It’s been about 11 years since I started teaching English abroad, so it’s time to turn my life upside down.

I say this because my life is on about a 10-year cycle. I change professions about every 10 years. I change major locations at about the same time. It’s kind of routine at this point.

This time is a little different. I’ve lived in three different countries since 2012, and traveled to almost a dozen others. Now, I want to settle down in one country for the long-term, outside the US. I want to have the freedom to travel, but the comfort of a home. I haven’t had that in a very long time.

The problem is that change is hard, and change is scary. We as humans both crave change and cower from change. We long to travel the world and experience other cultures, but to even get a passport is terrifying. We’ve outgrown our professions, we’re bored to tears in our jobs, but the thought of looking for a new position in a new profession is paralyzing. We feel we are slowly dying inside in our relationship, but being alone…we can’t bear to think about it.

We as humans are creatures of routine. We go to the same restaurants, the same coffee shops, we drive the same route to work, we watch the same genre of TV shows, we read the same genre of books. It’s normal and natural. But when our skin starts to feel too tight, when the routine has become all too routine, we want to turn our lives upside down.

And the fear descends.

Sometimes, the only thing that makes us actually change, is that the discomfort of staying where we are outweighs the fear of change.

That’s where I am now. It’s still scary, but the thought of staying where I am is worse.

I wrote these affirmations to remind myself that the fear of change is normal. That change itself is normal. And that I have survived 100% of the changes that have happened in my life so far. 

There’s a really good chance I’ll survive this one, too.

I hope they help you with whatever changes you are moving towards as well.