As good as our mindset

A positive approach to expat life.

Have you ever stopped to consider how your relationship with yourself impacts your life abroad?

Maayan and Gal are sisters, the founders of Smoozitive, currently living in France. They are guiding and supporting women to experience a smooth and joyful journey abroad no matter where they live.

We are taught from a young age to make wise choices and to value the relationships we have with others. Who we choose as school friends, who we date, who we work with, who we can entrust with our children... But also, how we want those relationships to be, as well as what we accept or not. We’re told that it’s beautiful to love others with all their flaws, that it’s important to invest in relationships, to be kind, generous, and forgiving. So, it’s natural that we pay a lot of attention to those external relationships.

Yet, oddly enough, we spend so little time thinking about our inner relationship – yes, the relationship with this person we can’t seem to escape and see every day when we look in the mirror (at least if we dare to look).

The challenges seem greater, the emotions seem crazier, and the day-to-day seem more adventurous. Everything is different, and if you don’t have a good relationship with yourself, your life abroad can easily lead to a… break-up.

To live a healthy and positive life abroad, you must rely on a healthy relationship. And we believe that the most important healthy relationship is one’s relationship with oneself.

Even if you moved with a partner, to be nearer to family, with children, with a best friend or for love, you are the one with whom you begin and end each day. Therefore, if this relationship is complicated, everything else might become even more complicated than it already is.

A healthy relationship with ourselves does not require us to eat salad all day, and it is not determined by the size of our jeans. As you can imagine, it goes much deeper than that.

But isn’t this relationship the foundation of our lives in general? When we stop and think about it, everything we do, how we think, what we dream about, where we live, our career, how we deal with challenges, our external relationships, and experiences – they all have a common ground – us; and thus, our relationship with ourselves is so foundational to the rest.

It’s true when we live in our home country, but it’s even more pertinent when living abroad.

Why? Because often life abroad can feel as if someone asked us ‘would you like that supersized?’.

It involves not only how you talk to and about yourself, but also your thoughts and how you look after both your body and mind. It also has to do with self-compassion, love, and forgiveness. Honouring your unique self and accepting your strengths and weaknesses.

Consider it to be just like any other relationship you may have with a person who is meaningful to you, and what you would do to maintain a positive relationship in that case.

Life abroad is sometimes complicated enough. It’s time to simplify your relationship status with yourself and go from ‘it’s complicated’ to ‘in a healthy relationship’.

Kam Heskin