127: How to mentally prepare for a move abroad

Most people focus on the logistics of moving abroad, visas, jobs, housing.

But the mental and emotional side is just as important.

You can have the perfect plan on paper, but if you’re not mentally prepared, the move can feel much harder than it needs to.

In this episode, I break down how to mentally prepare for a move abroad so you can feel more grounded, realistic, and confident going into the experience.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

•  Why you don’t need to feel fully ready before moving abroad 
•  The emotional phases of moving abroad (and what to expect) 
•  How to handle doubt, discomfort, and loneliness 
•  Why there’s no such thing as a “perfect” move abroad experience 
•  How to define what success looks like for you 
•  How to focus on your next step instead of your entire future 
•  Simple ways to create emotional stability in a new country 

Moving abroad is both exciting and challenging and that’s part of the process.

You don’t need to be fearless. You just need to be willing.

You can feel uncertain and still take a step that completely changes your life.

👉Take the free quiz: Which European city should you move to? 🤔

Grab my free guide: 5 exact steps to move abroad

Website: jordangiberson.com
Instagram: @jordan.giberson

Transcript

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If you're waiting to feel completely confident before you move abroad, you might be waiting forever. And I think that maybe you do feel a 100% ready, but I'd say that majority of people are not, and it doesn't have to feel perfect, you just have to be willing to take one step after the other Hey, my name is Jordan Giberson. I'm a Texas girl living and thriving in London. The best thing I've ever done? Moving abroad, hands down. And I'm passionate about helping others do the same. Are you curious about finding a job abroad? You're in the right place, friend. I'll teach you the tried and true secrets of how to make moving abroad a reality for you and how to live a fulfilling life once you get there. We'll cover topics like choosing the best visa for you, how to get a job offer in another country, how to get over your fear of moving abroad, and how to live a life you love once you get there, this is The Move Abroad Podcast. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Move Abroad podcast. Today we're talking about the most important, I would argue thing that we need to worry about whenever we think about moving abroad, and that is how to mentally prepare for a move abroad. I know it sounds perhaps a little bit silly, but I actually say that the first step that you need to take in order to move abroad is to. Drum roll decide that you actually want to move abroad. I think that the biggest hurdle that we all make whenever we think about moving abroad is actually deciding that this is what we want. And this takes a lot of mental preparation. It takes a lot of getting over mental hurdles and fully deciding that this is the transition that we want to make. Because let's face it, moving abroad is a big decision. It's a big life change, and it takes a lot of emotion, it's an emotional decision. It's a really big decision, and I think that the biggest hurdle that people have to get over is to mentally prepare for it and to decide that you 100% are going to go for it. Because I think that what stops a lot of people is they say like. Oh, I'll just, I'll move abroad in two years and they kind of kick the can down the road, which is natural because it's a really scary thing and it takes a lot of work and effort to make it happen. And it's just a really big change in life. It's a big decision, and I think that's the really, the biggest step is just deciding that's what you want. And then. From there. I think that actually moving abroad is a lot easier than people think. It's just taking one step after the other to make it happen for yourself. So in this episode, we're going to be talking about how to mentally prepare for a move abroad. I think that the mental and emotional side is just as important, if not more important than helping you figure out the logistics, like visas and jobs and housing. All those things are really important, but I think that the number one step, and probably the biggest step and probably the biggest hurdle is this mental and emotional side of mentally preparing for that move abroad. Because you can have the perfect plan on paper, but if you're not mentally prepared and you're not mentally ready to take steps forward and actually do it, to do the thing and move abroad, then the move can feel way harder than it needs to. So in this episode, I hope that it helps you feel more grounded, more. Realistic about how to move forward and to help you mentally prepare for actually saying, yes, this is what I want, and to mentally prepare for that move abroad. So the first thing that I wanted to talk about is that you are not supposed to feel 100% ready. No one feels fully ready before they move abroad. There are always going to be details that have not been ironed out, or maybe you're not 100% emotionally ready. I don't know, maybe you will be by the time that it comes. It's just a process. It's a process that takes a bit of time to get there and to be mentally ready to be abroad. I think that doubt. Does not mean that it's the wrong decision. I think that you could feel fear and excitement all at once, and they can coexist together. So readiness is not necessarily a feeling, although it is a feeling, but it's more of a decision. You have to decide that you're ready. You have to decide that you're just going to move forward even if it feels imperfect, even if you don't feel 100% ready. Because the truth is, if you're waiting to feel completely confident before you move abroad, you might be waiting forever. You might be waiting for the perfect time to come for all these things in your life to iron out for there be nothing in front of you that's in your way. But the truth is that's not how life works, and you're never going to feel 100% ready. 100%. Like all the pieces are put together that your life is all together, or you've lined up everything in your old life in a perfect way to where you can finally move abroad and the cloud's clear and it's perfect. Or an opportunity falls in your lap. Like sometimes that happens, but I feel like more often than not, you're going to be left sitting there for a very long time before things are absolutely perfect. So I think more than anything, I just want it to be clear that. You're not supposed to feel 100% ready and that's okay. That is absolutely normal. And I think that maybe you do feel a 100 ready, but I'd say that majority of people are not, and it doesn't have to feel perfect, and it does not need to feel like you are a hundred percent ready. You just have to be willing to take one step after the other. I also think it might be helpful for you to understand the emotional phases of moving abroad. So there might be a few simple phases for you and the emotions, and maybe before you move there is. Excitement and anxiety. Maybe right after you arrive there is going to be some adrenaline and some novelty. Maybe a few weeks in you're starting to feel a little bit of doubt, maybe a bit of discomfort, and maybe a bit of loneliness, as well as the adrenaline and the novelty of being there has worn off a little bit. But then after that, there's time for adjustment and stability. So you grow to adjust and get used to the life that you have. So that's the phases of what you can look. Towards, if that's something that's giving you anxiety or something that's stopping you or making you feel a bit anxious about the move. So it doesn't mean that something has gone wrong if you're feeling some of these things and kind of the ups and downs of the process. It's just really part of the process. So I just want to normalize it. Experience of some of these emotional phases that you might go through whenever you move abroad, and to help you have this mental clarity and picture of what that might look like for you so that you can go into it feeling a bit more confident, and maybe that will help you take steps forward and not feel so emotionally stuck or emotionally worried about what it will feel like in the future. I think you can also just expect some discomfort and not panic whenever that happens. there will be things that will be a little bit different for you. So there might be some unfamiliar languages. There might be an unfamiliar system of doing things, unfamiliar routine. But that's okay. I think that this discomfort doesn't mean that you will have made a mistake. All these things are to be expected, and it's an oral part of moving abroad and kind of adjusting. And I just wanted to make clear that it's not something to panic about if it does happen, but to expect that some of those things might be happen. And just to go into it with a lens of like, I'm gonna take this as an adventure and just take it one step at a time, and I don't have to have everything figured out. Which leads us to the next point, which is letting go of the quote unquote perfect move abroad fantasy. A lot of people might imagine instant happiness or a perfect lifestyle or everything falling into place with the move abroad, but I would expect that. It's not going to be perfect. You don't have to feel like you have everything figured out, have to feel like you're completely confident about the city that you're choosing to move to, or the neighborhood that you're choosing to move to, or the school that you're choosing for your child. I think that it's not going to be absolutely perfect, but that's life. Life is not perfect, but the good news is that nothing is really permanent in life. And a lot of times we can make adjustments once we're there. So maybe, we move to an apartment the first year, that's like 80% okay, or 60% okay. But then you move after a few months if you don't love it, or maybe the job isn't exactly what you imagined, but that's okay. It's not meant to be perfect. It's okay to actually just take a step forward and move abroad and then to trust yourself enough to figure it out along the way and to adjust and that's just real life. It's a part of life and not being able to expect every single thing that's going to happen, but it's okay to let go of feeling like everything needs to be perfect or everything needs to be perfectly aligned, or that you've checked off every single thing on your checklist. you know, you don't have to have everything completely figured out, and most of the time those things that we're really worried about, they end up being completely fine at the end of the day. The things that maybe aren't, that you really wanna change, you can change. A lot of things are not really permanent. I remember whenever I was thinking about moving abroad and felt really hesitant about it, I had two things that really convinced me to finally take the step forward. And maybe this is one of the biggest things you take away in this episode. And the biggest way that you can mentally prepare for your move abroad. So those two things for me that were the most important to finally get over that mental hurdle of saying, yes, I want this, and like everything else that's not perfect in my move is okay. And the first one was, I said. You know what? No one is holding me hostage. No one is keeping me there. I can move back whenever I want to. Even if I was there for one week. I have freedom in life. I have autonomy. I can move back at any point that I want. I'm not trapped there. No one is holding me hostage. So I think that was the biggest mental hurdle that I had to get over and gave me a lot of freedom because I said, you know what? Like I think that I'll be fine and I'm gonna give it longer than two weeks. It just gave me that mental freedom to say that I can leave at any point. I'm not trapped here. So it just gave me a lot of freedom to say, you know what, I can explore it and I can give myself this opportunity, but I don't have to feel trapped because I'm not trapped. So I think that was my number one biggest hurdle for me. And the number two thing that helped me mentally prepare for my move abroad for me was I said. If I don't move abroad and I take this other path of saying, okay, I'm just not gonna do it, then I will regret it. I will regret it later in life that I did not go for it. That I didn't take a chance in life and go for something that I knew that I really, really wanted. And that for me was. my second biggest like aha moment of helping me to mentally prepare was that I did not want to be later in life being an old grandma in my rocking chair and looking at my grandkids and reflecting on my life and saying like, oh, I didn't take the chance. I was too scared, or I was just too comfortable in my life, and. I didn't go after that dream that I had. And that for me was enough to scare me into getting mentally prepared and saying, you know what? I'm just gonna go for it. So it was the one not feeling like I'm trapped and saying, no one's holding me hostage here. And the second one was saying, if I don't go, I will regret it. And those for me were how I mentally prepared and let go of the perfect move abroad fantasy and not stayed in this constant state of, I don't know, or not making this. Or kicking the can down the road for two years saying like, oh, I'll do it in two years, and then two years passes and saying like, oh, I'll do it in two years. So I think for me, those were the biggest mental steps. And maybe that helps you a lot as well. My next suggestion for you to mentally prepare for a move abroad is to decide what you want this experience to be for you. it's good to take some time to think about. Intentionality to ask yourself, do I want to go for adventure? Am I looking for more stability? Am I looking for a reset? Am I looking for a long-term move or just for a short one year experience? Am I looking for progression in my job? And that's why I'm going. Am I looking for freedom from political pressure around me? Am I looking for more work life balance here? helping yourself to define what you want that experience to be, and really what you're looking for will help you to figure out the next best steps for you and to help match that with the type of job that you're going to get, the type of income you're going to get with. The city that you're moving to to make sure that it does fit all those things that you're really looking for in this transition. That also helps us mentally prepare and be intentional about this move and what we're really looking for in this change, in this move abroad. Another way to mentally prepare for your move abroad is to focus on the first step, not on your entire future. Just take it one step at a time. People might get overwhelmed by thinking, what if I don't like it? What if I stay forever? What will that mean? What will that mean for my family? What will my career change look like? What if I end up staying for a really long time I mean, the list could go on where we have this like mental tumble where we're trying to figure out our entire future and we're not just looking at our now, just look back at your life already. I mean, there's probably been things that you had no idea that were going to happen, that you did not anticipate it whatsoever. So don't try to decide your whole future. You're just deciding our next step. And like I said a few moments ago, you're not. Being held hostage there, you can stay for one year and then you decide with that knowledge of being there for one year to say, actually, I wanna stay one more. Or, actually, this was a great experience, but I wanna be back home with my family. I really miss my family. Or, you know what, this has been a really great experience in Italy, but I think that I heard of this great experience in Spain and I wanna try Spain next. So you just really don't know what your life is going to look like. Looking back and reflecting on your own life. Now, you can probably see that very clearly at how your life is looking a lot different than what you might have thought that it would. Maybe some for the good, maybe some for the bad, but that's just life. we just don't know our entire future. So don't let yourself get in this loop of panic, of overwhelmed thinking of. what will this mean for me? My future? What if I don't like it? What if I don't stay? What if, what if? What if? We just don't know. So just focus on your next step. Focus on what you're looking for, what you're looking to achieve in this move, and just focus on that and just taking it one step at a time as we just take life one step at a time, really. In the last way that I would suggest mentally preparing for your move abroad is to build an emotional safety net in a way. Before you go, just building up confidence. Figure yourself in different ways by staying connected with family and friends. Figure out how you will stay connected with them. I would plan on ways to meet people. I'd plan on how often you plan on going back home. I would start to maybe think about. Bringing some small comforts from home with you on your move. I would start thinking to make that decision and taking steps forward to move abroad, who can be your champion? Who can be your accountability partner and encourage you, like who is that person for you? Because maybe there are some family members that are holding you back, that are making you feel less mentally prepared and who are wanting you to stay. think about those people that are supporting you. Are going to be your champion and your cheerleader who will help you to take steps forward to mentally prepare and not take you steps back. So focus on those champions, those people that can help you to move forward. Just remember to take it one step at a time. in mentally preparing, it's just about taking one step at a time and not getting mentally overwhelmed with a huge checklist or with. the overwhelming lifestyle changes that you might have, but just take it one step at a time. Say, okay, well what is the next thing that I need to accomplish? Is it figuring out the visa category that I'm going to get? Is it to start cleaning up my cv to apply to jobs abroad? Is it to. Actually make the decision that this is what I really want. what is going to get you the next step closer to being able to move abroad. And honestly, something that might help you is I have a free guide on the five exact steps to move abroad if you think that's helpful for you and figuring out like what is the actual next step that might be helpful just to bring you a little bit of clarity on that. So if you're interested in the guide, you can grab it at the bottom of the podcast description, it is the five exact steps to move abroad. Or you can go to Jordangiberson.com/guide. So that might help you in figuring out your next steps. But if not, figuring out, okay, what is the next step for me? What is the next big thing that I need to think about? Or what is the next small thing that I need to figure out in order to take a step forward to make this a reality for myself because this is what I want. And I think that even in taking steps forward, that is how we mentally prepare for our move. Because as we start kind of inching closer and closer towards it, it starts to become more real to us. It starts to become something where we can see that becoming our reality. And I think that in taking those small steps that is one of the most powerful ways we can start to be more mentally prepared for a move abroad alongside all these other ways To get more prepared. So, that is it for me for today's episode. I hope that you found this encouraging. I hope that you feel like you have good, practical next steps to become more mentally prepared for your move abroad to whether you are deciding that this is what you really want and you're in that phase, or whether you know that this is what you want, but you still are feeling like you're trying to mentally prepare for the next steps forward and what your life abroad will look like. Thank you so much for listening to another episode of the Move Abroad podcast. I will catch you here again next week, same time, same place. I'll catch you then.