . is there another scenario on earth where you can strap a hyperactive five year old boy to a chair for more than 50% of an entire day and he actually enjoys it? If so I have not found it yet.
12. I love that they can process without comparing
My kids are no stranger to paradox. They have learned that most everything is some mix of good and bad, exciting and challenging, fun and boring. However they have naturally learned to do something that I cannot. They process the paradox of individual issues without comparing them. In other words they don’t ask, “which is better, life in China or life in America?” They acknowledge that both are wonderful and tough but it doesn’t make sense to compare the two. They are different.
13. I love that their innocence has been sustained just a little bit longer
There are some things that they have missed growing up in America. I am not sad about all of those.
14. I love that they are not shaped by pop culture
They may have also missed a boy band or two. Again . . . I am not sad.
15. I love that the Evening News makes more sense to them than it ever did to me
I still don’t get it.
16. I love that they go deep quickly
They understand so well the value of right now. It doesn’t take them years to make friends because they may not have years. My introvert goes deep with one or two and my extravert goes deep with anyone he can find but neither of them wastes time on the surface.
17. I love that they know how to say goodbye
Goodbyes never get easier. Since that is true I’m thankful that they are developing the skill of doing it well.
18. I love that they pick up where they left off like no time has passed
It may be years between play dates but both of my kids have shown that they know how to jump right back in like it was yesterday. Life long relationships are not contingent on proximity for them.
19. I love that they see two sides and seek to make peace
Ok I haven’t so much seen this in my son just yet but he’s five. My daughter however, often finds herself conflicted because she sees two sides of an argument. Both right. Both wrong. It’s confusing in the fifth grade but a skill that I pray continues to develop.
20. They don’t freak out when something stinks
WAAAAHHHH!!! NAAASSSTY!! That seems like a common (and even fair) kid response when the smell of the public restroom actually burns your nasal passages. My kids may not like it but they’ve been there and done that. They know their options. No need to make a scene.
21. I love the pride they feel about where they’ve been
Appropriately of course. I love it when we see a map or a flag and they get to say, “been there.” I love it when someone says something completely stupid and stereotypical about China and they just grin because they know better. I love doing this part of their adventure with them.
22. I love that they never stop blowing my mind
Ever.
23. I love that they are MY kids
We fit. We look nothing alike. We drive each other nuts. They embrace with full passion their roles of bossy older sister and bratty little brother. Our home is rarely quiet and never, ever boring.
It’s perfect.
24. I love that they are unique
There is no catch all TCK stereotype. If there was Disney would make a movie about them. Every TCK is different and unique, including the two at my house.
My five year old son said it best while we were in China. Having flown for two days from the place he now calls home and standing in front of the place he has always known to be home we asked him the unanswerable TCK question . . . ”
Where is home?”
Unprompted, he nailed it.
“Wherever WE are.”
I love it — and I love my TCK’s.
- Love that your kids are TCK’s too? Add to the list in the comment section.
- Know some parents who love their TCK’s too? Pass this along.
