How do you intentionally cut ties with your life and relocate? How do you let go of deeply entrenched roots?
For the first time in my life, I will be leaving the Seattle area with no specific plans to return. It's bittersweet. I feel like I'm finally making the decision I've probably needed to make for awhile to pursue my career, but a big reason why I haven't made this decision before is because I know what I will be leaving behind.
I don't actually know if or when I will return to Seattle. This will be the longest I have been away, and will be the first time I have chosen to leave with no concrete plans to return and no place to return to. I guess many people have this experience much earlier in life, picking everything up and moving to a new place, but for me it's new. True, when I am out of the country my "permanent" address will be a Washington address, but it will not be mine. It will not be a place I have ever lived. And yes, I will still own possessions that will remain in Washington. But for the first time in my life, I will not actually be a resident of Washington State.
I have lived at several addresses in the greater Seattle area, and even lived overseas temporarily (only for a few months at a time). But my permanent home has always been in the Seattle area. Even while I have been away for months at a time, family in Washington has been responsible for my belongings, I've always had a valid Washington State driver's license, and I always knew this was home and I had my own bed that I could to return to at any time.
It's hard to articulate how I feel about not having a home in Seattle anymore. On one hand, I feel confident that I am making the right decision personally and professionally. But on the other hand, I have been extremely fortunate to come from a great place and have wonderful friends here in Seattle. I will miss them fiercely. I hope I will be back someday, and I hope they will stick with me despite distance. But I know that nothing stays the same, and I know there are no guarantees.
One thing that makes this move monumental for me is the amount of time I have spent intentionally getting rid of belongings so I won't have to store them when I move. Since my mom died in 2006, I have been sorting through boxes (of her things, my own, my grandparents'...) and deciding what to keep and what to get rid of. At 23, with 3 huge storage units, it was overwhelming. It has felt like a project that will never end. But 11 years down the road, and with a rapidly approaching deadline, I am starting to feel like I'm getting there. At almost 34, I feel better able to determine what items I will want to have in my life moving forward, and more confident that I will not have any regret about the things I have gotten rid of. It's a nice feeling that despite a lot of unknowns in my future, this is a concrete way that I can progress toward where I want to be.
My favorite band, Switchfoot, wrote a song on their recent album that is about being evacuated from fires in Southern California, and there are a couple of lyrics from that song really capture my current thinking:
Left it all behind us
What we need will find us
There's a fire coming that we all go through
You possess your possessions or they possess you
I got everything I need, yeah
My grandparents all lived through the Great Depression, and my parents believed in being frugal and not getting rid of things that could come in handy someday. I've had to learn that it is ok to get rid of things. Although I can't imagine the luxury of being able to get rid of anything that "doesn't bring you joy" (KonMari method), I have learned from friends and my past travels that I really don't need too much stuff to live happily. I have learned that I can live just fine without many things, and if I really do need something I can usually find/afford it. I don't want to be possessed by possessions. I want to trust that I what I need will find me.
Letting go of "stuff" is a tangible representation of the letting go I have been doing of my city, my home, my community, the familiar. I suppose it's good, actually, to have a visible, touchable way to acknowledge the huge change I am making. If I didn't have this process of decision-making and giving away belongings, maybe it would be harder to comprehend such a big life change.
