Newsletter #32: On home and family
What moving out taught me about home and family.
I recently moved out of my home for the first time. This was a big change and although I was at an advantage over people who had to move out for undergrad, it still was challenging. In this post, I will share how I found new definitions of home and family.
As someone who’s never lived outside my hometown, when I think about family I think about it from more of a literal perspective. My immediate family, close friends and extended family. And for the most part, this is true, these are the people I love and care about and they also have a vested interest in me, my well-being and my happiness. However, there is another important function of family that I may have failed to see because I was way too deep in my comfort zone. That function is your immediate support system. I say immediate because it is not that your family and friends won’t support you or talk to you when you are stressed, but it is true that they won’t be able to do it right when you need it.
For example, if you got a low score on a test or you failed an interview, the people who know about it immediately and can console you are the people who are around you at that time. And of course, you will share the news back home later, however, at the moment they won’t be there for you, simply because of the distance.
Additionally, as you move away from home, you can’t share minute details of your life, because that takes too much time and memory! One way to think about it, is you share the complete article when you are living in your home, however, as you move away you only share the headlines.
Once you realize this, you realize why people form strong bonds with roommates and friends who stay in nearby apartments. That’s because these are the people with whom you share the article version of the events. For example, if you are stressed about exams, your friends living with you know how you were before the exams, on the day and then after. Whereas your family back home only knows that you completed a hard exam — the headline.
And the extension to this is what you call home. I found this awesome quote in Tim Ferris’s blog that really resonated with me and captured what I felt about moving out:
“Home is not where you were born; home is where all your attempts to escape cease.”
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If you think about the place where the function of the family is fulfilled as home, you realize that you have a new home now, and as uncomfortable as it might be to accept this fact, the new home might just become closer to you than your previous home.
I also read this tweet that puts this fact in a slightly different way:
Both the quote, and the tweet are saying the same thing — home is not just where you grew up, but it’s where your family — at that moment — lives.
This new chapter of my life is exciting for sure, but adjusting to this new reality — that my “family” until now might not always be my “family” will definitely take some time to digest.
What are your thoughts on moving out? How did you cope with finding and accepting your new home and family? Let me know!
That’s it for this issue. I hope you found this article interesting. Until next time!
📜The article corner
These are the mental processes required to tell a convincing lie
A good read about how lying is mentally taxing and hence the more your brain is working, the harder it is to lie!
well articulated.Every new step in life,one has to leave behind certain bonds &enter into new ones...though innemost u always wants it unchanged..it is part of growing up.More u are able to connect with others more supported and successful u will be.even if I am not the right person to tell you so.