Forty-Nine Other States….Stop Suffering Where You Are
One thing that frustrates me on a personal level is when people say they are unhappy with where they live and/or work. My first thought — is there really something holding you back. Besides you.
True, there can be family situations that can make moving difficult. Especially if someone is in ill health. That is a difficult period to live through.
Most people are not in this boat. There is usually only one thing holding people back. Themselves.
For me, moving is second nature. I grew up an Air Force brat. We moved every two years and lived all over the US and in the UK for four years. Every couple of years I still feel the urge to start packing boxes.
My bride, not so much. She grew up in the same beach town in Florida from age eight. When we moved to Atlanta and then DC, she asked if we should just get moving up the east coast over and move to Maine.
Ha, ha.
Here is the thing I believe most people miss. If you don’t like where you go to, you can move somewhere else or go back to where you lived. If nothing else, it will provide you an appreciation of where you lived before your move.
My wife and I went through this when we moved from Orlando to Atlanta and then DC. We decided we missed Orlando. So we moved back to the central Florida. My wife’s family lived in Florida and she wanted to be close to them again. After living there for seven years we began to grow tired of it (Orlando and Florida, not her family…just to be clear. Love you guys!). We had annual passes to Disney World. We went to the beach.
But it was getting, well, it was getting bland. Unexciting. Basically, we were done.
It took us two more years to pull the trigger and move. In that time, we visited Los Angeles and San Diego on vacation. My wife travelled to Chicago on business. Los Angeles never really made onto our list (sorry, but the city just feels grimy to me).
San Diego. That is a beautiful area. Chicago is exciting, though colder. Which we wanted. Living in Florida we missed seasons.
The Starbucks I write this post is in a northwest suburb of Chicago. It’s 25 F outside (and feels like 14 F).
And we love it here. Is it perfect? No. Do people look at us like we have three eyes when we say we moved here from Florida? Yes. But the people are great and Chicagoland has its own culture. Not one partially imported from New York. Or Ohio. Or Michigan. Or…well, you get the point.
Try something new if you don’t like where you are. Where ever you are, there are forty-nine other states to try.
