Growing Roots in Adopted Homeland

New country, new life, new challenges. A person experiences all of these things when he or she decides to migrate, regardless of whether the migration is internal within one's own homeland, or far away to some distant foreign country. Because living in a new place can be an incredible experience, many people choose to give it a try for a year or two and then end up staying in their country of choice forever. Others, however, have a more difficult time. Try as they might they miss the comforts and familiarities of home and never feel like they fit in. When this happens, what we once called home is no longer home but a far away place where we have left behind our deep and most sacred memories. And what if the heart is torn between two places -- one old, the other new -- and feels at home in neither? Thus, embarking on a new life in an unknown culture and venturing beyond one's homeland to a foreign land begins with a courageous heart. It is a journey marked with challenges unique to every individual and each one is a story unto itself.

Reasons, hopes and expectations for making these journeys vary—to seek a better job, to make more money, to see the world, to give the kids a brighter future or oneself a better education, to strengthen relationships, among others. Whatever the impulse for migration, challenges await us once we arrive in the new destination. Picture this — you're at the end of your first month in a new place, you haven't found friends in the neighbourhood, you have no idea what the job demands from you, and you don’t know what activities are there are for you to do, or where to go to meet new people. And as your panic increases, you tell yourself, "If I had the money, I'd buy a plane ticket home right now." Well, you might be lucky and able to do just that. But for most of us this is not an option.

How can we prepare ourselves and ensure we stand a chance of fitting in? In this short article, we’ll take a look at some of the answers to that question though, of course, some of these can depend a lot on the particular country in question. Nevertheless, there are ways to help oneself feel at home when living abroad.

When we move on we leave behind our familiar environment, our home country, or town where we have lived many years and formed lasting friendships—in other words, where we've put down roots. We leave behind a place where people on the street spoke our language, where customs, traditions, habits, food were familiar to us. In short, a place in which life coasted along smoothly and predictably, where everything was familiar and we knew what to expect. All of this and more gave us a sense of being at home, of belonging, of feeling safe and secure.

With the move, however, we have no clue what to expect and deep down we feel emotionally insecure and displaced. Like a plant in a new pot, we feel very vulnerable. Everything seems so totally different--the language, attitudes, customs, and traditions, work attitude, people's way of thinking and acting, even the humour. Suddenly we perceive ourselves as being different; suddenly, we have become the “others”! And just as suddenly we start asking ourselves, “What if I hadn't made this decision to move?”

One way to deal with this sense of uncertainty is probably to turn that question around. Instead, let's ask ourselves this: How can I find, or put down roots in my adopted homeland? Fortunately, we have one advantage over a plant, which must wait until the new roots start to grow—we can take action and do something. And to start, it is always helpful to remember never to deal with WHAT Ifs, but with FACTs. Keeping that in mind, who says we can not do here in our new place what we have been doing there in our former place? Start creating a life! It might be very different from the one we knew back home, but it’s going to be equally rewarding. It is a known fact that overcoming a challenge or an obstacle is much healthier than allowing oneself to be overwhelmed. The next challenge won’t seem to be as bad as we become much stronger and resourceful every time we face anything head on.

From here the next step is asking a very important question: do I want to create a good life here and keep this positive energy in my life, despite all the challenges, or do I want to feel unhappy and isolated just because I miss my friends, I don’t have the language skills, people are so different, my job seems more demanding? It is worthwhile remembering that simply wishing things were different does not lead us to a satisfactory solution—only actions will, and determination. Every new move is a new opportunity to explore the positive in one's surroundings, including one's own attitude, beliefs, and views.

We sometimes are not even aware of the fact that we may be shutting out opportunities for ourselves. Therefore it is so important to ask ourselves some crucial questions: What is it I want? In other words, do I want to focus on opportunities and my strengths or on shortcomings and differences? Once we know what we want, we can ask further: How can I get it? This question can lead us to find ways to get what we want, and show us opportunities we didn’t see before because we allowed the situation to overwhelm us. Only if we are not afraid to fail could we embrace the challenge knowing we are going to become stronger and even more resourceful

Asking questions like these is a great way of getting us to take action to grow roots in the new country. Once we know what we want for ourselves and the possibilities we have, we can start to analyse the options instead of the situation: for instance, will the option of learning the language first serve me better than the option of connecting with like-minded people? At this point we can make a decision and go for it, depending on the outcome of our analyses.

An important insight shared by many people around the world is that we can find, keep, or create our roots no matter where we are in the world. This is definitely possible, because it is us who create this life whether back home or in a foreign country! We can trust on this one! I’m not saying it all is going to be as easy as on the paper, but it will benefit us greatly in putting down new roots wherever we are in the world.