How to breakup with your old self after a major life transition

Significant life transitions, such as moving to a new city or a new country, becoming a parent or retiring, can be exciting, exhilarating and giving you a chance to grow.  Yet transitions, even positive ones, can also be stressful and bring up mixed feelings.

Breaking up with yourself is hard, yet necessary: In transitions, you’re breaking up with who you were during that time of your life. You’re not only leaving a place and a season in life behind, but you’re also leaving a version of you.

In life transitions, feeling strangely abnormal becomes the new normal.

So right now, if it feels like you’re going through an identity crisis it’s probably because you most definitely are.

The only way to truly own your life is to take responsibility for it. Sometimes things happen and there is no logical explanation, and it doesn’t need to be anyone’s fault. Finger-pointing and blaming doesn’t take away from what happened or change the facts. In fact, it keeps you living in the past by dwelling

Control, perfectionism, micro-managing. If it serves you, that’s great. Truth is I’ve yet to meet a woman that doesn’t drive herself crazy over it.

I refer to control as a ‘losing game’. It’s perfectly natural to desire that certain things happen in a certain way, but when we create requirements that everything happens according to plan (requirements to be happy, to feel successful, to feel good about ourselves), that’s when it backfires. And it’s only because we will never truly be able to control everything and everyone in our lives. It’s an impossibility. But we do have the power to influence ourselves and our lives to our greatest abilities.

Happiness stems from freedom, not control. But we can only feel truly free when we have the ability to choose. Restrictions and control are the polar opposite of freedom.

Breaking up with OLD_YOU starts with self-awareness.

Your inner self-talk determines what you say, what you do, and how you feel every single day. Influencing it is one of the most powerful things you can do to influence your life.

If you can identify when you are talking to yourself about yourself through the eyes of guilt, shame, blame, control, or comparison, and start talking to yourself like you would your own best friend (with acceptance, compassion, and understanding), your life is going to completely change.

Transitions never occurs in a vacuum. It Involves people at every turn.

Part of transitioning well means being mindful of the process involved in saying good-bye. If we give ourselves the time and space to say good-bye well we are freer at our destination to say hello with our whole hearts. Same principle applies when you have to say goodbye to your old self.

Is Expatriation an Addiction?

The last few decades has seen more and more people taking up a corporate expatriate posting, with all of the benefits and challenges an expatriation can bring.

Sourced through Scoop.it from: www.communicaid.com

After 25 years of expatriation, experiencing very different cultures such as Japan, United States or Russia,  I think I fit very well with the definition of an enthusiastic expatriate in this interesting article published by Communicaid : I feel comfortable almost anywhere.

I consider myself a successful “serial” expatriate and I think the following characteristics are very important :

1-Curiosity with a thirst for experiencing “otherness”

2 Humility with willingness to learn different ways of thinking

3-A strong family with high resilience and an adventurous spirit

4- Deep knowledge about who you are,  your strengths, weaknesses

5-Creativity and flexible attitude toward new challenges

6- Not afraid to step out of your comfort zone

7-Future oriented mindset

If expatriation is an addiction then by definition it means you can’t stop moving even if it would be reasonable to settle down. Sometimes this is called the  “Three Year Syndrome”: some expats, get bored, after 3 years, especially if they have no other job than being an expat partner and did not blend with the local culture by establishing a network of local friends.

There is another reason why some expats move so often: with the globalization and the development of virtual teams, with some exceptions, there is no need to have long term expats once the knowledge transfer has been done. There is also more and more people who work abroad  who are not sent by big multinational companies but hired locally. The problem is then to find ways to keep a job until you can retire.  Most of the time those people are forced to move to other countries where they can transfer their unique skills.

What type of expat are you ?

See on Scoop.it – Global Leaders

Related Articles:

• Are “Transnationals” The New Global Executives ?

• Three Year Syndrome: when expats get bored

Expat Life: Culture Shock May Be Inevitable But Pain Is Optional

At one point or another new expats will get a “lecture” about “Culture Shock” as it is explained in this video:

Not every expats experience that sequence of emotional reactions and saying this is “normal” is not removing the pain or discomfort. Often people who do not experience this “one size fits all” approach may feel “abnormal” or less competent than typical expats and sometimes think they are a failure not able to cope with their struggles while living abroad.

It is important to acknowledge first the feelings without judgement and then look at individual best coping strategies. You can’t change things you have no control about but you can change the way you think and from a new perspective make necessary changes to get the most of your expatriation.

Sometimes friends are not enough and it is important to allow yourself to find professional help.

If you need someone to deeply listen to you and help you solve issues you have as an expatriate, Please ►Send Me Your Message  for a complimentary coaching session

Related articles: 

• What is Coaching ? 
• Desperate Ex-Career Expat-Wives 
• Developing Global executives: Failure is not an option  
• Expat Women Confessions

How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams

See on Scoop.it – Global Leaders

A study that shows intercultural competence as a factor in effectiveness of global virtual teams, and that building relationships, establishing structure, and having discipline are critical for success.

Anne Egros‘s insight:

To build a global team, first determine what needs to be done and then identify who are the best individuals for achieving the goals based on individual coaching and through intercultural training programs

See on gbr.pepperdine.edu

Related articles

• Research Findings: The Value of Intercultural Skills in the Workplace
• Ideal Traits of Global, Cross-Cultural Virtual Team Members
• Avoiding Cross-Cultural Faux Pas

Conversation Killers : What Do You Do ? Where Do You Come From ?

Picture: Huffington Post : Want To Kill A Conversation? Ask Someone What They Do

Imagine , you are at a networking event and you are new in town or never met anybody in the group before, you have butterflies in your stomach, when someone comes to you and ask :

What do you do ?  Like most people you might feel embarrassed to answer such a direct question, especially when you don’t have a “job”.

Is what someone does the most important information you need to engage a conversation anyway ?

Same apply to  ‘Where do you come from? ” If you want to avoid being stereotyped, what would you answer?

Tips: Try to answer and give information about you that encourage the other person to share their personal interests .

So here what works for me:

What Do You Do? I love living abroad, meet people from different backgrounds, explore new food, discover natural wonders, learning new stuff like languages. How about you ? What do you love to do when you are not at work?

Where Do You Come From? I am not sure if where I am from defines me anymore as I spent most of my adult life living abroad, I get inspired by my French mom for cooking dishes with a Provencal flavor like “ratatouille” but would die for having authentic “zaru soba”. I really like cosmopolitan urban style of living like I had in New York, or Tokyo and now in Moscow. How about you? What are your favorite places for vacation?

If you are like most people,  you probably have fears and anxiety to engage a conversation with people you don’t know, so:

How do you feel when you get those questions ?

In addition if you are an expat “trailing” spouse like me and freshly arrived in a  city or country you may be even more uncomfortable to answer as nobody is really interested by what you are really doing : unpacking cartons, helping children adjust to their new school or being lost in translation at the supermarket. On top, you might experience the emotional struggles of the “culture Shock”.

What are your typical answers ?

What are the most embarrassing questions you ever got at a networking event ?

Related articles:

• Want To Kill A Conversation? Ask Someone What They Do
• 5 Tips on How to Connect With People You Don’t Know
• 5 Reasons Why Expat Women Make Such Great Networkers

International Commuters: Understanding the Benefits and Challenges | Expatriatus

See on Scoop.it – Global Leaders

International assignments  are getting shorter and the number of international commuters is increasing. Do you think it is beneficial on the long run for both the employees and employers ?

Anne Egros‘s insight:

Not living in the same country with your family is detrimental for learning fully about the culture. Local employees may also treat you as an outsider, not really part of the team as you can’t share social events involving partners or children.

Each family situation is different but if you embrace expatriation as a great way to grow then I prefer to do it with the whole family. However I understand that sometimes other considerations such as schooling system or health care or dangerous locations may give no choice but commuting, I think this situation should be exceptional and not exceed 1 year.

I am not surprised that long-distance commuters have 40 percent higher risk of separation compared to other people who already have 50 percent chance to get divorced in most countries nowadays.

And yes the tax filing can become a nightmare and a costly exercise, especially for US residents and citizen

See on blog.iese.edu